These two men are currently in trouble for perjuring themselves in court about lying about their use of steroids. It was stupid of them to lie under oath, but they never should have been put into a situation where they would have to lie. For one, the government has no business getting involved with Major League Baseball (MLB) and its players and making it a government issue, because it simply isn't one. Secondly, MLB and Bud Selig especially should be ashamed for letting it happen.
There was no doubt that steroids in the late 90's/early 00's was a problem in baseball. People were bulking up to sizes not before seen and were hitting more homeruns than ever before. People who work in baseball HAD to know this was happening but they didn't do anything about it. Why? Because they were making too much damn money on these juice heads who were hitting 60+ home runs per year.
Baseball suffered major attendance drops after the 1994 work stoppage and it took the home run race between Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire to get the fans to come back and to spawn a whole new generation of fans. So while it was obvious when these two were hitting a ridiculous amount of home runs per year that something fishy was going on, absolutely nothing was done about it. Same scenario for Barry Bonds. He was on the 'roids and that helped him to break the all time home run record from Hank Aaron, but the chase got a lot of press and popularity so baseball didn't care...until after it was broken. Now all of a sudden they show a deep concern for the integrity of the game and the safety of the players because they already got what they needed from the steroid era.
To rub salt in the wounds, MLB isn't even standing behind its players. They are distancing themselves as much as they can and even chastising the players of the steroid era. There is talk that Barry Bonds, the all time home run leader will not get into the hall of fame and I cannot understand why. People let it happen so they could make money off it, but now they want nothing to do with it. Major League Baseball and Bud Selig should be ashamed - I stress that point again.
So while I do not condone cheating, it is not fair that these players were put into this situation when the league they worked for did nothing to prevent them from doing it, all for the sake of revenue. It's ridiculous. Put McGwire, Sosa, Bonds and Clemens in the Hall of Fame because they deserve to be there (well maybe not Sosa). Their morale fibre might be questionable but their numbers are not. They played in the steroid era and we have to accept that. It's not entirely their fault.
P.S. Put Pete Rose in there too!
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