By now, if you tune in to ESPN or do much browsing around the Internet, you’ve heard or read about the firestorm created by an article on Midwest Sports Fans about Philadelphia Phillies slugger Raul Ibanez linking the amazing year that he’s having at 37 to performance-enhancing drugs.
The article has landed the writer, Jerod Morris (or JRod, as is his alias on MSF), in a lot of hot water with Ibanez, Phillies fans, and incensed sports fans, and it also earned him national exposure and an appearance on ESPN’s Outside the Lines, where, by all accounts, he didn’t exactly have the coziest of times.
I only caught wind of the whole situation after it’d blown up, and then I took the time to read both the original article and Morris’ follow-up comments. And honestly, all those who are taking the time to rip this guy need to take a step back and look at the situation a lot deeper.
I’m not defending what Morris said because I’m a fellow blogger. Plain and simple, if it appeared that he blatantly came out with the intent of slandering someone and grabbing some headlines, then I’d call him on it, but from reading all that he said, it certainly doesn’t appear to be the case.
I’m defending him because plain and simple, no one can put horns on this guy for doing what he did when it’s been done by the mainstream media many, many times and will continue to be - and a lot more explicitly than Morris did. There are some things that he wishes he’d done differently (from doing a little more research to prettying himself up for his ESPN appearance - thank goodness it wasn’t me, I’d have been super transparent times 10), but if you take the time to read what he wrote, it’s nowhere near as damning as some things I’ve seen written about other athletes and personalities in the past.
What it comes down though, is the fact that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with skepticism, because as sports fans, we’re tired of getting fooled, and no one is beyond being questioned. It’s a product of the current climate of the game, brought on by Ibanez’s peers who chose to run afoul of the rules and then, on multiple occasions at that, be dishonest about their actions with the public. In doing so, they hurt their integrity and reputation, and with it, hurt the sport and set peers like Ibanez up to be questioned, whether or not their peers are doing the same thing.
I don’t fault Ibanez for reacting the way that he did, sans the increasingly redundant blogger jibe that seems to be a staple of everyone who insults bloggers (and that‘s another can of worms for another time). Often when someone is even implicitly accused of doing something wrong, they’re going to fly off the handle about it, whether or not they’re innocent or guilty. No one likes being accused of something, whether they’re hurt that someone could even think to make an attack on their character or whether they’re pissed that they’re caught red-handed. It’s human nature, nothing more, nothing less.
But truth be told, you can’t fault Morris for raising the question, and not because of the numbers that Ibanez is putting up at this stage of his career (though, considering that he‘s on pace for 57 homers and 156 RBI when his previous career highs are 33 homers and 123 RBI, I don‘t think Morris is the only person to want to, at the very least, analyze the production spike - he‘s just the one that came out and did it, or at least got recognition for doing it).
In this day and age, when a number of our favorite athletes have knowingly misled us, we have a right to ask questions, to be curious, whether or not we express that curiosity within ourselves, in conversations with fellow sports fans, in letters to the publications we read, or in the outlet that Morris did. Everyone is open to scrutiny, and no one can be trusted, whether or not they donate half their salary to saving orphans, are openly devoted to their wife and children, or take the time to fulfill every autograph request and answer every fan letter they receive.
You can call me a cynic or a pessimist, but I’m simply being realistic. If Manny Ramirez getting suspended didn’t teach us a lesson to never hold any of our sports heroes above the rules, then nothing will. Nice guys they may be or appear to be, they can’t be held in any higher regard than someone you walk past on the street. Just like your pastor can stand there on Sundays and tell you about doing what‘s right and then going and doing the exact opposite as soon as he leaves the pulpit, your favorite athlete can lie about not using performance-enhancing drugs.
It’s not about going on a wild goose chase and indicting every overachieving ballplayer. But had the right people asked more questions in the past and forced the issue, then we wouldn’t be in a position of having to ask a lot more questions now.
Until/unless they get busted, only those people themselves know if they’re being truthful, and it’s up to us to take their actions and words and decide whether or not to trust them. Unfortunately, we’ve gotten burned for believing in people a little too much recently, and in the end, that’s the issue that we should be focusing on, not who Morris was accusing, his journalistic credentials, or his age and current living situation. It’s the world that we’ve come to, and as a sports fan and as a person, that makes me pretty sad to think about.
