Mitchell!

Friends, that man is former Senator George Mitchell. He was commissioned a little under two years ago to uncover the scope of the drug problem in professional baseball. Today, around noon eastern, his report will be public, and it reportedly names upwards of 80 names of MLB players (including All-Stars and MVPs...and not just Barry Bonds and people who have already been linked) who took performancing enhancing drugs.

Now, from what I understand, those named in the list didn't necessarily test positive for anything, and it's all guilt by association...so if someone told Mitchell that Player X took drugs, they'll probably be listed here...though I hope there is more credibility to this list than hearsay, but I think that's all Mitchell is going on (it's a regular black list)...and this report was compiled with absolutely no help from players or the players union. Also, if you watch the videos below, you'll see some other shortcomings of this report (like the fact this report may stretch back to 1985...and they only came up with 80 names? Really?)

Once this thing becomes public, I'll update this with the players who surprised and disappointed me.

Videos that were here have been discontinued by ESPN.


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The names are out there, and Roger Clemens, Miguel Tejada, Eric Gagne, Andy Pettitte are the big new fish in the steroid pond that Bonds & Giambi were swimming around in together. Clemens, Pettitte, and Tejada were already out there before with the testimony of busted user Jason Grimsley, so they aren't huge surprises. But the detail given in this report makes it seem more credible than the Grimsley leaked testimony, especially with Clemens & Pettitte (there are stories of a trainer injecting them).

Mark McGwire is named in the report, but only for the andro (a steroid precursor) that he had admitted using and was legal at the time...but nothing that I could find that links him definitively to HGH or anabolic steroids beyond andro. I don't know if that's good for McGwire or bad for the report. Sammy Sosa is not linked to anything in this report. Again...is that good for Sammy, or bad for the report? I don't know.

The names that really surprised me were Fernando Vina and Rondell White. Not that I'm big fans other either player, but Vina was a tiny, scrappy guy, who you wouldn't expect to be a `roider. Plus, he's currently employed by ESPN as a baseball analyst...so I'm sure somewhere in the archives there is footage of him making statements on PEDs. (David Justice, who is in the report as a user, is also on the ESPN payroll...or was at one point...so I wonder what will happen with him).

I always pictured roid users to be the mid-level players, or the bulking goons (Albert Belle, Mo Vaughn for example...and you know, Albert Belle is not in this report), but little scrappy guys who are all hustle like Vina, and Lenny Dykstra (who is also on the list as a user)...that is surprising.

And I'm only surprised by Rondell White because the amount of evidence against him in here. There is a ton of cancelled checks to a known roid supplier with White's name on it. Who writes checks for steroids? It's like using a credit card to buy weed. Stupid, stupid guy. Same with all the other cancelled checks people (like Paul Lo Duca). Don't they know you always buy your drugs with cash?

And a majority of the players named in here are in the Vina/White kind of quality of player, and lower. I mean, is anyone going to care that Kent Mercker was a user? What's surprising is that Kent Mercker used steroids to be a Kent Mercker type player. Really? Holy smokes. What is he like without the roids? Same with all the backup catchers, and marginal players on the list.

So the report didn't strike down many of the players directly, but in his speech, Mitchell said that just because a player has a negative test for a performing enchancing drug, that doesn't mean he's innocent. Now that's some heinous shit to say. You mean to tell me that baseball is irrevocably dirty, no matter what? What kind of thing is that to say? It may be true, but that is completely contrary to the "innocent until proven guilty" line of thought. That statement hangs a "guilty" label on anyone you want...and Sen. Mitchell more or less said it's okay to believe that way, and even testing shouldn't change your mind. That's just careless from a man in his position. It's one thing to be an armchair goof who swears that any player is on the juice, and not trust any testing policies...but it's another thing all together to be in a position of such authority and say the same thing.

There may be more names listed in this 400 page document, so I might write more later once ESPN finds it, or I find it with the search function. Oh, and just to say this, eight former and two current St. Louis Cardinals are mentioned in this report (The Former: Mark McGwire, Cody McKay, Gary Bennet, David Bell, Fernando Vina, Kent Mercker, Jason Christiansen, Larry Bigbie....The Current: Ryan Franklin [who has already served a suspension for this] and Rick Ankiel [who has been recently been cleared of any wrongdoing by the league]).

Twinkies fans...Chuck Knoblach, Denny Neagle, Chad Allen, Daniel Naulty, and Rondell White are the only names I could find in the document. Mitchell does detail this little story about someone finding a spent syringe in the visiting clubhouse at the Metrodome, and then manager of the Twins Tom Kelly advised the employee who found it to throw it away...and Kelly did nothing else about it. Don't know what that says, but there it is.

Viva beisbol!