Ibanez Steroid Use?

Earlier this week on miswestsportsfans.com they wrote an article about Raul Ibanez and tried to explain his torrid start to the season.

Ibanez lashes out about possible steroid use

To summarize the article briefly he brown down his stats and looked at what ballparks he hit the home runs and off what pitchers and also looking at his career statistics.  After doing all of that he said speculation of potential steroid use, while unfair, is warranted.

After that  the story blew up and not before long mainstream media was talking about it.  The Philadelphia Inquirer wrote a story in which the author called it a cheap shot.  Then Raul Ibanez lashed out about the allegations saying “I’ll come after people who are trying to defame or slander me.”

Ibanez went on to say “”You can have my urine, my hair, my blood, my stool — anything you can test,  I’ll give you back every dime I’ve ever made if it’s positive.”  He added  “I’ll put that up against the jobs of anyone who writes this stuff.  Make them accountable…”

Then on Outside the Lines the blogger, the columinst, and a writer for foxsports discussed it the issue.  The discussion was mainly a two on one bashing of the blogger who couldn’t say anything without getting shut down.

Now this brings us to the question of whether or not he was right in writing the original story.  After reading what the original blogger wrote I have no issue at all with what he did.

When he set out to write the article he was trying to disprove that Ibanez was not using steroids.  In his conclusion he said that it was impossible to conclude to determine from the factors he looked at and in today’s world if a 37 year old is having a career season he will be suspect to speculation.  It’s not fair to Raul Ibanez, which he says, but you can’t blame anyone giving the recent history of baseball.

Raul Ibanez does have a right to be upset but he went a little overboard with his comments though.  All he was doing was writing an honest piece and he can say whatever he wants in it.  The first amendment does give everyone the right to free speech so he can write whatever he wants to.  He shouldn’t be worried about people say about him.  People will always find a way to say something negative and demean someone else.  He should be focusing on maintaining his current pace and not what some blogger may say about him.  All the blogger was doing was trying to write an interesting piece on some rumors he and his friends talked about.

You don’t see David Ortiz speaking out like this and Papi has been hit much harder.  It’s been much more than one blogger that has attacked him.  Even established newspapers and ESPN have talked about his possible steroid use.  But you don’t see Big Papi crying and complaining but rather keeping his mouth shut and now he’s starting to turn  it around a little bit.

I’m not trying to say Ibanez was wrong either.  He has a right to speak his mind and be upset over the commments made.  He is having a tremendous seaosn and if he truly is clean he doesn’t deserve this specualtion.  But this is the world in we live today.  Any baseball player that puts up a stats thats are inconsistant with his carrer numbers will be quesiotned and a small sotry on a blog can turn mainstream in a second and the whole world will know about.  That is the why things are right now and its not changing.