Baseball’s Long-Awaited Report on Doping Names Names
Dec 17th, 2007 • Posted in: NewsBut the document is not intended to hold up in court, and some question the standard of proof.
WASHINGTON
A much-anticipated report on the use of performance-enhancing drugs in baseball got down to specifics last week, accusing dozens of players of cheating. But at the same time, the nature and form of the document raised some ethical issues about the report itself.
The 409-page report, drawn from a 20-month investigation by former U.S. senator George Mitchell, concluded that abuse of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs in baseball has been widespread for more than a decade and that baseball management and ownership were slow to address the problem, reports the Reuters news agency.
The most noted name was that of pitcher Roger Clemens, who may see his bid to become a member of baseball’s Hall of Fame bid thwarted — and who also might find an estimated $3.5 million in annual advertising endorsements endangered, according to sports network ESPN.
Clemens continues to deny ever using steroids, the Associated Press notes.
But the Mitchell report had some other troubling implications, reports the Wall Street Journal. Noting that the evidence in the document was never meant to hold up in a court of law — as Mitchell himself acknowledged — the findings have plunged players into a legal and public-relations limbo.
“How do you unring the bell?” Rusty Hardin, the attorney for Roger Clemens, asked in the Journal report. “Does he trot around to every media outlet and say, I didn’t do it. I didn’t do it. I didn’t do it? And even if he did, is that going to change anything? No.”
In response, Mitchell told the Journal that there was no easy answer about whether to include names of suspected users. Without them, he said, the report might have been characterized as a whitewash.
In some cases, evidence came entirely from published news sources or from testimony of one source, the Journal reports.
Major League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig said he might consider punishments for active players, even though the Mitchell report recommended against such action, according to the Christian Science Monitor.
Selig also said he would search for new methods to test for banned substances. The current drug of choice, human growth hormone, is more difficult to detect than anabolic steroids.
Sources: ESPN, Dec. 15 — Wall Street Journal, Dec. 15 — AP, Dec. 15 — Reuters, Dec. 15 — Christian Science Monitor, Dec. 15.
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