Baseball Makes First Steroid Bust

Tampa Bay Devil Ray center fielder Alex Sanchez on Sunday was suspended for 10 days for violating Major League Baseball’s new drug policy, becoming the league’s first player to be punished for testing positive for steroids.

Sanchez, who has four home runs in 1,351 career at-bats, said he had not intentionally taken steroids, but had taken over-the-counter supplements. Listed at 5 feet 10 and 179 pounds, Sanchez was scheduled to start in center field in the Devil Rays’ opener tonight against the Toronto Blue Jays.

Per a policy strengthened over the winter and yet heavily criticized in a March 17 congressional hearing, the league announced Sanchez’s suspension in a one-sentence statement. Baseball and Players’ Assn. officials believe that publicizing the names of violators will be a deterrent. The suspension, which begins today and will cause Sanchez to miss eight games, is without pay.

Baseball began testing for steroids two years ago and initiated disciplinary testing last season, but no players were suspended. In an off-season racked by leaked testimony from the BALCO investigation and Jose Canseco’s tell-all book and by a congressional inquiry into steroids and baseball’s strategy to deal with them, the policy was made more stringent with suspensions for first-time users and more frequent testing.

As the game’s great power hitters became the subject of public accusations, and Canseco, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Jason Giambi and Rafael Palmeiro, among others, were subpoenaed by Congress, the policy’s first discovery was Sanchez, the slight Cuban who was released by the Detroit Tigers and, on March 19, signed by the Devil Rays.

“I’m surprised,” Sanchez told the St. Petersburg Times. “The only thing I can say is I don’t use that kind of stuff. Look at what kind of player I am. I never hit any home runs.

“I’m fighting it right now. I never took any steroids because I don’t need them.... I take stuff I buy over the counter.”

The suspension can be appealed by Sanchez, but it cannot be abated during the penalty phase.

The first tangible proof of baseball’s intention to curtail steroid use arrived hours before the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox opened the 2005 season, and two days after baseball officials learned of the positive test.

Yankee Manager Joe Torre, whose first baseman, Giambi, reportedly admitted in grand jury testimony to using steroids, advocates a stricter policy.

“Well, the fact [is] that the testing evidently worked,” Torre said. “That’s what we all wanted to find out. Even the players wanted to make sure we got the fans’ trust back. I don’t want to say I’m sorry he got caught, but [I am] sorry that some still believe they’re not going to get caught.”

Said Boston Red Sox center fielder Johnny Damon: “It’s unfortunate for him. He’s got to face that scrutiny now. He’s going to be suspended for 10 days and he’s got to look himself in the mirror. This policy is going to be tough. Now his name is out there. Hopefully, he can go on without having to use the substance, but I think right now it’s a very embarrassing moment for him and hopefully it’s something he will overcome.

“You’d like to think it was a big bopper, because it would be a big name in this game and it would definitely raise suspicion. But everyone can be a target.... It’s around the game and that’s why we really need to clean it up. It’s not biased toward anyone.”