Do Steriods Matter?

With the news that baseball superstar Manny Ramirez has tested positive for a drug that is often used to mask the end of a steroid cycle, baseball is once again under the same dark cloud that has hovered over the sport for years. The names of players that have either tested positive or are thought to be users reads like the all-decade team: Clemens, Giambi, Palmero, Bonds, McGwire, Sosa, A-Rod and now Manny.

When it came to the strike of 1994, there was little debate that that event had the power to destroy baseball. In fact, if it wasn't for Cal Ripken breaking Lou Gehrig's ironman streak and the incredible battle between Sosa and McGwire, many experts are unsure the sport would ever have recovered at all. The same experts love going on SportsCenter to tell us that the sport of baseball is facing the same kind of crisis due to the Steroid Era and the way it has impacted statistics, but more and more lately, that claim seems to ring hollow. There has been some begrudging acknowledgement from the sports media that the general public, as a whole, doesn't care about steroids. A poll on ESPN.com asking if Manny's positive test excluded him from the hall of fame was answered by over 234,000 people at the time of this writing, with 46% saying that he still gets in, while 33% saying he should now be excluded and the remaining 20% proving that they are likely brain damaged by saying that he wasn't a hall of famer in the first place.

The same acceptance, or indifference, to steroid use can be seen elsewhere, too. In an article appearing on Major League Baseball's website on October 1, 2008, this past season was the second most attended in history, with seven teams, including The Yankees (stung by the Pettitte, Clemens and Giambi steroid scandals) and the Cubs (Sosa), setting all time franchise marks. Last year wasn't a fluke, either. The National League in 2008 set all time marks for attendance. The record they broke was from the previous year. One could argue that stadiums are bigger and there are more teams around so numbers are bound to be up, but if fans really cared about doping, why would they continue to support a sport that seems plagued by digressions?

Baseball isn't alone in this rise in popularity in the face of scandal. One would have to be pretty thick to think that steroids aren't present in the National Football League or in other sports, yet attendance, especially in football, continues to rise. Every team in the NFL in 2008, including lowly Detroit, sold over 90% of their tickets to every game, with 10 teams managing to sell 100% or more (standing room) to every game.

Perhaps the best example of the complete disinterest in steroids by the general public is the continuing and seemingly unabated interest in professional wrestling. No other form of entertainment has seen more premature deaths, more crippling disabilities and more instances of scandal than the WWE, yet they continue to sell out areas and sometimes stadiums around the world each week.

It is unknown exactly why people, in general, don't seem to care about steroids. It could be that chicks really do dig the long ball, or it could simply be that we enjoy watching performers perform at their best regardless of what they have to do to themselves to get there. No matter what the reason, it appears the media and the government will continue to try to get us to care about this issue when most of us will simply turn the channel to whatever game is on.

 

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