Are the Feds now making mlb into a victim?

Going back how far? Mitchell? BALCO?

 

"Hey Papi just pee in this cup. We protect your identity. Don't worry" / Donald Fehr

 

People should be concerned about how this affects their own allegedly confidential drug testing programs (whether it's for medical treatment, employment or insurance or EAPs) but because the feds are going after rich, greedy ballplayers, they're cheering for the feds.

 

The Mitchell Report was a bad idea poorly executed. It named dozens of players using less evidence than would be required to discipline them under the CBA. In fact, had MLB attempted to discipline players named in the report it would have been limited a handful of legitimate cases and even they would have had a good chance of reversing discipline in an arbitration.

I believe the real reason Mitchell recommended no discipline was that he fully understood it would undermine his efforts when few if any of the allegations held up to a neutral arbitrator's review.

And the feds can fight steroids in sports all they like and I'll applaud them for it as long as they don't use that "good fight" as a way to disguise blatant efforts to gain continually broader access to employees' confidential medical information without cause.

 

The crapola factor is this: Mitchell et al crying for the safety and well-being of children and young athletes. Well, gosh, who's selling illegal PEDs to those kids? And if you're serious about solving that problem, shouldn't you also support the effort to put away the dealers and suppliers?

 

One would need to be terminally naive (or a reporter trying to breath life into a potentially salacious story) in order to buy into the "it's all about the kids" rationale. So, no, I don't support unchecked efforts to put away dealers and suppliers by any means necessary.

 

Exactly. But the 'save the children' mantra was ostensibly the cornerstone of Mitchell's work, and MLB's support of it. So isn't it ludicrous then to stand in the way of further investigation?

 

Using that logic, we might as well toss aside the fourth and fifth amendments.

 

MLB already got what it wanted -- a stronger drug-testing provision in its CBA. Now it's justifiably concerned that its ability to reach agreement with the union on any future drug testing would be severely hampered if confidentiality -- a deal breaker -- can be breached so easily.

How could MLB make a good-faith agreement with the union that the testing was confidential then fail to help protect that confidentiality when challenged?

The union, for its part, was opposed to the Mitchell Report from the beginning, of course.

 

I'm sure Bud Selig is delighted to let the Feds take the whole mess out of his hands. So don't expect the league to put up any kind of constitutional fight on the matter. The PA should of course try to mount a right-to-privacy defense, but will have very little popular support for doing so.

To those in favor of the Feds rooting around in the players' lab results, I'd ask this: would we all be so sanguine if they were rifling the drug-test records of Wal-Mart employees - or newspaper employees - looking for leverage to mount a case against local crack dealers?

 

I'd bet MLB lawyers are already involved and defending their agreement. They have a lot to lose if they don't demonstrate solidarity with the union in defense of a collectively bargained provision, especially one that benefits the league. In fact, employers around the country should be disturbed by this development because it will adversely affect their ability to obtain such agreements, too.

Hell, the Chamber of Commerce should be getting behind MLB and the PA on this one.