PGA: Lay off the Juice!

written by Matthew Lungariello

Baseball’s all-time single season home run leader is being investigated for use of illegal steroids. Some time in 2005 or the beginning of the 2006 season, Barry Bonds will pass Hank Aaron for most career home runs and no one seems to care about it. Most people say that those records are tarnished because of all this BALCO talk. Yet Mark McGwire, was embraced by the entire country (I will address this racism issue within this country in another piece), held the single season home run crown, was admittedly taken Andro, which was available at any local GNC store. Don’t be fooled. It is now outlawed in Professional Baseball, and any way you slice it, it’s a performance enhancer. So the only slugger of that time that’s credibility has not taken a hit is Sammy Sosa. But wait! Sammy was caught using a corked bat. Whether or not he had always used that corked bat is a moot point, because after he was done serving his suspension he came back to hit home runs at a pace that was equivalent to any streak he had in his career. Not even the biggest of fools would return and immediately use a corked bat again.

Why is it that the fans and the media are so fast to attack baseball players for good performances? Professional Football players use steroids to help them run faster, gain weight, add muscle, and look better. Fans and casual observers don’t talk much about that because they want their football players bigger, stronger, and faster. I thought that baseball fans wanted the same things. I guess I am wrong. In baseball, they want to catch the players using enhancers. This country wants to put their players way up on a pedestal so that they can knock them down.

No one seems to talk about the fact that if a Professional Golfer changes his clubs or equipment, that he can add up to 50 yards on their drive. Does it sound like some of these guys are using a corked golf club? They are. Certain golf balls travel farther than others. But no one cares, they are too busy worrying about whether today’s baseballs are wound tighter than they were in the past. What about the golf balls? They are wound tighter too. Golf is the only sport where a man like Daly who has battled drug and Alcohol addictions, and still has an entire group of people on his side, cheering for him. In any other sport, this guy would be an outcast. They cheer for him because he can drive the ball 400 yards. The fans don’t care that he is on steroids, uses corked clubs, tightly wounded balls, or that he was just drunk and using beer muscles. If this man played any other sport, the fans would have chewed him up and spit him out because of all his trips to rehab. (see Darryl Strawberry (see race issue above)). They didn’t care how far Strawberry could hit the ball, because they considered him an addict.

Golf’s version of steroids is simply in their equipment. Some Golfers use certain equipment, and have advantages over other players before the competition even starts. Tiger Woods changed his equipment and blamed his miserable play on his clubs. He claimed that he needed to use different clubs. Everyone can test this theory. Go to your local driving range and use one of the drivers that they have in the bucket that looks like it should have a keg in it, and hit some cheap balls toward the 200 yard sign. Not that easy. Once you smell the burning from the clubs smacking into the ground too often, take a break and look around. See who looks like they have the nicest equipment. Go up to them (you cant ask them to borrow their driver, because they will say no), and steal the club from their hands and run. Once you get back to your little area put the ball down, set yourself, and swing as quickly as possible. Chances are this guy is going to be running after you with a 4 iron in his hand. My guess is that you will see that golf ball soar past that 200 yard sign with ease, or if you don’t, it will be a hell of a lot closer to the sign than with the other clubs. After that, that angry fellow should be arriving near you to beat you up. Hold out his club, and tell him that you like it. I will leave the on-the-spot excuse to you. But you have now used what we’ll call a “corked” golf club. Let’s just call you Sammy Sosa.

There is equipment and substances in every sport that can be considered “illegal.” I say leave them alone. Leave them alone until someone does something about the sport where old out of shape drunks can still be competitive because they are juicing.

Thank you for all the support. And juice one for me!