As Alex Rodriguez prepares to break the 600 home run mark, baseball fans everywhere are silent. Only Barry Bonds*, Sammy Sosa*, Ken Griffey Jr., Willie Mays, Babe Ruth, and all-time home run king Hank Aaron have reached the milestone, but no one is excited for the latest admitted cheat to join the club. Baseball hasn't figured out a way to separate clean numbers from the dirty, so immortal legends' records are being shattered by performance-enhanced monsters like A-Rod.
Pete Rose was thrown out of Baseball for betting on games, but he never did anything to give himself an unfair advantage DURING games! Why do we allow these dishonest players to keep playing? If they admit wrongdoing are we supposed to forgive and forget? The numbers won't let us forget! How should we compare the players of today with the greats of the game's past? Can't we just eliminate all of the stats from 1990-2009?
This season at the All-Star break, the league leader in HRs was Toronto's Miguel Bautista. He had 24: The lowest amount of bombs to lead the league at the break since 1993. The game is changing now that testing is more stringent, and the numbers are returning to normal. Small ball is back in style, and pitchers are dominating again. This is great news for baseball and its fans, but it is also proof that steroids are to blame for the inhuman level of output during those years. The greats have been cheated, literally. Asterisks aren't enough recompense.
We didn't know how to feel when Barry Bonds was clubbing his way to the top of the record books, but we won't get fooled again.
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