Mister Faded Glory | www.misterfadedglory.com

I’m going to be blunt with baseball’s frustrating media. I’m even going to make an example of old friend Jayson Stark, who isn’t necessarily he most condescending, hypocritical or fractured reporter among baseball’s dubious media. He’s simply the most ubiquitous, or, perhaps, he rubs me the wrong way. Full disclosure, I suppose.

But he’s scarcely the only supposed baseball poet who turned a blind eye to steroids in the middle 1990s. He’s scarcely the only writer now petrified objectively understanding steroids, learn about testing. He’s scarcely the only baseball writer assuming any sort of backgrounding or context analysis would result in the dismissal of their current clubhouse access or gravitas or panache, or appearance-fee dollars.

He’s scarcely the only reporter shouting down the attempt, process, or hope to discover the depths of steroid use in baseball, if only to preserve some assumed tie with the players; like the football team water boy who shows off his letter jacket. And he’s scarcely alone, castigating the Mitchell Report in a self-serving attempt to preserve self-professed relevance. Perhaps ESPN should strip him of any “reporting” that he does, and actually just give him a blog (Interesting paradox that ESPN’s best baseball reporter does almost nothing but blog. I digress).

And, finally, Stark is hardly the only reporter preferring to speculate amidst casual, amateur legal analysis surrounding steroids – he simply does it at the most insulting and frustrating level possible (Check that, and read this happy moron. Try not to punch your screen after seeing the first paragraph). So here, now, we’re taking him to task, making him an example again, because his analysis of the Mitchell Report is as clueless as his fractured protectionism of sluggers past or the baseball bourgeoisie. Of course, it’s summarily an effort to bolster his own career.

Remember, Jayson‘s the writer who couldn’t hold a positive test against Rafael Palmeiro when the faux-slugger’s circumstantial smoke turned into fire with a positive test for roids. Jayson rushed to his defense, issuing an appalling “I can’t police the game” diatribe, apparently because Stark “didn’t actually see anything happen.” Prosecutors everywhere, don’t let Mr. Stark anywhere near your jury. Nothing short of DNA evidence, a smoking gun, or videotape, or actual signed confessions equates to guilt in Stark’s mind. Apparently he prefers to throw any entire evidentiary construct out the window when it comes to baseball, unwilling to use his Hall of Fame vote for its actual purpose – to enforce accountability among star players. No, Jayson, you’re not the police. But in baseball, which isn’t court (stick with us, this is important) you are, partially, a judge. Fucking act like it.

So there’s that. So it’s no surprise to read today’s column, where Stark expresses the same fondness for injecting legal argument where it’s convenient. Got it? (Would it help your distaste if we told you Deadspin endorsed Jayson Stark as the best recap of the day? We nominate Tom Verducci.) We shake our head softly, after the break.

First, Jason bemoans the cost of the investigation. I can’t understand his frustration, or other reporters’, with the length of time and money the Mitchell investigation cost. Send any of them to a corporate consulting seminar. Ask any of them to cover a school board meeting. Tell them to watch C-Span for half an hour. Or, better yet, send them to Iowa in January. THEN, we’ll see some outrage over fruitless time money. This was an independent investigation of a phenomenon to gauge it’s ten-year impact. It’s gonna take a while, and it’s gonna take dollars. For someone who reports on athletes’ being paid umpteen million dollars, and even critiques certain expenditures, well, this is simple cherry-picking (So is this column, but I’m way better at it. And I’m a blogger.).

Next, Stark launches into his harangue whining that, specifically, Clemens was harmed by the document, and, generally, the document singles out players without a chance to prove their name. Such a violation of a central legal system tenet – “Innocent till proven guilty!” So this bit of legal reasoning is convenient for him, but ultimately unfounded. And this is the biggest problem with baseball writers’ diatribes against steroids or code or the investigation in general.

