This is a very bad precedent. Not only are "we" going to know, but again, it's going to be run with by the press as the vileness of cheaters, etc...and all without any real context.

David -- MLB's not blameless here. The agreement was to have anonymous, survey testing with the goal to see the percentage of players, not which players. There was no need to have a system in place where donors and samples could be matched up. By putting one in place, MLB made possible the abuse of the results.

Or the union could have asked that the sample be destroyed.

The Union did -- and MLB agreed. If you look at the decision (and I am no lawyer), the dissent quotes from the Joint Agreement that all samples and data were to be destroyed.

Well then, it sounds like MLB did a good job getting a new agreement before this happened!

And why wasn't the union more vigilant in seeing that the samples were actually destroyed?

It's hilarious and sad that the government thinks that the right thing to is to destroy the reputations of hundreds of players AND jail Lance Williams / Fainaru-Wada. Why not put the owners in jail for allowing this stuff to happen in the first place? Pathetic.

See what happens when you drag your feet too long? The Gov't gets involved and f@%*$ it up royally. Don't do drugs.

A) Leaking from BALCO appears to have come from the defense, not the Government. B) This is what the Feds do. It is a zero sum, destruction game. They do not need cooperation from players. If the publicity exists they will find the weak link and destroy. Happens in every other segment of industry, why should ballplayers live a privileged existence? Michael, they are paid for their public performance, how does full disclosure cheat them of their reputations? MLB and the PA have/had no choice. McCain and co were dying to ram thru some type of Olympic style testing. If that came about what percentage of the players would have been implicated? Prosecuted? Raffy's busted rep, and tanking HOF shot, hurts. But Vs a couple of years cooling his heels in the big house? Yeah, he'll take the ridicule all day long. To be clear, I don't like it. But it's the world we live in. And I can't believe anyone not employed by MLB or affiliates would give a damn. As a couple fellas from Hollis, Queens once said, "It's like that, and that's the way it is."

I'm sorry, but I fully believe in the "name 'em and shame 'em" rule.

Whee. While the Iraq war was being mismanaged (and strong and manifold evidence of systematic lying leading up to that war was being ignored), the Republican Congress busied itself with... grandstanding about steroids.

This is SO unimportant.

"Name 'em and shame 'em"? Good God, over THIS? As Rob mentioned this is, to write softly, ridiculous. It's ridiculous in the context of our current world, ridiculous in the context of our judicial system, ridiculous in the context of drugs in sports (so many more culpable parties than just players/so much more to it than the "magic pill" theory), ridiculous in the context of our judicial system and what it should be focusing on, and, amongst other points, ridiculous in the context of law enforcement.

Implement rules against PEDs and state the punishments for breaking these same rules. Move on. This is our government, spending all these years and all these dollars to bring out the dirty laundry on baseball players? (As NBA, NFL, and NHL surely don't have any PEDs...yeah right.) I'm, if you couldn't tell, angry about this. For one, the sports media, culpable on so many levels, is going to run with this without context and for two, people are going to buy this crap.

It is ridiculous if you pay no attention to the real world. If you do, it is par for the course. So why does anybody lose sleep over the Feds screwing with jocks like they do with everyone else, rich or poor? What's ridiculous is anyone giving a damn, outside the players, their families, and their employees. It is not "fair", so what?

The opinion and dissent can be found at:http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/ca9/newopinions.nsf/410347FABA0293F388257251006DF1D1/$file/0510067.pdf?openelement
I don't agree that this is a matter of simply being concerned about "Feds screwing with jocks." I initially looked it up out of interest in baseball, but the issues are broader. I was shocked to read the dissent in this case. As it notes, this case has significant implications regarding the government's ability to seize computer records which are located in the same facility. As the dissent notes, although suppposedly searching for records on the 10 BALCO athletes, the feds seized medical records and drug tests on every single MLB player, as well as thousands of medical records for 13 other sports, 3 sporting events and the employees of three unrelated businesses; and the government claims that it can use all of the information it seized in its investigations. BTW, the disposition of the drug tests is not over, since the matter has been sent back for further hearings to the district judges who previously ruled against the feds.

The opinion and dissent can be found at:http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/ca9/newopinions.nsf/410347FABA0293F388257251006DF1D1/$file/0510067.pdf?openelement
I don't agree that this is a matter of simply being concerned about "Feds screwing with jocks." I initially looked it up out of interest in baseball, but the issues are broader. I was shocked to read the dissent in this case. As it notes, this case has significant implications regarding the government's ability to seize computer records which are located in the same facility. As the dissent notes, although suppposedly searching for records on the 10 BALCO athletes, the feds seized medical records and drug tests on every single MLB player, as well as thousands of medical records for 13 other sports, 3 sporting events and the employees of three unrelated businesses; and the government claims that it can use all of the information it seized in its investigations. BTW, the disposition of the drug tests is not over, since the matter has been sent back for further hearings to the district judges who previously ruled against the feds.

If the union pursues it, there's an excellent chance the decision will be overturned. A 2002 article by CNN said the 9th Circuit had the highest rate of turnovers. This was later disputed, but what's not disputed is it's a court in transition, and it takes cases farther out on a limb than most. As previous poster was kind enough to detail, info grabbed involves a great many more than the baseball guys.

Susan -

the people that attack the Ninth Circuit do so on the grounds that it is too liberal, and it is very unlikely that the current US Supreme Court will reverse the Ninth Circuit in order to issue a ruling that is more restrictive on Government police powers under the Fourth Amendment than was the Ninth Circuit panel.

Now it is my belief that the view that the Ninth Circuit is all that liberal and out of line is often misplaced, and the judge who wrote the opinion is a quite conservative judge. But it is very unlikely that the Supreme Court would take this case -- although the issue of when the Feds can seize computers for the information therein without a warrent for all the info therein is interesting. It is slightly more likely that the Ninth Circuit would agree to rehear the case en banc (as a group), and there is a much better chance it would come out differently in that case than there is that it would be reversed by the Supreme Court.

McMillan, don't start... Congress, Repub, Dem, Ind., all grandstand at every opportunity. If leaders were "lying" about Iraq before we invaded, then we're talking about leaders for the last 2 administrations, as well as those in NATO and the UN. Has Iraq been mismanaged? I'm not even going to begin to argue w/ you there becuase, first and foremost, this is a BASEBALL blog, not a political one...

Still, it's funny how steroids are such a big deal in baseball, yet in football, there's not stigma at all attached to them. Look at the guy for the Chargers who got suspended this year - people can't stop raving about him, and he's likely to win several defensive awards. Despite owing some of his prowess to steroids and being dumb enough to get caught.

Susan, the union will pursue it, and it will not be overturned. as Capy notes, this particular decision is not a case of the 9th being the 9th. There's a couple of black robes that attempt to invent law every so often. Those make up 90% of the reversals. this is not one of those instances.
CJ, i know it it's more than feds v jocks. My point is this is how the feds treat the rest of us regarding search and seizure. So the player loving bellyaching that lead off the post stuck me as absurd. where/why do they get an exemption? Look at the stunning abuse Nifong has perpetrated. Yet some folks want to make an issues of bad faith, and bad PR ballplayer exposure. Get real, this is the world we live in. keep a low profile, or do the right thing. Otherwise you open yourself to abuse. Those invovled opened themselves, they can deal with the consequences.