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RPerry
08-01-2005, 07:20 PM
Rafael Palmeiro (http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/player/85374) was suspended 10 days for violating Major League Baseball's steroids policy Monday, nearly five months after the Baltimore Orioles (http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/team/71587) first baseman emphatically told Congress that "I have never used steroids. Period."

Palmeiro became the highest-profile player among the seven who have failed a test under the toughened major league policy that took effect in March, rules criticized by Congress as not being stringent enough.

In a conference call Monday, Palmeiro said he never intentionally took steroids and could not explain how the drugs got into his body. He also apologized and said would accept his punishment.

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/3853196?GT1=6773

Maybe this isn't such a surprise to some of you, but it shocked the hell out of me. Mark McGwire was my hero, and they way he testified in front of congress broke my heart. I had always believed Palmeiro was taking steroids, but belived when he looked congress in the eye and swore he had not. Congrats on all those Home Runs Palmeiro... But now they do not mean shit to me

Skiz
08-01-2005, 07:42 PM
Pffftt...10 days. You think that a guy who make 50 million dollars cares about a 10 day suspention? I don't. That's a nice vacation. :dry:

RPerry
08-01-2005, 07:45 PM
Pffftt...10 days. You think that a guy who make 50 million dollars cares about a 10 day suspention? I don't. That's a nice vacation. :dry:


He stands to lose $163,934.42 of his $3 million salary during the suspension.

not quite $50,000,000 :blink:

Skiz
08-01-2005, 07:53 PM
But he's been playing for 15 years or so. Still not quite 50 nillion, but I was just trying to convey the point that it was barely a slap on the wrist.

manker
08-01-2005, 08:01 PM
I bet he's earned several dollars more than £50 million in his career what with endorsements and so forth.

You're right, Skizo. Whatever the punishment, $50 thousand or $150 thousand, it will hardly cause him to feel regret nor will it discourage others from going down the same path.

RPerry
08-01-2005, 08:22 PM
I bet he's earned several dollars more than £50 million in his career what with endorsements and so forth.

You're right, Skizo. Whatever the punishment, $50 thousand or $150 thousand, it will hardly cause him to feel regret nor will it discourage others from going down the same path.

this goes along with my feelings that once a player is caught, their records should be nulled, and they should be given a lifetime ban. For me this is just as bad as the Chicago White Sox scandle

manker
08-01-2005, 08:27 PM
Totally agreed. It's the only way to heal the sport, in my opinion.

RPerry
08-01-2005, 10:41 PM
Positive test may doom Palmeiro's shot at Hall

The baseball world was stunned Monday by the news that 20-year veteran and presumptive solid citizen Rafael Palmeiro failed a random test for performance-enhancing drugs and has been suspended for ten days. The latest installment in the game's ongoing scandal is perhaps its most important, and it raises a number of vital questions.
For the moment, we'll lay aside issues such as whether Palmeiro perjured himself before Congress, the vaulting credibility of Jose Canseco and the apparent potency of MLB's testing program. Instead, let's ponder what it means in terms of Palmeiro's Hall of Fame chances and, in the here and now, for the Orioles' playoff aspirations.

On the numbers alone, Palmeiro is an incontrovertible Hall of Famer. He's truly a poor man's Hank Aaron who, by the time he retires, could eclipse 600 homers, 3,000 hits, 600 doubles, 2,000 RBI, 1,750 runs scored, 1,500 walks and 100 steals. Throw in his strong defense and the fact that he's one of only seven players in history to hit at least 500 home runs while having more walks than strikeouts, and you have what should have been an easy first-ballot selection.

Those who assail the excellence of Palmeiro's career are emphasizing peak value at the expense of career value; while he was never the greatest player in the game for an extended period, his sustained excellence is matched or exceeded only by luminaries like Aaron, Willie Mays, Dave Winfield and Eddie Murray.

If Palmeiro has a statistical calling card, it's his defiance of age (he's working on what would be one of the ten best seasons ever by an age-40 hitter) and the lofty career totals that ensued. Unfortunately for him, it's exactly that quality these latest revelations call into doubt. Would he have been able to reach that litany of career benchmarks without the aid of performance-enhancing drugs? Probably not.

