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Readers In A Rage Over 'Roids

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 15, 2007

Players, Game Tainted

Regarding "Report Blames All Corners Of Baseball" (front page, Dec. 14):

After reading Sen. George Mitchell's expansive report on the "steroid era" of baseball, I am angered and saddened by the audacity and outright contempt that these individuals have brought to this nation's favorite game. The mere fact that these athletes would taint their legacy to get an unfair advantage by taking performance-enhancing drugs borders on idiocy if not insanity.

The accused can deny all day long that they were set up and "didn't know what they were taking," but that doesn't wash with the millions of fans who struggle to feed their families on their infinitesimal salaries while these spoiled, overpaid curmudgeons weave their lies and denials through their mouthpieces as if will make my anger go away. How dare they taint the game of my youth with their greed and vice. I am not talking about the athletes who play the game with integrity and the physique that the good Lord gave them, but the ones who sold their souls for an extra 10 points on their batting average or and extra step on the base paths.

The problem is that the bad apples have made every player suspect because of the untraceable HGH and other steroids that they hypodermically stick in their rears. The only way to re-establish the integrity of the game is to require that Bud Selig and Donald Fehr resign immediately and all players and team staff who are named be banned from baseball forever and their names stricken from the record books. Void all Cy Young awards, all MVP's, batting titles, all records that these morons won unfairly and award them to the runners up.

In this age where Alex Rodriguez can parlay his mediocre worth to more money than 200 normal hard-working people combined will see in a lifetime, the average Joe is already fed up with these spoiled athletes. It is imperative that MLB take steps to police its own. Baseball was very quick to ostracize the great Shoeless Joe Jackson and the tainted White Sox and more recently Pete Rose to protect the game and for the future of the game. It is warranted here immediately. All of those indicted in this report are a bunch of cheaters, and if I ever spend another dollar taking my family to a game I will turn my back on them, and they will know why.

TONY FOLDS

Brandon

Waste Of Tax Dollars

Listen up, Georgie Porgie! As for the results of your baseball witch hunt, frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn. It's more like the pot calling the kettle black. My advice to you is point your venom at the people who administer these drugs. Take your teeth out of Barry's back. Set a "cut-off" date for these athletes, and then turn your efforts into cleaning up your own back yard.

Since you're using our taxpayer dollars getting your medical degree, turn it from steroids to hemorrhoids.

CAROLYN E. MOORE

Thonotosassa

Barry Bonds Redeemed

At first I was against this investigation. For almost two years we witnessed the media harassing Barry Bonds while giving admitted steroid abuser Jason Giambi a free pass. During the chase for Hank Aaron's home run record, I feared America was regressing into its discriminatory past.

This report means a lot more than guys cheating. This is a test for the whole nation. This is a measurement of how much progress we've made since the hate-mail days of Aaron breaking Babe Ruth's record.

By linking Roger Clemens and Bonds, George Mitchell is giving us a chance to judge ourselves. Mitchell is using the two best players of our generation to test our pluralistic ignorance.

Can America afford to let Clemens into the Hall of Fame without letting Bonds in? I hope Bonds didn't have to pay Mitchell off for this sweet scenario like he paid off his mistress. America is on the clock.

HENRI CHARLES

Lakeland

Selig, Fehr Also To Blame

Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig and players union chief Don Fehr believe the American public is so naive that they were not aware of the use of illegal drugs. They must be held as legally liable as the players.

I will fight the only way I can: I will quit going to ball games until they clean up their mess.

PATRICK DONNELLY

Tampa

We All Take Steroids

I am so angry commercial meat growers feed or inject steroids into beef, poultry, lamb, etc. We consumers have no choice but to consume steroids each time we eat meat. I don't know many athletes who are vegetarians, so if a ballplayer wants to take growth hormones by choice let him, but please take away the use of growth hormones from the average consumer. I do not want to gain any more weight. I bet if you tested every person after a steak dinner, 80 percent would test positive for growth enhancers.

As for poultry, the growth hormones are causing breast cancer in teens and men. It used to be a midlife women's problem due to hormone imbalance, but thanks to the wide use of steroids, everyone is affected.

PAM ANDERSON

North Port

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