If you weren't sick of PED talk enough after the sham of Hall of Fame voting we just witnessed, get ready for more. A Miami New Times (which sounds like a fictional newspaper from Back to the Future) report says that a number of pro athletes were on the client list at Biogenesis, an anti-aging clinic in Miami that is under fire for providing human growth hormones to customers.
Among the athletes named are Alex Rodriguez, Bartolo Colon, Melky Cabrera, and Yasmani Grandal, all of whom have been caught or suspended for steroid use in the past. Other notables include Nelson Cruz, Gio Gonzalez, and a number of coaches.
First of all: Innocent until proven guilty, etc.
But beyond that, would it really surprise anyone that A-Rod continued to juice beyond 2003 (when he said he stopped)? His body hasn't changed...except that he developed a degenerative hip condition, which is a red flag (/looks at Mike Napoli, and, sadly, Mike Lowell). He maintained his performance into his mid-30s, with 30 homers at age 34. Only the aforementioned hip situation has slowed him down.
I know as Red Sox fans we should be smug and laughing about this, but it's actually probably a bad thing for us. As Buster Olney pointed out in his blog this morning (Insider), this situation might allow the Yankees to pursue voiding Rodriguez's contract, which is a Crawfordian albatross. We already know A-Rod will miss much (or perhaps all) of this season...and he's still got four years and $100+ million after that. After a year off, plus a potential suspension coming, plus (presumably) taking himself off PEDs, we could be seeing a pretty serious decline in which the Yankees get next to nothing for that money. If they get out of it, that's a huge benefit for our rivals.
Besides, it's not like we should be very confident that the Red Sox are all clean. David Ortiz was semi-busted, said he'd get to the bottom of it, and then never spoke about it again. Manny (who is also linked to this story) was caught something like 600 times. It's easy to speculate about Lowell and Napoli due to their hips, or Varitek or Nomar due to their bulking up -- or really anyone.
But then again, it is A-Rod, who is among the more detestable professional athletes in my lifetime. So I won't criticize you if you want to have a chuckle at his expense.
Update, 1:00 pm: Rodriguez, through a spokesman, has issued a complete denial of all accusations.