Steroid testing

(Minneapolis) Star Tribune

Better late than never. Missing from Bud Selig's launch last week of an investigation into baseball's troubling involvement with steroids was an apology from the commissioner about the game's painfully late attempt at self-examination. Threats from Congress were less effective in getting baseball to budge, apparently, than a new book that offers astonishing details of Barry Bonds' transformation from ballplayer to chemistry experiment. Selig acknowledged the influence of "Game of Shadows," a best seller by two San Francisco Chronicle reporters. The book describes vividly the Giants slugger's pharmaceutical habits during the years 1998-2002, and asserts that he was motivated by a raging jealousy over the attention that Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa were getting in their celebrated drive to set a new single-season home run record in 1998. Those players are now also suspected of using steroids. While the substances were outlawed by Congress in 1990, baseball did not respond to suspicions in 1998. Nor did it test players until 2003 or impose penalties until 2004, due both to union resistance and owners' fears of what might be found. But the public needs to know the full extent of drug cheating during the 1990-2004 period so that players and records can be properly judged. We hope that former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell has the integrity to set aside his corporate ties to the Boston Red Sox and ESPN to lead a thorough investigation. ...