This year's MLB season has be turned on it's ear from the recent unveiling of positive a tests from an"anonymous and private" 2003 banned substances list.  The results of the testing revealed  three of the galacticos of the current  game, Manny Ramirez, David Ortiz, and Alex Rodriguez had tested positive for performance enhancing drugs or PEDs.  The current MLB testing policy wasn't in place until the 2006 season, rendering these tests hollow and void.  As heavily as it's scrutinized and reported on,  you would think that the players knowingly violated the rules.  Not the rules of the United States as relating to illegal steroid use, but what rules MLB had in place, at the time.  MLB didn't have steroids, HGH, or many of the other PEDs that are now on the banned list.

Not saying at all I accept or support athletes taking PED's, but if at the time of  the positive test it wasn't a violation of the rules then what the players did was technically legal.  Whether or not the media, you or I believe it's an appropriate or inappropriate action, players have done it to gain a competitive edge but also an advantage in dealing with their contracts.  That said, how much of a competitive advantage do they gain, that's the real question. There's no tangible evidence as to how much the players that have used gained from using.  You also have to take into consideration long term users to short term, and specifically identify which PEDs each person took and the benefits of them for pitchers and hitters.  There's too much gray area to accurately define and point out exactly what happened.  Just as there is no way to tell how much amphetamines or "greenies" as they are called by those in baseball helped boost players performances and statistics over decades of their use.

This leads me to my point.  The legends of the game Hank Aaron and Harmon Killebrew and others have recently said they wanted the entire list of players that tested positive to be exposed.  Which in itself is ridiculous, this was supposed to be a voluntary, anonymous and private test.  None of the names were to be released, yet three have been for whatever reason.  Aaron and Killebrew also talked about the integrity of the game being damaged.  Is there going to be a stain or cloud over the game for the foreseeable future? Without question. The players that are on the list lives shouldn't be ruined just for sake of curiousity or cleansing of the game though. Should the list of players be revealed it would only open a pandoras box.  There will be no end to wanting to know how far back PEDs date in the game and who took them.  No end to questioning players statistics and their place in the annals of the game.  This may very well happen anyway, but it shouldn't be at the expense of the players that haven't been named from the list.

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