Near Death

I flew out to Kansas today. I don't know if anyone has ever fishtailed in a plane before, but I came in on one of those propeller 20 person planes in 50 mph winds and did so several times. Let's just say I prayed more in the 10 minutes it took to land than in the last 5 years or so. It wasn't any better after we landed when the pilot came out of the cockpit and said, "that was nasty."

So with my feelings of near death aside, Giambi is back in the news with the steroids thing. Most of the news is preliminary stuff, but as I understand it there's politics in play. How couldn't there be though?

Basically what has surfaced is this. Giambi made his comments criticizing MLB and admits he used "the stuff". MLB didn't like what was said and considered suspending Giambi as an initial option. I'm not clear that that's an actual policy in MLB, but for some reason Giambi could have been in hot water. Then Selig and Giambi talked, about what is pure speculation. Now that Giambi's injured and also given his regret for doing steroids, (quite different from other suspected players) Selig is extending an olive branch of sorts. The deal looks to be Giambi won't be in trouble if he testifys for the Mitchell Commission.

What has the Mitchell Commission been doing though? I have no idea. As the article linked above seems to say, the Commission has no teeth. It looks as though MLB took a page out of the Bush administrations use of commissions. Just set them up to look like you're doing good and when they're done they really have no power and life goes on as if nothing ever happened. As I see it, the Mitchell Commission is a first step in trying to seek the truth in the Steroid Era. How much truth they find is up to whomever they get in to investigate. I believe in Giambi's case, if he's serious about keeping on the good face and saying steroids is wrong, he should and will testify, but he won't leak out names of other players he knew doing them.

The other aspect is that a Commission goal is figuring out if Barry Bonds perjured himself. Since Greg Anderson is keeping silent I'm not sure who nails Bonds on this. I won't go into my thoughts on Bonds here, I'll save that as he gets very close to the HR record.

In any event, I'm not expecting much from the Commission other than it rattles a few cages and makes some players nervous. Unless they find the siringe or pill or cream or whatever form a steroid can be taken in in a steroid drug bust, all the anedotel stuff will just be that.

One recommendation for the Mitchell Commission from me is this. Its been made out to be controversial that steroids helps you hit homeruns. Some players say, if you can't make solid contact then they make no difference-you still need to know how to hit. Point taken. But what if you can hit homeruns? I would like the show Mythbusters to take this up. Then it will be settled.