Mitchell Report on your TBR list?

Is anybody surprised or upset about the whole investigation and report? I thought Sen. Mitchell's comments were very well said, and it would be nice if the whole ordeal was behind us... but what about the HOF? and the home run records?

Surprised? No. I think anyone with any interest in the MLB knows there are problems. Just look at the warning teams get before someone comes to do any testing. How that makes any kind of sense is beyond me.

I don't think there's anything that can or should be done about people already in the Hall or who have already put records in the book. There is no clear cut way to say "this particular HR was hit cleanly" or "so-and-so was taking HGH when he stole 3rd base on July 12". If HoF voters want to take the Mitchell Report into account for future voting, that's their right; I don't know if I would though.

Here's a fun debate for baseball to undertake over the next several years - would you admit Roger Clemens to the HOF but not Pete Rose?

Who's wrong is more right?

I'm inclined not to admit either one of them. Cheating is cheating, right? Of course, Clemens is denying the allegations in the Mitchell Report and Pete Rose has openly admitted he bet on games in which he was managing. I think we need more information about Clemens alledged use. Pettite admitting to it today, though, doesn't help him.

I think the bigger debate is would you admit Roger Clemens over Barry Bonds? If these allegations are true then Clemens is just Bonds with a better personality.

Rose stays out for a very, very long time... maybe forever.

Clemens and Bonds, still too early to tell -- what will be revealed in the next year, how much will be forgotten in 5 -- if every player (exept Tony Gwynn) did something in the 90's, what's the point? Will Barry still be in jail?

I wasn't that impressed with the Mitchell Report, in that it seems from a cursory reading to be made up of information from news stories, public testimony and witness statements given to Mitchell by the federal government. When you hear that it reportedly cost MLB $20 million for Mitchell and DLA Piper to "investigate" you wonder where all the money went.

I would have liked to see more investigation of where the illegal steroids and HGH comes from. I think that is potentially a bigger and more important story -- at least going forward -- than any revelation about the past. I gather that the report is mainly silent on this because that was not the focus of the inquiry, but perhaps it should have been.

I also note that the recommendations in the report, some of which were good, did not include much about educating kids in school about the dangers of steroid and HGH use. The report did recommend that MLB educate professional ballplayers about them while they are at Spring Training, but I'm guessing that many players have already been exposed to them by that point.

I also think the media coverage of the report has been atrocious. The emphasis on the "list" has created a false impression that the report contains the final word on who cheated. In fact, it's not necessarily certain that all players named did cheat, and it's absolutely certain that many not named did cheat.

I don't think this is the final word on steroids in MLB, given that players will probably continue to test positive in the future. One thing Mitchell got exactly right is that we need to concentrate on that future, and not dwell on the past.

The only meaningful home run record is 622 HRv and it is unattainable in the current era.

>7 findundercan:

Care to elaborate?

I think one reason they concentrated on the players, scrubs and a few stars, and passed the blame out to everyone in baseball was to not be accused of blaming others... now I hope thay can go after those others, the suppliers and others unwanted around the sport.

And I'm sure they could have put many, many, many more names on the list; and I don't feel they should be blamed/portrayed as despicable human beings... wouldn't you want to make millions and provide a nice life for your great-grandchildren?

but um... "HRv"?

Statistics are irrelevant when devoid of context. The context, in the case of the raw number of career home runs, is the league average. Ruth hit 622 HR versus the league average. Bonds, somewhere in the high 400s (and no current player is even close to him). Now that's just one way of measuring production, but it's certainly more meaningful than a pure counting stat. The raw total is a product of the era Bonds hit in, combined with his skills and longevity (natural or artificial).

It's probably more useful to look at HR rates anyway. Ruth and McGwire were both more prolific in HR/100 outs, HR/100 PA, and HR/100 AB both in raw numbers and versus the league. Williams, Gehrig, and Foxx hit more per 100 outs versus the league. Foxx and Gehrig hit more per 100 AB versus the league. Sosa hit more per 100 PA (raw). Since they were (more or less) contemporaries in the same league, Sosa's lead in HR/100 PA is probably a product of Bonds' absurd walk rate which somewhat evens out when compared to the league average.

