As usual, Posnanski says it better than I ever could

*I don’t want this to sound wrong because I obviously respect journalists who are able to get true information and break news. And I fully embrace our responsibility to protect sources. But how can anyone respect the lawyers and others who are leaking names in clear contempt of court? I mean, nobody can hide behind Watergate here—this isn’t exactly an issue of national gravity. They’re leaking names of BASEBALL PLAYERS who tested positive for steroids in an ANONYMOUS TEST taken back in 2003. Hard to see how they’re serving the public good here.

And now you hear people saying that since the names will get leaked out anyway, baseball should just release the entire list and be done with it. That sounds fine except ... the lists have been leaked unethically and perhaps illegally. The players took those tests with the expressed understanding that they would remain anonymous and the results would be destroyed. And their rights are being trampled. Maybe deceitful leaking is not as interesting a story as the latest big name user. But it’s hard to understand how so much anger can be spilled over athletes who took performance enhancers so they could play their sport better and so little is over self-interested people who are underhandedly and perhaps unlawfully giving out names.

Like most fans, I’m just sick of this story.  Steroids are bad, but the “scandal” is completely out of proportion to the offenses.  It’s no more interesting to a real baseball fan than the Michael Vick nonsense is to real football fans. 

I’d like to know why the Commissioner’s office doesn’t do more to fight this on both the legal and public relations fronts.  Other sports have the same PED issues (football is probably much, much worse), yet all the idiotic ESPN talk is about baseball. 

Enough already.  It’s way past time to close the books on this era and just move on.

Sim, the realist/cynic in me is convinced Bud is THRILLED every time a new name gets leaked.  It paints the players, and the MLBPA, in a bad light, most of the attention goes on them - which (in Bud’s mind at least) gives him leverage in the next CBA.  And when Bud is asked about it, he can tout his wonderful new testing program and how awesome it is and boy if only that nasty MLBPA would have let him implement it years ago like he always wanted to and blah blah blah.

Besides, outside of moralizing sportswriters, where is the PR hit for baseball?  Outside of revenue loss due to the downturn, its not like people are giving less money to MLB because of PED usage.  As long as the revenue is there, there is no PR hit for MLB.

Then you just gotta find the Yankee fan.

And there ain’t no Yankee fans outside of New York, so your suspect list should be quite short.

You must be kidding right?  Why would a Yankee fan, if he/she had access to the list, out Arod first and not Ortiz/Manny?

The second statement is even more hilarious.

[note: if this is sarcasm, I apologize]

“I wanna know, both as a lawyer—and for as much as complain about the legal system, I still hold my duties as an officer of the court in pretty damn high regard—and as a baseball guy.”

So basically you have a prurient interest in someone else’s criminal activity.  Sound familiar?

Jack:

“Criminal activity harms people and communities…that’s why its criminal. There is no right of privacy where criminal acts are concerned. What the hell are you talking about?”

Except for illegal drug users?  Steroids are illegal right?  Transporting them accross international borders is illegal, yes? 

I’m just pointing out that while everyone wants to protect the privacy of the players (and I do as well), it seems odd that no one wants to protect the privacy of the leaker.  They’re both criminals who have been promised confidentiality of sorts, right?

Sorry to be repetitive, but so far we seem to have this, as per the New York Times’ breaking (yesterday) story:

David Ortiz, tested positive for PEDs, “according to lawyers with knowledge of the results.”

However, these lawyers “did not identify which drugs were detected.”

The Times rather quaintly adds that “The lawyers spoke anonymously because the testing information was under seal by a court order.”

But if Donald Fehr (a practicing attorney, last I heard) is to be believed, and that

“The leaking of information under a court seal is a crime,” and furthermore “The active pursuit of information that may not lawfully be disclosed because it is under court seal is a crime,”

then desire for anonymity is pretty understandable, since we’re looking at lawyers unlawfully leaking information to reporters who illegally solicited the dirt.

So: A criminal tells another criminal about an alleged drug test that supposedly took place six years ago; it resulted in (dis)positive results for a mystery substance that ranged somewhere on the scale between cough drops and extract of pineal gland.

And?

Doesn’t Occam’s Razor as well as history suggest the leak comes from the US government? Is this whole steroids investigation anything but another government PR extravaganza - to “vindicate the awful majesty of the state”, as the Romans did?

By the way, I’m one of “those men” concerned with losing freedoms. That’s why I despise everything the last president did, despise the way the current one continues the worst of it (while blandly lying about it all), and I don’t admire North Korea so much that I want their health care system. I also despise the growing lack of accountability for government prosecutors and enforcers, of which the steroids flap appears to be a nasty little sideshow.

The lawyer-leaker in the BALCO case only came forward as the reporters were about to be sent to jail. Not sure what the shield law situation is right now—-if there is one that is applicable, it’s not going to happen.

Don’t get ahead of yourselves, gentlemen. Let’s catch the leaker first.