I have a sneaking suspicion that Bartolo Colon?s drug suspension coming a week after Melky Cabrera?s is gonna be like manna from hack commentator heaven. The story line ? and it will be treated as one, seamless story line ? is gonna break down thusly:
Angle: Here we go again! The Bay Area is once again the center of the PEDs universe!
Comment: It is true, Colon plays on one side of the San Francisco Bay and Melky plays on the other. It is also true that Jose Canseco played on one side of the San Francisco Bay and Barry Bonds played on the other. This is an accident of geography and nothing more. ?I?ll allow this as a viable angle if any evidence is revealed connecting the old Bay Area drug cases and these new ones. But that?s extremely unlikely.
There is almost certainly no connection at all between the old BALCO things and these testosterone tests. There is likely even no connection between Colon?s test and Cabrera?s. As such, linking all of these things together, or even just linking Cabrera and Colon together in some sort of grand ?the Bay Area and PEDs? kind of thinkpiece without any actual factual basis for doing so is pretty good evidence that someone is mailing in a column. It?s the equivalent of writing a story about a murder in New York and spending several paragraphs on the Son of Sam killings.
Angle: Major League Baseball has a serious drug problem and has to do something now!
Comment: I bet Tom Verducci is kicking himself for writing this story yesterday instead of tomorrow, because it?s always way better to write a ?the world is ending? trend piece when there is more than a single data point. ?But now that there are two positive drug tests involving prominent players this year ? sorry Freddy Galvis, Guillermo Mota and Marlon Byrd, you just don?t rate ? we?re twice as far along into epidemic territory as we were yesterday.
That said, I still can?t see how the fact of a positive test and a player being penalized can serve as evidence that Major League Baseball?s drug testing program is flawed. Now, maybe it is flawed. Maybe the tests are done haphazardly and too seldomly. Maybe the whole thing is a farce. But the one thing that is not evidence of that is someone getting caught. No, to make the case that the system is broken, you have to actually explain what about it is broken. To do otherwise is the same as saying that the criminal justice system is broken because that guy who robbed the liquor store was caught and punished.
Angle: The Oakland A?s are sunk/The Oakland A?s are rallying
Comment: With all apologies to Mike Krukow, this line of thinking is post-hoc nonsense. It?s not going to help the A?s to have lost Colon, but in a world where people seem to think that even Stephen Strasburg is a non-essential part of a playoff team?s roster, I have a hard time buying Bartolo Colon?s absence as the tipping point. Especially now that they have Brett Anderson back to take his place.
If the A?s lose the wild card now, people will blame Bartolo Colon being gone. If they win it, they will credit the A?s rallying around the loss and/or betrayal and/or whatever of Colon and say it was the season?s turning point. ?In reality, the A?s wild card hopes have a lot more to do with their offense, Brandon McCarthy?s health, the Tigers, the Orioles, the Angels and the Rays. ?Colon is not a serious factor for anyone except someone searching for an easy storyline.
There. Now that you?ve read that, you can ignore everything else. Isn?t that a relief?
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