So Cheating Pays After All

Jason Tougaw
St. Louis Cardinal newly acquired shortstop Jhonny Peralta

St. Louis Cardinal newly acquired shortstop Jhonny Peralta

Just yesterday Free Agent former Detroit Tiger shortstop Jhonny Peralta signed a monster contract with the St. Louis Cardinals.

Jhonny Peralta was signed for 4 years for upwards of $50 million.

Now that isn’t such a shocking total for a Major League baseball contract. MLB contracts are getting just ridiculous, so this should surprise nobody.

What is shocking about this is Jhonny Peralta was suspended this past season for using performance enhancing drugs (PEDs.) Peralta missed over 50 games for the Tigers, and returned in time for the playoffs. While Peralta was forced to come off of the drugs that he was taking (or we imagine he would be forced to,) Peralta still played pretty well for the Tigers. With the Cardinals having an above-average player at every position other than Shortstop, the spoiled Cardinals made the move.

This contract has other baseball players and analysts in an uproar. This completely proves that cheating pays. Jhonny Peralta cheated, and it literally paid for him to do so. Doesn’t that completely tell the story of what has been going on in baseball for the last 10 or even more years?

Is baseball really eradicating this problem? Yes, they are calling players out. Yes, they are making suspensions. Yes, they are regularly checking these players.

But if players are still able to get paid after taking these drugs then what is stopping the drug use?

If I was a decent player who didn’t really have a chance to be anything special, why wouldn’t I take PEDs? If I could get paid a ton of money, then get caught, keep the money I already made, and possibly make even more money after being caught, why wouldn’t I take PEDs? If I was a player at the end of his career, fighting to stay in the league, why wouldn’t I give PEDs a shot? What is the worst that can happen? They catch me? If I were at the end of my career anyway, retiring would have been in my mind anyway.

Baseball is saving face. They are calling players out, and checking players, but they are not stopping this problem at all. If a player like Peralta can get away with this contract it shows everyone else the wide-open door to making money in the major leagues. This was baseball telling average players that they can use PEDs to make money. It is a disgrace.

Former New York Met, New York Yankee, and now Free Agent, David Aardsma, shared some thoughts on the issue via Twitter.

Arizona Diamondback relief pitcher, Brad Ziegler, also shared his thoughts via Twitter.

The players have every right to be angry. The ones who actually work hard to overcome injuries, and improve their play every single day are the ones who lose. Something has to be done about this problem. You can either allow everyone to take PEDs, or you make more strict rules.

I have always been in favor of making the rules more strict. You have to find a way to take the financial gain away from PEDs. There will always be the players who do not care about the integrity of the game. There will always be the players who just want to make a ton of money. Major League Baseball definitely needs to stop contracts like this Peralta one from happening in the future. They should put a limit on how much a player who has taken PEDs can be paid in the future. They should also take a huge fine from these players. Take away from the money that they have already made while taking PEDs. Do not allow these players to get ahead in any way.

If baseball is serious about fixing this problem, then they better show it. Taking Alex Rodriguez to court, and hearing stories about it every single day on ESPN is nice, but where are you really making your impact? How about we take our eyes off the Alex Rodriguez case for a second, and realize that a steroid user just got paid enough money to last him for the rest of his life. Lets fix that, and then get back to A-Rod.