Bulletin: baseball players have been using steroids and human growth hormone. We knew that, now we know it with an official Major League Baseball stamp on it, It’s called the Mitchell Report, a 400-page summary of an investigation done by former U.S. Senator George Mitchell. I’ve read through parts of it, especially the parts that document the numerous Orioles named as users. I’ll give Mitchell credit for his authoritative presentation in the press conference at which he unveiled his findings, but the investigation and the findings themselves were less than earth-shattering. I kept hearing analysts and news people speak of the report as “historical” and “definitive,” but as is too often the case in matters of media build-up, there was more hype than heat to this fire, in my opinion.

Most significant was the information naming Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte as users. The testimony by their former trainer was rather damning (although Clemens claims there’s not a shred of credible evidence in what his lawyer terms a slanderous report). We’ve all heard the rumors and whispers regarding Clemens, the Mitchell Report provides the first true documented allegation against the seven-time Cy Young Award winner.

Looks like the Orioles win the Mitchell Report sweepstakes with 19 guys named who played for the O’s at one time. But none of those named are surprising. Raffy Palmeiro and Jay Gibbons have already been busted and penalized. David Segui had already admitted his use of HGH. Jason Grimsley’s case is well-known, and we already knew he fingered Brian Roberts after Grimsely was arrested. Miguel Tejada was named in Jose Canseco’s book and accused by Palmeiro. Larry Bigbie comes across as a tattler. Through it all, I can appreciate some of the salacious detail and documentation, but if I had to draw up a total “guess list” with my own version of how players may have been involved- I would’ve been pretty close to what took Mitchell and his team 20 months to uncover. Not to discount their work, but none of it comes across as truly important or revealing. Again- I feel like we already knew most of this stuff.

What the report does show, I think, is that as much as we feel we now know- there’s so, so much more that’s undocumented and untold. Mitchell found a clearing in forest, only to find himself (and baseball) surrounded by immense acreage of unchartered woods that’s unlikely to be discovered. In other words, the more you learn- the more you realize what you don’t know. And, unlike science, no one is in a rush to help Mitchell or anyone else find out any more.

I’m sure I come across as cynical on this one, but revisionist discovery that uncovers scant new information only goes so far with me. Mainstream media has done a decent job in uncovering some of the material that was regurgitated by Mitchell. Significant, too, is Mitchell’s use of hearsay evidence that upon strict analysis holds little credence. Example: Larry Bigbie says Brian Roberts refused to take steroids when offered them by Bigbie and David Segui, but years later Bigbie says Roberts told him he injected steroids once or twice. That testimony given by Bigbie results in Roberts being named as a user in the Mitchell Report. Lame.

To his credit, Mitchell is more concerned with revising baseball current monitoring and testing system than he is rehashing its past. The past he presented elicited a yawn relative to what was expected. Move forward, as Mitchell says. The old stuff is stale.

Posted on Thursday, December 13th, 2007 at 8:53 pm.
Categories: Opinion.
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