Given the groundswell of anti-Palmeiro statistical sentiment, this is a player whose Cooperstown case, while not tenuous, is certainly somewhat vulnerable. Now that it appears he's been cheating at least of late, it's difficult to project what will happen. Unlike, say, Mark McGwire or Barry Bonds, Palmeiro has failed a test and, as a result, has something far more forceful than anecdotal evidence working against him.

On the other hand, McGwire hits the ballot a little more than two years after he positioned himself as the villain of the recent Congressional hearings. Palmeiro, at the earliest, will be up for vote five years from now. That's a lot of time for anger to quell and for the tenor of the debate to change.

Still, absent some mitigating evidence — such as a "false positive" test result or proof that he used a non-banned, over-the-counter substance — Palmeiro seems a reach for first-ballot induction. Normally, a dose of non-scripted contrition would go a long way, but in light of the vehemence Palmeiro showed before Congress, a belated admission-cum-apology may not play well. If there's less to this story than it appears, then the onus is squarely Palmeiro's to demonstrate to us why that's the case.

In any event, if recent statements are any guide, that doesn't appear to be Palmeiro's tack. Voting writers are justifiably outraged over the steroid scandal, and the vast majority took Palmeiro at his word when he denied — complete with finger-wags and everything — ever juicing.

After all, who are you going to believe in a "my word against yours" showdown, an esteemed veteran like Palmeiro or an oily opportunist like Jose Canseco? Well, after Monday's bombshell, it's advantage oily opportunist.

Poll
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So it's not only that Palmeiro failed a test, it's also the righteous indignation he showed at the very idea of it all. Those factors in tandem with the (admittedly misguided) idea that his career is something less than stellar will shanghai his election, at least early in his period of eligibility. If there's a guess to be made, it's that he'll slide down to the veteran's committee, at which point he'll eventually be voted in. Should he be? If, as it appears, he knowingly took a banned performance-enhancing substance, no, he shouldn't be admitted to Cooperstown.

Then, of course, there's the matter of what it means to Baltimore's fraying pennant hopes. Since May 26, when the Orioles were a season-best 14 games over .500, they've gone 21-38. At present, the O's are seven-and-a-half games behind the wild card-leading Oakland A's and even further behind Boston in the AL East. According to the postseason odds report at Baseball Prospectus, Baltimore, as things stand now, has roughly a 3.0 percent chance of making the playoffs.

It gets worse.

Of Baltimore's remaining 57 games, 45 come against winning teams. Yep, winning teams constitute almost 80 percent of the Orioles' schedule from this point forward. That's a gruesome stretch drive for a team already circling the drain. All of this is to say that Baltimore wasn't going to make the postseason regardless of what became of Palmeiro, the team's fourth-best hitter to date.

So what will Palmeiro's suspension for violating MLB's drug policy mean to his team? Not much at all. What will it mean to his Hall of Fame hopes? Probably — and deservedly — a great deal.


http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/3853594


there is a poll on that page

Busyman
08-01-2005, 10:42 PM
I bet he's earned several dollars more than £50 million in his career what with endorsements and so forth.

You're right, Skizo. Whatever the punishment, $50 thousand or $150 thousand, it will hardly cause him to feel regret nor will it discourage others from going down the same path.

this goes along with my feelings that once a player is caught, their records should be nulled, and they should be given a lifetime ban. For me this is just as bad as the Chicago White Sox scandle
I disagree.

A player caught on the juice doesn't mean he was always on it.

I think:

Their records should stay intact
They should be suspended for a year and fined a percentage of their salary.

If a player isn't playing the sport he so-called loves and gets hit in the pocket, that's a real punishment.
The percentage fine hurts the big as well as the small (on top of the ban).

RPerry
08-01-2005, 10:56 PM
I disagree.

A player caught on the juice doesn't mean he was always on it.

I think:

Their records should stay intact
They should be suspended for a year and fined a percentage of their salary.

If a player isn't playing the sport he so-called loves and gets hit in the pocket, that's a real punishment.
The percentage fine hurts the big as well as the small (on top of the ban).

