Your 1998 “Juiced” Baseballs Scandal Nine Years Later
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by user LastRow
Let’s all go back to the Major League Baseball season of 1998…The season where it brought baseball “officially back”! Why, it was the year of the homerun…Balls were flying out of ballparks left & right. Inparticularly the ballpark known as the “Old Busch Stadium”, there balls were flying off and landing in the bleachers at a faster clip than chicks flinging their clothes off and diving into the Playboy Mansion’s pool…And let me tell you something, that’s hard to believe, for I’ve seen that with my own peepers! Perhaps that’s why “Chicks dig, (or dug) the long ball?” Well, nine years have past since we watched McGwire & Sosa swing their swizzle sticks around in utter amazement and now we come to find out that the balls were juiced? Yes, I did say the balls were juiced!
Gosh, I feel so used! A company that uses computer imaging claims baseballs had a larger rubberized core and a synthetic rubber ring in 1998, including the ball Mark McGwire hit for his 70th homer. Cool…That’s all well and good, the balls back then were on Viagra. No biggie, there’s viagra dispensers in every bathroom of the Playboy Mansion as well…I guess Hef likes having juiced balls, but who doesn’t, right? Although I don’t know if anybody has noticed or not, while number 70 was the record at the time…Well, it isn’t anymore. Universal Medical Systems Inc. said Wednesday that with the assistance of Dr. Avrami S. Grader and Dr. Philip M. Halleck from The Center for Quantitative Imaging at Penn State, it took images of 1998 baseballs. "Examining the CT images of Mark McGwire's 70th home run ball one can clearly see the synthetic ring around the core -- or 'pill' -- of the baseball," UMS president David Zavagno said. Thanks for enlightening us about these findings, only took nine years later…Job well done on being thorough and I do mean a thorough research! I’ve watched CSI enough to know that it definitely doesn’t take anywhere close to nine years for lab reports to come back, Jack! “Pill”, huh…What were the baseballs on? Purely steroids, HGM, or a combination…Or perhaps it’s too early to determine that?
See, now there you have it. When McGwire pleaded the fifth on Capital Hill he wasn’t covering his own ass…No, no! He was trying to save the ass of Rawlings…The exclusive supplier of baseballs to the major leagues since 1977. Yes, it was these “juiced” balls and not the fact that Big Mac went from one day looking like Pee-Wee Herman to the next looking like Hulk Hogan that had anything to do with him hitting 70. Bob DuPuy, baseball's chief operating officer, said the core of the ball has been unchanged for decades. "All of our balls are subject to rigorous quality control standards and testing conducted by Rawlings," Dupuy said. "No changes have been made to the core of the ball through the entire time they have manufactured it." Nothing like having a “rigorous quality control” ball test…Something everybody should have done at least once in their life! I wonder if Baby Bob was on Capital Hill if he would still sing this same tune…Or would he have pled the fifth too?
Okay, so what does this all prove? Nothing really that everybody didn’t already know, but thanks for the 411 update! It’s not like we all didn’t know Major League Baseball turns its cheek on everything…And they haven been juicing the balls for years and will continue to do so. How is it that a league which is concerned about cleaning up the game and whose goal is to bring some integrity back to it is virtually doing the same thing Big Mac and so many others did or are currently doing by bending the rules and hoping not to get caught? Really, what’s the difference here? A cheater is a cheater regardless if it’s juiced balls, corked bats, or probing oneself with needles to turn into the Incredible Hulk. As time goes on Jose Canseco is looking better and better…At least Jose told the truth on everything instead of lying about shit like everybody seems to do in Major League Baseball!
So it’s against the rules to play with juiced baseballs, but yet MLB doesn’t seem to care and will deny it to no end. Then how is it that Pete Rose did the same thing in principle and the same league wants to pin his ass to the cross? Isn’t this a clear example of being a hypocrite? Do as I say, not as I do, isn’t that correct MLB? Let me guess, you had no idea of this? Somehow the balls got mixed up…They’re only supposed to be used for batting practice purposes only. “To help put on a show for the fans.” Gee, where have I heard that line before? Where’s Sammy Sosa?
With these new findings, isn’t it about time somebody contacts McGwire and tell him the great news and that it’s really okay to step foot outside his gated community now. I mean he was the one that drank all the shakes, popped all the pills, stabbed himself in the ass (or wherever else) with all those needles, but despite all that it was the juiced baseballs all along that helped him achieve 70 home runs! Welcome back to the human race Mark…It’s okay to once again go outside!
LastRowSports.com
