coach weighs in on the mitchell report

what can i say about the mitchell report that hasn't already been said? my guess is probably nothing. so i'll just give my reactions.

1) none of these names surprise me. none. not barry bonds. not brian roberts, despite peter gammons going bananas over that. i'm certainly not surprised by roger clemens. i mean honestly, how do you explain a pitcher with a sub-2.00 era despite being over 40. dis is not right.

2) george mitchell is pretty much 100% right about everything. that's perhaps an over-statement but my point here is that his recommendations are proper, and everyone in baseball who's responsible for the proliferation of the steroids era, which is pretty near everyone, needs to work together to rid the game of PEDs. will they do this?

3) i think bud selig will finally get serious about this. he's likely retiring within the next three or four years. he's already going to remembered for certain things like expanded playoffs and interleague play. he's also going to be remembered, obviously, for the steroids era. he can't really do anything about that, but he can now work to help clean up the game, and be remembered for helping to solve a problem (even though he, through his negligence, helped to create it). however, this also leads me to ask another question.

4) how much does the average fan honestly care about this? i don't mean to diminish things, because i know there are some parents that care, because they see their children in high school using PEDs after seeing the professionals doing it. but MLB did just set attendance and revenue records last year. the NFL is also enjoying an era of unprecented popularity, and despite their relative clean skate through the media, they also aren't free of PED use. i really think the average fan knows that a lot of players do a lot of various things to enhance performance. at some level, we demand bigger, better, faster, more of the athletes in the leagues we actively follow. how much do we all, to one degree or another, turn our collective heads, or just accept certain things as coming with the territory? how much do we even think about it at all?

5) i think the media cares about this stuff a lot more than the average fan. it's fodder for their trade. it helps to sell papers and get website clicks. but if barry bonds wasn't such an enormous jerk, and if he hadn't been chasing the most hallowed record in sports, most americans probably wouldn't have cared nearly as much that he used steroids. in my opinion, this helped further media attention on baseball as a "dirty sport." but as i alluded to in my previous point, i wonder how much the average fan truly worries about this.

Separated at Birth: Brothers in Arms

Not only were Joaquin Phoenix and Jason Marquis separated at birth, they remain good friends to this day. In fact, occasionally they will fill in for each other, sometimes just for fun. Upon discovering this, the Rogue League sent an e-mail to both Joaquin and Jason, asking for a story of when they impersonated each other. Here now are their responses:

Jason: When Joaquin was filming Ladder 49, he asked me to fill in for him one day, after he had inhaled some smoke in one of the fire scenes. I had actually taken an acting class in high school, so I felt I was holding my own pretty well during the scenes. I guess my instincts got the best of me, though, as over lunch, I had the whole crew listening as I carefully explained baseball's balk rule. You probably know, this is a very difficult rule to understand, and I make it a priority to explain it properly to everyone I meet. The director (Jay Russell) started looking at me kind of funny. "How does an actor know so much about such a complex baseball rule," he asked. I was frozen. Luckily he was distracted by Morris Chestnut and I made a quick escape.

Joaquin: Just this year I pitched for Jason in St. Louis. He really didn't feel like going back there a second time, what with it being his old team and all. Well obviously I am an actor, not a pitcher. As you can tell from this Yahoo! box score, I got lit up, and I was not happy about it. After the game I asked Jim Edmonds to meet me out in the middle of the field. We both arrived, still in full uniform. He said he didn't really feel like talking to me, and turned to walk away. "How dare you turn your back to me," I said. "You will remove your helmet and tell me your name." But he kept walking, so I extended my left arm and slowly gave a thumbs down. Then a lion abruptly emerged from the bullpen and charged and devoured Jim whole. I told Jason about it later and he was kind of mad. Not because I had had a lion eat a person, but because other better outfielders would now get a chance to play for the Cardinals, who are of course, Jason's rival team.