Speaking of context, I agree that it's hard to see people like Andy Pettite and Brian Roberts as despicable criminals for trying steroids or hGH in a desperate attempt to come back from injury. I don't condone that use, but it's understandable in a game in which miniscule differences in performance distinguish stars from scrubs.

That may be my biggest problem with the way the Report has been handled by the media -- habitual users and dealers like Jose Canseco and David Segui are rendered equivalent to Pettite and Roberts, because all are on some "list" of proper names hastily pulled from the Report.

Will Carroll on BaseballProspectus noted yesterday that a reader had alleged that Sandy Koufax had once used steroids. It turned out that he had been given the medical kind, which are legal. However, there is a sense that if we dug deep enough, we would find that most of our baseball heroes have indulged in something stronger than black coffee to enhance their performance at some point -- whether "greenies," hGH, steroids, or cocaine.

Like I said in my earlier post, I think looking forward is essential. All of this emphasis on the past draws attention from the present and future problem of PEDs (performance-enhancing drugs) in sports.

"Performance enhancing" is pure rhetoric. There is no scientific study that positively correlates steroid, HGH, or amphetamine (oops, did you forget that one, George?) use to any form of increased baseball skills. When the media focuses on sluggers and high-profile pitchers and puts the "performance enhancing" label on steroids, it sure seems like a good fit, but we conveniently ignore the fact that most of the players who have actually been caught through testing or even through the somewhat dubious trappings of the Mitchell report would be hard pressed to have a replacement level season. I don't see anybody writing a column on Neifi Perez, who has tested positive for amphetamines on multiple occasions en route to racking up the worst RCAA in the modern era. Is anyone clamoring to adjust his stats? Slap an asterisk on his futility?

Obviously, there are potential advantages to using these substances. I don't think there's any debate that some of them can significantly aid in strength training, but being able to swing harder isn't going to help if you can't make contact in the first place. Throwing an 90 mph fastball over the middle of the plate is actually worse than throwing an 86 mph fastball over the middle of the plate because more of those are going to end up in the bleachers. Being able to throw the ball to home plate on the fly from the outfield doesn't help if the ball bounces off your head for a home run (you can use that one in your next book, Jose). It also doesn't help if you're trying to throw from second to first (see Knoblauch, Charles Edward).

The biggest advantage for most of these substances is being able to recover faster from injuries and to stave off exhaustion or the deleterious effects of aging, which we don't seem to have the same level of outrage over, though, as always, the reaction appears to depend on the player in question (Pettitte : OK, Sheffield : bad boy). Naturally, the same issue crops up here, too. If you're Neifi Perez, playing more games just means you're just racking up more miserable performances.

tom1066> If the allegations are true, all of these players are criminals. They knowingly took illegal or prescription-only medications without a legal prescription. Whether they are despicable is a matter of personal opinion. I don't give a free pass to Pettitte or Roberts, but I don't condemn Segui either. The specifics are debatable, but they all committed the same crime. Similarly, there's no reason to focus on those that appear to have gained from the use over those that didn't. If I kill someone and forget to take their wallet, does that make me less of a murderer than if I kill them and make off with an extra thirty-seven bucks, too?

I do agree that it's pointless and likely counterproductive to dwell on what might have happened and the very complicated consequences (e.g. everybody wants to amend Bonds' numbers, but nobody wants to consider how many juiced pitchers and fielders he hit against that could have negatively affected those numbers, not to mention that it all comes out in the wash, so to speak, of the league average). Admit mistakes were made, learn from them, and move on.

The problem with saying "move on" is that baseball never does and can't... we continuosly look to the past for numbers, performances, characters, the history (1905 or 1975 or 2005...) of the game is as much a part of baseball as the present. You could say it's a blessing and a curse. Maybe after all the HOF eligibilty discussions are over for the steroid era (in say, 50 years?) we'll view this time like we view the cocaine-fueled 80's and see it slightly, out of the corner of our memory, when we look back at the game's past...

And there really is no reason to seperate Bonds and Clemens from Knobloch and Brady Anderson... breaking the rules (and laws) is the only black & white issue, how much a player was helped or hindered during the era is too grey and can never be sorted out...

