Manny being Manny

Up until this weekend life was pretty good for Dodger fans. Aside for the blip that was the end of last season this is the first time in the past 10 years or so that I have opened up ESPN.com and gone straight to the MLB section. Things were going great. The Dodgers are the best team in Major League Baseball. Their hitting is awesome and the pitching has me thinking of 1988 all over again. Things were looking pretty good in Dodgerland. Then Manny does something stupid.

All Dodger fans knew it was only a matter of time before Manny had issues. We were only kidding ourselves when we said that his Boston past was behind him. He has changed. He cares about his teammates and his team. It was all a fascade. The worst part about the whole thing is that baseball is a ruined sport again.

Ever since McGuire, Sosa and Bonds became tainted in the public eye baseball has been trying (or at least putting on a show to make us think they are trying) to clean up the game. Now with Roger Clemens, Andy Petite, A-Rod, and Manny all dirty there really isn't any respect left in the game. Is there a person out there who can look at Albert Pujols' chiseled frame and keep the idea of steroids out of their mind. Is that fair to Albert? Certainly not, unless of course....

So what now? What should be done? Is a 50 game suspension punishment enough? If you had no morals and you were told that you would be suspended for 50 games for taking a banned substance but by taking the banned substance you could up your numbers and secure a $45 million salary over 2 years would you take the drugs? Consider that Manny is still under contract and the 50 game suspension amounts to a little over $8 million. Assuming he doesn't dope up again he still got $37 million out of the deal.

Is the current system discouraging high school kids from using steroids? No way. If anything it is encouraging kids to dabble in the dope. Why not? It's a gamble to get caught anyway and even if you do get caught you say sorry serve your suspension and be done with it having made millions in the process. Even the second offense is just 100 games.

I say kick them out. Suspend them for life. If Pete Rose can get banned for betting on baseball why not ban those players who are cheating with drugs. I've known since middle school that performance enhancing drugs were a way to cheat so don't tell me any of these athletes are unaware of the effects of the drugs they are injecting in their bodies. The powers that be could end this now. Test everyone, from the minors up to the majors. Make it public and those who fail get banned. That's it, get them out, end of story. Is it really that hard?