Posted by: The Hitting Guru () on Sun Jan 14 16:38:33 2007

Bob L. With regard to Sammy Sosa's corked bat incident, I believe he got caught cheating. But at times we forget that the old motto in baseball was "it ain't cheatin if you don't get caught". Players have scuffed balls, used foreign substances (Kenny Rogers), used corked bats, hammered nails into bats, stolen signs, and bribed players in an effort to gain an advantage. And actually players were considered smart for doing such things as long as they did not get caught.

We should also remember that America is a very forgiving nation. As such people commit crimes, cheat, fail, and otherwise make mistakes for which they are forgiven for the most part as long as they do not commit major crimes and or crimes that involve the loss of life. Even criminals that go through the system and pay their debts are seen for the most part as having served their time and are allowed a great degree to re-enter society. As such Sammy Sosa, and Palmeiro etc, should have come clean with regard to cheating after caught. That way they could have moved on and kept most of their dignity.

Sosa's corked bat incident was the beginning of his decline. And after found out he put pressure on himself to produce without use of the corked bat. That pressure is easily enough to keep a player from producing as we have seen many a player who is trying to reach a milestone fail repeatedly after trying to do too much.

I believed he left the game to get the steroids out of his system while trying to rebuild his body without them. I also believe Barry Bonds did the same thing before returning a year ago. Coming off steroids cold as Jason Giambi (likely) did in 2004 probably destroyed his body and as a result cost the New York Yankees a championship run.