"Move on" was a poor choice of words. I am in no way in favor of sweeping the past under the rug, good, bad, or ugly, but I think tom1066 is also correct in that we don't need to be fixated on the past to the point where it's a detriment to the present and future. There is no reliable way to accurately sort through who did what, when, and for how long. We need to focus on establishing an appropriate and viable system for ensuring that we can detect and deter the use of not only the current substances, but whatever future ones are invented (and I think it's safe to say they will be more).

Statistically speaking, we can look back at this era in its context, just as we can look back at the dead ball or any other era and compare statistics from them in relation to the league averages.

It's equally important to realize that steroid use is not the only defining characteristic of the current era. There are many, many factors that contribute to the character of the sport, both good and bad. The use of illegal and banned substances is certainly a problem that needs to be addressed, but it's far from the only problem facing MLB today. And none of the problems should detract from the positive aspects of the sport. That's what I mean by "move on", not to forget or diminish the problem, but to recognize it for what it is and that it's just one aspect of MLB today.

>12 findundercan: Mitchell didn't forget amphetimines.

fn19 on p. 2-3 reads:

"19. My investigation did not include an examination of the use of amphetamines by players
in Major League Baseball. The allegedly widespread use of amphetamines in baseball, rumored for decades, is a problem distinct from more recent allegations that players have used steroids
and other substances with anabolic or similar effects to gain an unfair competitive advantage.
I was asked to examine the latter question, and I am comfortable that a thorough examination did
not require me to look into the additional problems posed by amphetamines use, serious as those
problems might be. Moreover, an expansion of the scope of this investigation to include
amphetamines use inevitably would have increased the already significant time that was needed
to complete this investigation and diluted its focus, which I believe would have hampered
whatever improvements might be achieved as a result of this report."

>15 DromJohn:

Thanks DromJohn. I'm glad someone was paying attention. I completely missed that one. (aside : I hate when a footnote spans pages.)

being able to swing harder isn't going to help if you can't make contact in the first place.

And if you can make contact?

There are too many variables to predict the effects on an individual player. Similarly, it would be impossible to analyze what impact past use had on a player's stats. Even when you know precisely when particular players started using steroids, you can't unequivocally state which changes are due to an (alleged) increase in power and which are due to other factors.

For a very general analysis, I'd take an idealized hitter and make an estimate of the potential benefit, then compare actual hitters to the ideal.

Different players are going to be affected differently. I suspect that fly ball power hitters probably have the most to gain, based purely on observation and speculation, but we need to start somewhere, so let's say you're an ideal player based on the following assumptions :

1) You've added a generous amount of power, let's say 20%.
2) The added power has not affected your swinging motion, flexibility, bat speed, or timing.
3) You are a leadoff hitter, getting a historical amount of at bats (700) and, for some reason, teams are still pitching to you.
4) You are getting hits at the highest rate in the modern era for a .426 average (Lajoie 1901).
5) You are hitting home runs at the prodigious rate of 15.34% (Bonds 2001) before the added power.
6) You have an extraordinary fly ball ratio (62%). If you think a line-drive hitter would note greater improvement from added power, you could just adjust the ratio accordingly.
7) You can consciously add the power only to balls that are already going to be close enough to a HR to push them over the fence, so the added power is not turning slow ground-ball singles into outs, ground-ball outs into DP balls, infield flies into bloop singles, bloop singles into fly-ball outs, and pop-ups into slightly higher pop-ups.

700 AB with a HR% of 15.34 will net you 107 HR without any help. The .426 average will get you 298 hits, of which 185 will be fly balls. 107 of those are already HR, leaving 82 non-HR flyballs. If we shove an extra 20% of those out of the park, that gives you 123 HR for nearly a 15% increase.

At 15% for an amalgam of the most ideal players in history under perfect conditions, you have to figure even for a Barry Bonds, that number is going to be less than 10%. In Bonds' case, that's still a significant number (say 3-5 HR a season), but for most players, it's going to be a smaller percentage and an even smaller impact over the course of their career. For all but the most Ruthian players, the difference will be absorbed into the league average.

Again, this is a very rough off-the-cuff analysis and you could certainly come to different conclusions if you put more time and research into it.

Make that 78 non-HR flyballs for maybe about a 13% increase.