Cheating is cheating, period. Once they are caught, who's to say when and how long they have been doing it ? There needs to be a zero tolerance policy, then you'll see this crap stop

manker
08-01-2005, 11:00 PM
Yeah.

If the sport was in a healthy state, then perhaps Busy's meansures would be good ones. Perhaps.

Atm, it's in dire need of a radical overhaul. Fining millionaires a fraction of what they earn and banning them for a relatively short period won't do.

Busyman
08-01-2005, 11:01 PM
I disagree.

A player caught on the juice doesn't mean he was always on it.

I think:

Their records should stay intact
They should be suspended for a year and fined a percentage of their salary.

If a player isn't playing the sport he so-called loves and gets hit in the pocket, that's a real punishment.
The percentage fine hurts the big as well as the small (on top of the ban).
Cheating is cheating, period. Once they are caught, who's to say when and how long they have been doing it ? There needs to be a zero tolerance policy, then you'll see this crap stop
Okay I agree.

RPerry
08-01-2005, 11:29 PM
After all, so many people who had found Palmeiro a resistible Hall of Fame candidate three weeks ago came around when he delivered his 3,000th hit, and now they get to hand-wring their way out of voting for him now. He was a feel-good story -- the forthright, stalwart member of the Zero Tolerance Club who said he had never, ever, ever taken a steroid, damn it.

Now it turns out he had never "knowingly" taken a steroid, and it is only a conference call or two from becoming, "I never knowingly took a steroid while wearing my space suit on the surface of Neptune."

Better yet are the caveats from Prez Bush and the steroid congressman, Tom Davis, both of whom stood up immediately and said, "We believe Raffy when he said he never knowingly took anything." They also said they believed him when he said he never took anything, period. So that only means that the same rules that apply in politics apply everywhere else, namely that, "It's wrong when your guy does it, and it's OK when my guy does it."

fkdup74
08-02-2005, 12:21 AM
Pete Rose cant get in for gambling.....

I think Palmeiro should be kept out for being a liar
had he admitted it, he would have shown some accountablitiy,
but he chose to flat out lie

RPerry
08-02-2005, 12:36 AM
Pete Rose cant get in for gambling.....

I think Palmeiro should be kept out for being a liar
had he admitted it, he would have shown some accountablitiy,
but he chose to flat out lie

this was my argument the first time this came up. Pete Rose gambled, but I would bet my own money he never threw a game, and he was never accused of it, however he was slapped with a lifetime ban. Your gonna tell me what he did was worse than cheating ?

Busyman
08-02-2005, 12:44 AM
Pete Rose cant get in for gambling.....

I think Palmeiro should be kept out for being a liar
had he admitted it, he would have shown some accountablitiy,
but he chose to flat out lie

this was my argument the first time this came up. Pete Rose gambled, but I would bet my own money he never threw a game, and he was never accused of it, however he was slapped with a lifetime ban. Your gonna tell me what he did was worse than cheating ?
I never thought Pete Rose should have been in trouble whatsoever.

(only if he bet on an opposing team winning)

This "ya just don't bet on baseball" motto is bullshit.

fkdup74
08-02-2005, 01:03 AM
This "ya just don't bet on baseball" motto is bullshit.

agreed.

and if they're going to adhere to that idea so strongly, well then...
fkrs shouldn't get in for cheating IMHO :D

and you know what the bitch is....
we here are not the only ones making that argument,
it's all over the place where baseball is the talk I imagine, but....

I bet they still get in and Pete still gets the shaft :dry:

RPerry
08-02-2005, 01:07 AM
This "ya just don't bet on baseball" motto is bullshit.

agreed.

and if they're going to adhere to that idea so strongly, well then...
fkrs shouldn't get in for cheating IMHO :D

and you know what the bitch is....
we here are not the only ones making that argument,
it's all over the place where baseball is the talk I imagine, but....