It’s an independent, third-party investigation. It is explanatory. It is not an indictment, nor a pleading, nor an affidavit. It is a third-party report detailing the phenomenon of steroids. George Mitchell is not a cop, prosecutor, judge, magistrate, detective, inspector, or any agent tangential to the law. He is performing a third-party corporate investigation on baseball, which is a big deal, but smallish in legal, societal, and populist terms. Baseball writers, read the bold text again. Hey, one more time, and stop furrowing your brow.

So, if you’re scoring at home, legal standards don’t apply. No. 1, it’s not dispositive on a private report discussing a private enterprise. It is not an investigation. No, Roger Clemens is not going to jail. No. 2, baseball’s commissioner never has been bound by a notion of due process or evidence; theoretically, Bud could ban Clemens now forever, in some sort of detrimental conduct violation. In fact, the only laws the entire report or steroids cases are relevant toward are union-corporate-collective bargaining stuff that we don’t understand fully, or violations of federal drug trafficking. (Our same disgust with this failure of understanding registers any time a reporter tries to explain away the use of steroids as “legal,” simply because it wasn’t directly written in baseball’s rulebook. Um, it’s an illegal fucking drug. Presumably baseball’s rulebook doesn’t forbid murder or rape either, simply because we assume federal and state laws are a little more important.)

But this convoluted understanding of legal principles enables the phony judgments and easy words spilled onto millions of pages. After all, how could us laypeople be experts on baseball?! We need a beat reporter to inform us of the lasting impact of drug use and investigative exploration! Stark‘s best line:

You probably don’t even care that two attorneys who were surveyed Thursday, both of whom now work in the sports world, say they’re extremely dubious that the allegations against Clemens would hold up in court. Not even in a civil case.

Ooh, not even a civil case! Thank you, Lionel Hutz, but nope, I don’t care. Because there’s not going to be a civil case. Or a criminal case. Because no one cares about Clemens but baseball writers and the institution, and this document indicates what he’s been up to. Presumably this report could serve as your rationale for not voting Clemens into the Hall of Fame. Presumably, if you were forced to adjudicate or formally argue your Hall of Fame voting practices in front of a jury, it might be problematic. Baseball writers – forced to critically evaluate each Hall of Fame player! Ooh! The horror! Again, writers impart legal standards to give themselves an easy out. Grow up. (I suppose, additionally, Stark‘s repeated use of unnamed sources — “two attorneys?” — deserves its own column.)

And, of course, Bart Miadich … Tim Laker … and Josias Manzanillo.

It’s those names that will keep the headline writers in business. It’s those names that will feed the tabloid portion of all our brains. It’s those names that are now stained forever.

OK, so maybe not all those names.

You could see it coming, the sports-radio logic, the contempt of a study for including lesser names using steroid. Stark uses it as a point to laugh off, but it’s not. Everywhere, the violins emerged, calling the study or report or whatever harsh for including Jim Parque or Gregg Zaun. “He’s just a journeyman hanging on, why single him out.” Well, of course you single them out. One, they’re a player, also, just as Bonds or Canseco. Two, it indicates a steroid curve; the drugs are most noticeable among either margin – helping lesser players hold onto jobs, or helping megastars dominate further.

No one’s going to call for Gregg Zaun’s head, he just used steroids to his benefit. He ain’t giving his salary back, he’s not going to jail. We just perhaps understand where, why, and how the whole drug culture seeps in. So the small guys are important, or they’re not. It’s easier to understand why Bubbles on the Wire shoots heroin rather than, say, Marion Barry. So this is no surprise, and also not unimportant.

Stark also rushes to the defense of Brian Roberts, poor Brian has no recourse to defend himself after Larry Bigbie fingered him in a steroids probe, according to Stark. Actually, wait! He does have recourse! He could have met with Mitchell, as George says following each player’s report. He chose not to – whether because of union relations, casual dismissal, or supposed fifth amendment rights (trick! doesn’t apply!), Roberts didn’t. Of course, he had Stark going to bat for him:

What’s the “evidence” in [Roberts'] case? An alleged lunch date with Radomski, David Segui and Larry Bigbie — after which Segui is said to have bought steroids (with Roberts not present). And Bigbie’s claim that Roberts told him he used steroids “once or twice,” even though Bigbie never witnessed it or even suspected it.

