Baseball

Much has been made of Manny Ramirez's suspension for using performance-enhancing drugs, and rightfully so. When one of Major League Baseball's most prominent stars embroils himself in the game's biggest scandal, it figures to get a lot of run in the media.

If you listen closely to the static, somewhere in all the volume are whispers about how the revelation benefits no team more than our beloved San Francisco Giants—about how the 50-game hiatus for Manny has saved the Orange and Black season.

To a degree, the whispers are appropriate.

This is a situation that I was not too eager to broach, but now that it's the halfway mark into May and the home-run total by David Ortiz matches my career total, it's time.

When do the Red Sox make a change with David Ortiz?

The Mets lost two out of three to the Braves, which isn’t a complete disaster, but the games were filled with baserunning blunders, fielding miscues and all around sloppy play. The good news is that they’re showing they have some fight in them by coming from behind the last two games (but falling short yesterday). But we’ll start with the bad news.

Look, it's one thing when you flip on the local coverage of a local ballclub.  In those situations, you can stomach the Hawk Harrelsons, Bob Brenlys, and the rest of the clowns who only have eyes for the home dugout.

Personally, I prefer my broadcast booth to play it closer to the middle—give me sound analysis of both uniforms, keep it entertaining, and mix in a subtle air of hometown loyalty.

It's not even because Manny Ramirez wears Los Angeles Dodger blue (OK, that's part of it).

In news I'm sure you'll hear from my fingers first, Ramirez has tested positive for human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG). 

Although his agent, that bastion of credibility and integrity Scott Boras, tried at first to spin it away with a story about a prescribed medication for a personal ailment, I'm beginning to think that might not be the case.

Right off the bat, hCG is a female fertility drug.

Yet another domino fell in the ongoing defamation of baseball in this generation.  Add to the list of household names to be crucified for their actions now and forever, Manny Ramirez.

Manny is not the topic of this article, but his situation must be mentioned to really drive the point home. Manny now joins this generations group of baseball dunces, and sure the baseball community is shocked, but really how shocked are they at this point? 

Canseco has been trying to tell us for years.

When the news broke that everyone's favorite dreadlocked slugger, Manny Ramirez, had been suspended for 50 games after testing positive for a banned substance, we were immediately greeted with the usual hand-wringing dispatches about preserving "the sanctity of the game" and calls for "zero tolerance" for steroid users.

Welp, here we go again.

Another superstar caught with a failed PED test. Another person Jose Canseco has busted before an official leak came out.

By this time today, you've all heard the story.

Manny Ramirez has tested positive for a banned substance and will be suspended for 50 days by Major League Baseball.