FYI

I just wanted to make sure everyone who ever reads this blog knows: I am exclusively posting over at Goat Riders of the Apocalypse now. The site is still in the developmental stage, but hopefully we'll have the kinks worked out soon. Feel free to check it out, and try to guess which one is me. Thanks for reading this blog, who knows, I might wind up back here someday.

BLOG FROM A STEROID NATION

It's been quite a couple of days for baseball. Now, we know Jason Giambi and his brother have doped up, we already knew Sheffield did, and while both revelations were big news, the other shoe dropped yesterday when the report came out that Barry Bonds confessed in court to having used steroids as well.

These events are going to have huge reprocussions in the baseball world. First, naturally, there will almost certainly be stricter drug policies. Second we may see a few contracts voided in the coming months. The recent confessions also may effect any Sammy Sosa dealings - according to Newsday the Mets have seen similarities and apparently suspect Sosa of steroid abuse.

But the biggest reprocussions will be how this effects the fans. While it makes us all a bunch of hypocrits, the striking majority of fans feel that steroids are now a blight on the game and it seems that they have caused irreparable harm with the people who follow baseball. Of course, we're the same fans who have suspected all along that there were cheaters in the game, and up til now we were perfectly happy with our massive homeruns and high-scoring games.

Back when I was a kid, one of the first baseball facts I became aware of is that there was a "modern age" of baseball. I learned that there had been a quarter century of baseball in the 19th century, but the stats didn't count the same as those from the 20th century because of fluctuating rule changes and different compositions of baseballs. So, for quite a while I thought that maybe that's how it would always be... the 20th century would stand alone and everything would start over again in the 21st. The 21st century would stand apart from the 22nd as well, and so on.

Maybe that's something baseball should consider. Rather than disallow Barry's numbers entirely, let's just separate all modern statistics from the past champions of baseball play. This way, while the numbers may be tainted, they don't effect the classical statistics that baseball purists covet like miners covet gold.

To me at least, it's an easy solution in a time where fundamental institutions inside baseball may soon be toppled.

GROTA NEWS

My new site Goat Riders of the Apocalypse is live and kicking. Feel free to check it out, although it'll be down this weekend. We're just getting started and still sorting things out, but soon in the future I think the site will be a must-read for Cub fans everywhere. So, check it out!