Jose Canseco Was Right About Steroid Users
Many Accusations About Performance-Enhancing Drugs Prove True
May 13, 2009
A little more than four years ago, Jose Canseco released a tell-all biography entitled Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Hits, and How Baseball Got Big. The book detailed Canseco's own steroid use, and alleged that as many as 85% of Major League Baseball players were taking some kind of performance-enhancing drugs. Canseco also specifically identified a number of players whom he claimed were users, including Rafael Palmeiro, Mark McGwire, Juan Gonzalez and Ivan Rodriguez.
In its review of the book, the New York Observer reported, “One gets the overwhelming impression that Mr. Canseco is delusional.”
Players throughout the league, whether named in the book or not, claimed that Canseco was either broke and needed the money, was bitter at baseball and lashing out at the entire game, or, as the Observer had said, he was simply delusional.
Four years after the fact, however, it’s become clear that Canseco’s allegations weren’t “delusional” at all. In fact, many of his accusations, some of which did seem very dubious at the time, have turned out to be dead-on accurate.
Rafael Palmeiro's Steroid Embarrassment
Before the release of Canseco’s book, Rafael Palmeiro had a clean-cut image, almost 3,000 hits and more than 500 home runs. So it was a huge surprise when Canseco claimed that he had introduced Palmeiro to performance enhancing drugs, and had injected the first baseman with steroids “many times".
Palmeiro denied the accusation, first in the press and then in front of Congress, saying, as he pointed his finger emphatically, “Let me start by telling you this: I have never used steroids, period. I don't know how to say it any more clearly than that. Never.” Five months later, Palmeiro tested positive for Winstrol, a steroid, and was suspended for 10 games.
After the season, he filed for free agency, but didn’t receive any offers. Although he never announced his retirement formally, Palmeiro's career is over. And it was ended by steroids.
Mark McGwire
Canseco also claimed that he introduced Mark McGwire to steroids and actually injected Big Mac in the depths of the Oakland Coliseum back in the late 1980s when the Bash Brothers led the A’s to three straight American League pennants and one World Series title. At the same hearing where Palmeiro issued his infamous denial, McGwire refused to answer questions about possible steroid use, saying that “he did not want to focus on the past.”
Most interpreted McGwire's actions as a clever, not-so-subtle assertion of his fifth amendment rights. Or, to put it more bluntly, an implied admission of guilt.
Other Alleged Steroid Users in Canseco's Book
Among the other players that Canseco implicated were Juan Gonzalez, Brett Boone, Brady Anderson, Roger Clemens and Ivan Rodriguez. They all denied it. Three years later, they were all identified in the Mitchell Report as steroid users.
Alex Rodriguez's Steroid Use
In 2007, Canseco tried to find a publisher for a follow-up to his controversial debut. During marketing efforts for the book, Canseco claimed that he was going to reveal some “stuff” that he had on Alex Rodriguez, whom he called a "hypocrite" with respect to the steroid issue. Rodriguez denied the implication that he was a steroid user, and denied that he had ever taken performance-enhancing drugs. Anyone who watches baseball or pays attention to the news knows what happened there.
Canseco's Claim that 85% of Players Used Steroids
Canseco’s estimation that up to 85% of major leaguers remains a fairly outlandish, and almost certainly exaggerated, claim. However, his general accusations that the steroid problem was much more widespread than Major League Baseball or Commissioner Bud Selig were willing to admit back in 2005 was obviously on target.
With the limited information that has come out from the Mitchell Report, Grand Jury leaks, and positive test results, it is apparent that the steroid problem was systemic for at least a decade. Maybe not 85% systemic, but certainly more than the 5% Selig said it was in 2005.
Vindicated, which is the tentative title for Canseco's second book, has not yet been picked up by a publisher. With the recent A-Rod and Manny scandals, however, one would think that somebody will give Jose the money to crank out a sequel. If he does write the book, fans and readers may want to heed his words because as silly and outrageous as many of his claims have seemed, a lot of them have proven to be true, which, at least partially, vindicates Mr. Canseco.
