Here’s what I see: Neither Bonds nor Clemens was charged with using or possessing P.E.D.s. They were charged with making false statements and later cleared. As The Times reported in 2007, the Mitchell Report “tied 89 Major League Baseball players” to “the use of illegal, performance-enhancing drugs.” Bonds and Clemens were mentioned in the report, but they were far from alone. As The Times reported in 2008, U.S. attorneys had “documents that link more than 100 Major League Baseball players to positive tests for steroids conducted in 2003.” I’ve had many conversations with M.L.B. players from that era, and based on those conversations, along with those numbers, I believe that a major portion of M.L.B. players used P.E.D.s before the league and the players’ union agreed to put forth their now-credible anti-P.E.D. program. For a long time, P.E.D. abuse wasn’t an aberration as much as it was part of a larger culture within the sport.
Did M.L.B. officials ultimately take the steps necessary to clean up their sport? Yes. But along the way, it took 10 baseball players and executives testifying under oath before the House Committee on Government Reform in March 2005, at a daylong hearing that increased pressure on the league to get serious about combating P.E.D. use. Before that, from my point of view as a federal investigator, there wasn’t enough proactivity. As an executive for a sports league today, I think it’s incumbent on management and player representatives to set standards and eliminate ambiguity so that athletes can focus on setting and maintaining an example for current and future competitors.
The Mitchell Report concludes that “the use of steroids in Major League Baseball was widespread. The response by baseball was slow to develop and was initially ineffective,” and goes on to say: “Obviously, the players who illegally used performance enhancing substances are responsible for their actions. But they did not act in a vacuum. Everyone involved in baseball over the past two decades — commissioners, club officials, the Players Association and players — shares to some extent in the responsibility for the steroids era.”
I’d add many of us to that list — we savored every towering home run and viselike shutout.
Yes, the Hall of Fame, M.L.B. and the Baseball Writers’ Association are separate organizations. And yes, the Hall of Fame selection criteria include “integrity,” “sportsmanship” and “character,” not just stats and ability — no doubt, some baseball writers place a great deal of weight there. But if we’re going to deny Bonds and Clemens, then there’s something amiss with the integrity of the whole Hall of Fame process and the record of a time when baseball itself didn’t live up to Hall of Fame standards. Bonds and Clemens represented the best on-field performers in baseball — and represented the era in which they played. When you add that up, they should be in Cooperstown, enshrined in the Hall alongside the game’s other greats.