That’s it. No syringes. No empty bottles. No shipping labels. Nada. I can’t think of any self-respecting editor I’ve ever worked for or with who would have allowed me to write a news story based on “evidence” that flimsy. So what’s it doing in a report that cost more than the Florida Marlins‘ entire payroll?

I won’t belabor the point, but Stark’s asking for testing evidence, even when a central point of the report is that baseball’s testing program, er, didn’t work. Actually, had he built his entire column around objectivity and ethics in journalism juxtaposed with a third-party corporate investigation, he may have had an interesting read. But, as we’ve mentioned – Roberts had opportunities to defend his name; he didn’t. Perhaps this is a strong-arm of the MLBPA, perhaps it’s just reliance on key participants in the report. Whatever it is, it’s not irresponsible as Stark would have us believe, but rather, evocative of a baseball trend – and if a player can try steroids once or twice, perhaps the report simply is bolstering its own conclusions or course of action, or even the seriousness of the problem. But it’s not a witch-hunt for Roberts. It’s not even a newspaper admonishment. Stark‘s “news story ethos”, however, are out the window in the next paragraph, in his best lines of the whole misguided exercise. Stark finds “an unnamed baseball man” (Seriously, the fuck? A baseball man? Who the hell could that be? It can’t be an MLB spokesman? A lawyer? A bat boy? It might just be Stark himself.) to perfectly encapsulate the column:

Yet every player named has to carry that black mark around him for the rest of his life. Not that a large percentage of them aren’t guilty — of something. But if you read each account carefully, you’d have a hard time deciding which are and which aren’t.

“The main points in this report are good,” said one baseball man after reading it. “But he really could have written this, and drawn the same conclusions, without the names. And I wish he would have.”

Italics m’fing mine. What black mark? The same one you’re willing to rule out when it suits you for players like Palmeiro? The same black mark which could only be applied if you, the reporter, witnessed Brian Roberts inserting a needle in his ass? Jayson, the simple truth is, no report, circumstantial evidence or hearsaywould have proven good enough for you, aside from Barry Bonds’ sworn affidavit. No one’s going to remember or care about Roberts‘ actions; he’s largely irrelevant, and will be gone in five years. The same goes for most of these guys. The same does not go for the stars. Again, that’s the way it goes.

Oh, but there’s the crown jewel, the quote at the end. The baseball man, the person with whom Stark supposedly assents (why would he include it in an opinion column, or news analysis, unless it was convenient for him!) wanted a 450-page report, detailing the significance of steroids, and recommending a course of action, with ZERO tangible case studies. Not even baseball’s highest execs, or most menial contract lawyers could read that thing. In fact, the report arrives at conclusions we all have – it’s just nice to have a basis, finally. You’ll be interested to note that this baseball man (me, I watch 162 Cubs games a year), thinks the report’s journal of the current landscape of steroids is extremely valuable, and though not dispositive, suggests at an effective management program for the future. Oh, yeah, it also outs Clemens apologists. That’s good too.

Stark is correct to question Bud Selig‘s apparent commitment to punish. The commish may not understand the appropriate course of action of the report, but Mitchell actually may. It was Mitchell who urges baseball not to retroactively punish – especially on the basis of a study that’s, admittedly, third-party and simply exploratory. Sometimes, actually, there’s a public, policy, or societal – even a corporate – benefit to airing facts and investigation in some sort of tangible, public, future reference document. And, if anything, Mitchell‘s investigation is a tacit acknowledgment of the past, in detail, with case studies to boot.

It’s not a scarlet letter for most, and it’s not a major, public, fandom focus from here on out. But it is industry paper, with considerable merit. If there are repercussions for Clemens, Tejada, Pettitte, Bonds, then I agree with Mitchell, and repercussions should follow in public opinion, contract negotiations, and Hall of Fame judgment. Sure, the best who used will get stung – and the repercussions may be personally jarring for them. You’d think professionals would grasp that ramification going in. You’d think reporters might grasp the same.