Opinion

JUICED ‘GREATNESS’: AMERICA’S TRUE PASTIME

Baseball players are making outrageous salaries, and because of that fans have to pay too much to go to ballparks (“Disgrace,” Dec. 14).

Maybe now is the time to ask for some refunds.

Victor Maltsev
Rego Park

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Why is anyone surprised?

We take relatively uneducated individuals, whose contributions to society are minimal, and turn them into gods.

We then wonder why they develop such a sense of entitlement that they don’t feel they have to go to the gym to develop muscle.

Nat Weiner
The Bronx

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Some professional football players sport hair longer than women’s and cavort in the end zone, yet they still are adored by fans.

Likewise, steroid-using pro baseball players will continue to bask in undying fan idolatry despite being mutated into “juiced” monsters with preternatural pitching and hitting powers.

The once pristine and honorable role-model aura of America’s pastime has become irrelevant as records are broken by monsters, not men.

Jimmy Reed
Oxford, Miss.

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Whether it’s Joe McCarthy of the 1950’s or Sen. George Mitchell of 2007, investigations and declarations of guilt without proof is un-American.

It’s a disgrace that this $20 million steroid commission is destroying reputations and careers on hearsay, not actual smoking-gun proof.

For $20 million, I want information. I could have made the same allegations and accusations for $10 million and saved Major League Baseball a bundle.

Dominick Speziale
Cedarhurst

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This all comes down to greed.

Money changes everything, and this type of behavior cannot be blamed on the players who were involved.

We live in a world where people will do anything for gratification, not just in professional sports but also in the workplace, business and amateur sports.

Everyone needs to take a closer evaluation of themselves.

Daniel Goscicki
Rockaway, NJ

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Mitchell is right when he says that the greatest reason to rid baseball of steroids is for the benefit of our nation’s young.

Since team owners and television networks clearly have established that they will not police themselves in any meaningful or comprehensive way, it’s up to us, through our elected officials, to mandate weekly blood tests for all participants.

The government must ensure that these and other “games” no longer exist as daily TV commercials for the use of illegal chemical substances.

Surely these multi-million-dollar industries should have a responsibility to the society in which they prosper.

Jim Burns
Valley Stream

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The media have chosen to abandon players who have done wonderful things for our teams and city.

You have chosen to take Mitchell’s report as the word of God instead of questioning its obvious failings in its ability to produce solid evidence.

The commission was bound by no rules of procedure, no rules of evidence and no ability to confront the evidence against the accused.

You have sold out the Yankees, Mets and all of New York.

You should all be ashamed of yourselves.

Kyle Berglin
East Quogue

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Since so many of these ballplayers are into steroids, we can logically assume that they were competing on an even level.

We must therefore conclude that their stats are valid, but under one condition: We will simply call the whole kit and kaboodle “steroid ball.”

Fred Baruch
Sunnyside

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Does anyone seriously believe that only baseball is sullied by steroids? How about football, weightlifting or the WWE?

Starting now, I’m calling all professional sports “confessional sports.”

J. Andrew Smith
Bloomfield, NJ

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If an end to steroid use is the goal, then deal with the problem.

Make baseball the sport it once was – where farm teams built franchise players, and clubs did not become battlegrounds for bidding wars, making the game a glamour cast of pampered prima donnas, greedy owners and fans willing to buy into something that is about as far from the true Americana baseball once was.

Fix that problem, and this one will go away.

Otherwise, let players do what they must to be the best in a sport where being a superstar is nothing more than modern day mediocrity.

Scott Y. Stuart
Manhattan