Steroid Issue Gets Writer More Than a Little Juiced

Ken Rosenthal, in a recent no-holds-barred column in the Sporting News, writes that the time has come for baseball to address the steroid issue.

“The sport is rolling merrily along,” he writes, “producing bulked-up revenues, flexing its pharmaceutically enhanced muscles. Ban steroids? Sorry, more research is needed. Test for them? Sorry, union approval is required.”

Agreeing with Rosenthal is San Diego Padre General Manager Kevin Towers, who told him: “Baseball has done a great job with smokeless tobacco. There are fewer and fewer players dipping. Alcohol and cocaine abuse are not what they used to be. Your big problem right now is steroids.”

Mark Grace of the Arizona Diamondbacks told Rosenthal steroid use in baseball is “prevalent.”

A Penn State professor, Charles E. Yesalis, a recognized expert on steroids, told Rosenthal that little can be done about it now.

“There’s no financial incentive to clean this up,” he said. “I haven’t seen anyone taking to the streets, or the ballparks emptying or TV contracts canceled--[fans] say they care, but I don’t think they care enough to alter their viewing behavior.”

*

Trivia time: In Cy Young’s 22-year, 511-victory major league career, what was his highest salary?

*

Bad deal: Here is Newsday’s Jon Heyman’s candidate for worst trade proposal of the season:

“The Orioles suggested the Cardinals trade them rookie third baseman Albert Pujols, a potential superstar, for pitcher Sidney Ponson, not a potential superstar.”

*

Downright carried away: In describing Brian Giles’ recent ninth-inning, two-out grand slam that gave the Pittsburgh Pirates a victory over the Houston Astros, Robert Dvorchak of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette offered this item:

“Throw in the fact the blow was struck at 3:36 p.m.--the minute Bill Mazeroski beat the Yankees in the seventh game of the 1960 World Series--and it’s downright eerie.”

*

Big D is dead: In a story headlined “Who Killed America’s Team?” in the Sporting News, writer Paul Attner lets Dallas Cowboy owner Jerry Jones have it with both barrels.

“The journey’s over,” Attner writes. “Jerry’s boys have tumbled and they won’t be back.

“The king has lost his grasp on reality. He’s out of the Super Bowl business, on life support, and he can’t--and won’t--get up again, not for years to come.”

How bad is it? Writes Attner: “One third of [the Cowboys’] cap money will go to players no longer on the team.”

*

Looking back: On this date in 1969, the Pirates’ Willie Stargell became the first man to hit a fair ball out of Dodger Stadium. His blow against the Dodgers’ Alan Foster cleared the right-field pavilion roof and landed 512 feet from home plate.

In 1973, Stargell hit another long home run at the stadium, this one landing on the pavilion roof.

*

Trivia answer: $6,000.

*

And finally: How can a book about a horse still be on the best-seller list?

Because Seabiscuit was big, according to author Laura Hillenbrand, in the preface to her “Seabiscuit: An American Legend.”

“In 1938,” she writes, “Seabiscuit was the subject of more column newspaper inches than President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Adolf Hitler, Pope Pius XI, Clark Gable or Lou Gehrig.”