Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
February 26, 2008
Tony La Russa Still has McGwire's Back

Tony La Russa doesn't believe Mark McGwire used steroids. Tom Fornelli reaction:

Seriously, if Tony LaRussa honestly believes that Mark McGwire was completely clean after everything we've learned in the years since he retired, the man needs to retire right the hell now. He's obviously insane, and shouldn't be managing a baseball team, even one as bad as the Cardinals are going to be.

The man had andro in his locker, in the Cardinals club house. Yes, it was legal at the time but as we know now it helps. McGwire's bulk wasn't all natural.


Posted by David Pinto at 03:57 PM | Cheating | TrackBack (0)
Comments

The exercise physiologists that I have talked with tell me that the evidence indicates that andro doesn't have any ergogenic benefits. The studies that I have found seem to confirm this.
Link

This doesn't mean that there are not other studies out there that reach different conclusions, but if they exist I have not found them.

Posted by: JC at February 26, 2008 04:31 PM

Thanks for the link, JC. However, you're missing the point. At the time, McGwire certainly thought it was helping him. It also makes one believe the other stories that McGwire was actually using performance enhancing drugs.

Posted by: David Pinto at February 26, 2008 04:38 PM

Oh, I'm not denying that McGwire thought it helped. :-) I was just speaking to the point that it doesn't actually work. It does have some negative side effects; therefore, I like to point this out as often as I can in order to discourage its use.

Posted by: JC at February 26, 2008 04:50 PM

Thanks, JC.

Posted by: David Pinto at February 26, 2008 04:55 PM

McGwire's intent was the same, even if he picked a substance that didn't help (highly debatable). He was still trying to cheat.

- The other JC

Posted by: JC at February 26, 2008 06:08 PM

i agree. All those guys who I see at the gym drinking protein shakes and taking pills from GNC whose names have more numbers than letters should be ashamed of themselves, too... gimme a break.

At the time McGwire used andro, you could buy it in the checkout lane at wal-mart. It's ridiculous to think it proves anything about steroid use. I'm sure he did use, but it's important to keep things in perspective.

Posted by: SleepyCA at February 26, 2008 06:34 PM

Just reading the short blurb on the AOL Fanhouse blog, it sounds as if LaRussa at first doesn't really care that McGwire used steroids -- it's not like it's some magic pill that makes you good. Then it seems like he just switches to be angry old man mode to be contrary. I guess you could say that the key phrase is "performance enhancers." Obviously LaRussa doesn't think steroids help, so why the hell should he care?

Posted by: Tom at February 26, 2008 09:03 PM

By the way, David, you should probably take out the comment about McGwire's bulk not being all natural. That just confuses the issue since there are plenty of things that baseball players do that aren't natural - Tommy John surgery, laser eye surgery, hyperbolic chambers, etc.

Posted by: Tom at February 26, 2008 09:05 PM

Dave, I am really disapointed in what you are saying here. Did you really expect McGwire to know in advance before it happened that Andro who end up classified by the Feds and by MLB as a steroid when it was not at the time he used it? Sure, he used it because he thought it would help just like almost all (if not actually all) other professional athletes use other legal supplements every day. How does this proof anything about McGwire's use of illegal performance enhancers? There is evidance that McGwire used these but his use of Andro is not one of these.

Posted by: giantsrainman at February 26, 2008 09:55 PM

For what it's worth, Jose Canseco has claimed that Mcgwire's use of Andro was a cover-up for his actual steroid use.

Posted by: dark at February 27, 2008 12:08 AM
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