It's hard at this point to generate much outrage over Alex Rodriguez's confession that he used performance-enhancing drugs. The reaction is more one of sadness and disappointment that the former Seattle Mariner shortstop who once seemed to have the world on a string no longer seems destined for Cooperstown - not with that enormous asterisk now attached to his name.
By now most sports fans have grown only too accustomed to discovering their heroes' feet of clay. Rodriguez, who plays for the New York Yankees, is just the latest in a long list of star athletes whose accomplishments have been tarnished after they were found to have been juiced - or at least suspected of it. That list includes Mark McGwire, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Jason Giambi, Andy Pettitte, Rafael Palmeiro, Marion Jones and Floyd Landis. Unlike athletes who continue to swear they never used drugs, Rodriguez has come clean - to a point - but only when it became clear there was no point in denying it. Sports Illustrated reported that he was one of 104 Major League Baseball players who had tested positive for steroids in 2003, when he was a Texas Ranger. He had earlier denied using drugs in a 2007 interview with Katie Couric.
In his admission this week on ESPN, he said he had no excuses for why he tested positive for banned substances - but then came up with several. The lamest: that drug use was pervasive among players.
The old "everyone's doing it" excuse? He's got it exactly backwards. Any athlete who uses creates pressure on his competitors to do the same.
The one that probably sounds most hollow to Mariner fans is the notion that Rodriguez felt a lot of pressure to live up to the record $252 million contract the Rangers offered him to leave Seattle. If so, that was pressure he manufactured himself.
Baseball fans are left wanting to know more. Did Rodriguez really not know what drugs he was using, as he claims? Did he only use drugs for that short period of time from 2001 to 2003, or was he also juicing when he was a Mariner? Why won't he reveal who gave him the drugs? After he lied earlier, why should anyone believe that he isn't using some other drug that doesn't show up in test results? Once a cheat . . .
Star athletes like Rodriguez who use drugs to hit farther, run faster or throw harder aren't just cheating their fans who buy tickets and enjoy comparing modern athletes' stats to those of earlier greats. They're also cheating themselves. In their heart of hearts, they know they don't really deserve that batting title, that world-record time, or the millions of dollars in salary and endorsements. They know they've taken a place that should go to a more deserving athlete - one who doesn't use drugs.
Rodriguez's Yankee teammates weren't far off when they not-so-jokingly referred to him as A-Fraud. If he has any hope of salvaging his career and reputation, Rodriguez would do well to be more forthcoming than he was in his ESPN interview and take the lead in a campaign urging young athletes to avoid his mistake and compete cleanly.
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