I bet they still get in and Pete still gets the shaft :dry:


That conclusion is, Joe played his best in the World Series of 1919, he fielded to win, he batted to win, he ran the bases to win. We admit, Joe did have guilty knowledge of the fix, but we feel his punishment in perpetuity is unjust for this "supposed" crime.

let us not foget this man got the shaft too :dry:

fkdup74
08-02-2005, 01:40 AM
That conclusion is, Joe played his best in the World Series of 1919, he fielded to win, he batted to win, he ran the bases to win. We admit, Joe did have guilty knowledge of the fix, but we feel his punishment in perpetuity is unjust for this "supposed" crime.

let us not foget this man got the shaft too :dry:

no shit.

Joe Jackson and Pete Rose out...all the roid freaks in :huh:

it just doesn't seem right :(

some numbers for those who may disagree :P

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/BA_career.shtml
(this was Joe Jackson's most outstanding statistic, there would have been more for sure,
but he only played in a little over 1300 games, about 8 years by today's standards)
and where the hell's the carreer fielding stats?
Jackson had .964 carreer fielding average ffs

and this is all Pete:
http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/H_career.shtml

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/2B_career.shtml

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/TB_career.shtml

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/G_career.shtml

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/AB_career.shtml

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/R_career.shtml

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/1B_career.shtml

http://www.baseball-reference.com/leaders/TOB_career.shtml


where the fuck is Palmeiro on any of those lists? ;)

RPerry
08-03-2005, 12:16 PM
Source: Palmeiro tested positive for stanozolol

NEW YORK -- Rafael Palmeiro (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?statsId=3897)'s positive steroid test was for stanozolol, a powerful anabolic steroid that is not available in dietary supplements, according to a newspaper report.


http://espn.go.com/i/mlb/profiles/players/3897.jpg
Palmeiro The New York Times, citing a person in baseball with direct knowledge of the sport's drug-testing program, reported on its Web site Tuesday that Palmeiro tested positive for the drug known by the brand name Winstrol, most notably linked to the Olympic sprinter Ben Johnson of Canada.

Johnson was stripped of his 100-meter gold medal in 1988 after testing positive for stanozolol.

"It's a mildly strong to strong steroid," Dr. Gary Wadler, a professor at New York University and an expert in sports doping, told the Times. "Potent is the word I would use."

The person who said that Palmeiro tested positive for stanozolol did not want to be identified because the testing policy prohibits anyone in baseball from disclosing information about test results without authorization, the Times said.

The Baltimore Orioles (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/clubhouse?team=bal) first baseman was suspended by Major League Baseball for 10 days on Monday after testing positive for a performance-enhancing drug. The highest profiled player to be punished so far, Palmeiro testified before Congress in March that he "never used steroids."

Palmeiro didn't deny turning in a positive test, but was adamant it was an accident.

The test was taken some weeks after Palmeiro testified before Congress in March, meaning he is probably not at risk for perjury, the Times reported, citing a committee staff member who spoke to the newspaper on condition of anonymity because official statements are supposed to come from members of Congress.

The Baltimore Sun reported on its Web site Tuesday night that Palmeiro tested positive in May and chased his 3,000th hit with the knowledge that he had failed a drug test. Palmeiro appealed the ruling in secret arbitration proceedings in June, a source told the Sun.

The Sun also said that Congress is looking more closely into the chronology of Palmeiro's case and is poised to call on baseball to reveal more details: when his drug test was conducted, analyzed and disclosed to the player and the team. Some members also want officials to reveal what Palmeiro tested positive for.

The House Government Reform Committee was drafting a tentative information request Tuesday, the Sun said.

Palmeiro was the seventh player to fall under baseball's new, tougher steroids policy; Seattle Mariners (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/clubhouse?team=sea) right-hander Ryan Franklin became the eighth when he was also suspended 10 days for a violation Tuesday. Baseball does not release what type of drug a player has tested positive for, and so far none of the eight have spoken openly about details of their violations.


if this turns out to be true, Palmeiro better take some anti-nose growing steroids too :dry:

BigBank_Hank
08-03-2005, 03:10 PM
if this turns out to be true, Palmeiro better take some anti-nose growing steroids too :dry:
:lol:

I like the part when he says that he took them unknowingly. I guess he figured that they were Flintstone vitamins.