Tonight I use this space to call upon my fellow bloggers, loyal readers to this blog and baseball fans in general to demand that Allan Huber "Bud" Selig, Jr. resign as Commissioner of Major League Baseball.
Forget Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte and the rest. Take a look at a few other aspects of the "report".
1. MLB knew of a steroid problem as early as 1994 under commissioner Fay T. Vincent. Vincent did nothing. As chairman of the Executive Council of Major League Baseball and owner of the Milwaukee Brewers Bud Selig said and did nothing.
2. As players were getting abnormally bigger and stronger during the late 1990's, Selig, now commissioner, did nothing.
3. MLB allowed access to players, teams and clubhouses to "personal trainers" without requiring background checks. MLB allowed these people continued access while they were under federal investigation.
4. Bud Selig commissioned an investigation to be lead by a person who is on the board of directors of a MLB team. Thus causing a questioning of the integrity of the investigation and report from the beginning.
5. The report, commissioned by Bud Selig, is based on the testimony of 2 men who are under federal investigation and are facing criminal charges. Their credibility is highly questionable.
6. The report, commissioned by Bud Selig, contains hearsay and circumstantial evidence with very little proof of anything.
7. In regards to the above two items, Bud Selig allowed names of the alleged players to be made public, opening up MLB for a slew of slander and libel law suits further embarrassing MLB. Even the president of the United States said "I think it's best that all of us not jump to any conclusions on individual players' name."
8. By allowing names to be made public, MLB seems to have violated the collective bargaining agreement (CBA) between the Major League Players Association (MLBPA) and MLB. The CBA clearly stipulates that the standard of proof is a positive test. Un-tested players have been accused in the report.
9. Due to the hearsay, circumstantial evidence, integrity of the sourses and the CBA, Bud Selig has very little ground to 'punish' any of the accused.
10. Bud Selig's lack of action since 1994 caused the U.S. Congress to conduct hearings on steroid use in MLB. These hearings were yet another embarrassment to MLB.
11. Due to Bud Selig's lack of action since 1994, the U.S. Congress has threatened to intervene and take away MLB's anti-trust exemption.
The best course of action is for Bud Selig to resign. The next commissioner then could establish a committee of players, team executives, union officials and doctors to examine the recommendations in the Mitchell Report and implement a model program to eliminate performance enhancing drugs in MLB.
The only time that I want to hear a president discuss baseball is during a ceremonial first pitch and when the World Series Champions are welcomed to the White House.
Mr. Selig, please resign.
2 comments:
I agree with everything that you wrote regarding the Mitchell Report. This report was doomed to failure from the start by having a biased Mitchell conducting the investigation. After reading this "Report" and I use the term loosely I find it very difficult to see the difference between this so called list versus another list from the 1950's called the McCarthy's list of communists. We as a country vowed never to repeat that type of mistake but on 12/14/07 at 4:00pm history repeated itself.
Bravo Dr. E! You are absolutely correct.
Thanks for reading NYYU!
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