The New York Times reported last week that former Chicago Cubs slugger Sammy Sosa was on a list of 103 players who tested positive for performance enhancing drugs in 2003.
Sosa, 40, a seven-time All-Star selection and six-time Silver Slugger Award winner, helped revitalize the game of baseball in 1998 when he and fellow juicehead Mark McGwire pursued Roger Maris’ home run record.
“Slamming Sammy,” who won the 1998 NL MVP and ultimately broke Maris’ mark when he finished that season with 66 home runs, has long been rumored to have abused anabolic steroids during his playing career.
The native of the Dominican Republic is simply the latest name in a growing list of Major League Baseball superstars to be publicly exposed as a charlatan.
In July of 2002, Sports Illustrated columnist Rick Reilly confronted Sosa about his alleged steroid abuse at his Wrigley Field locker and he asked the onetime “Windy City” icon to take a drug test to prove that his feats on the diamond were legitimate.
“You’ve said if baseball tests for steroids, you want to be first in line, right?” Reilly asked an unprepared Sosa.
“Yes,” replied the man who tallied 609 career home runs from 1989-2007.
“Well, why wait?” Reilly said.
According to Reilly, at this point he wrote down the name and phone number of a local LabCorp and he handed the information to Sosa.
Reilly then informed the 2000 Home Run Derby winner that the test could be conducted with either a blood or urine sample and the results of the examination would be returned within 10 days.
“Why wait to see what the players’ association will do?” Reilly continued. “Why not step up right now and be tested? You show everybody you are clean. It’ll lift a cloud off you and a cloud off the game. It’ll show the fans that all these great numbers you’re putting up are for real.”
The questions posed apparently chapped the 1998 Roberto Clemente Award winner’s ass and Reilly said, “Sosa’s neck veins started to bulge.”
“Why are you telling me to do this?” questioned the muscleman who once looked as physically imposing as Flavor Flav when he made his professional debut with the Texas Rangers in 1989.
“You don’t tell me what to do,” Sosa persisted. “You’re not my father! Why do you tell me what to do? Are you trying to get me in trouble?”
Reilly says he then asked Sosa how he could get in trouble if he never did anything wrong.
“I don’t need to go nowhere,” Sosa yelled. “I’ll wait for the players’ association to decide what to do. If they make the decision (to test), I will be first in line.”
Reilly wanted to plead his case further. But, Sosa stepped forward and said “This interview is over! Over, motherfucker!”
Three years later in 2005 at a hearing before congress, Sosa mysteriously forgot how to speak the English language.
So, his attorney testified on his behalf and stated, “To be clear, I have never taken illegal performance enhancing drugs. I have never injected myself or had anyone inject me with anything. I have not broken the laws of the United States or the laws of the Dominican Republic. I have been tested as recently as 2004, and I am clean.”
Sosa, who was also caught cheating when he used a corked bat in a 2003 game, is a yellow weasel and he does not deserve to be inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
In a recent interview with ESPN Deportes, Sosa said he would “calmly wait” for his induction into the Hall of Fame.
Sosa will become eligible for induction in 2013.
One can only hope that Sosa “calmly” waits for a ticket to Cooperstown for the remainder of his life without ever seeing his dream realized.
The Hall’s motto is “Preserving History. Honoring Excellence. Connecting Generations.”
“History” should forget about Sammy Sosa.
Sammy Sosa would never have approached “excellence” without the benefits of synthetic testosterone.
For the health of the “American Pastime,” this rogue era should be erased and never connected to another generation.
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