Carlton Fisk Goes Off On Steroid Users

When I was a kid just starting my love affair with the game of baseball and the Chicago White Sox, one of my favorite players was Sox catcher Carlton Fisk.  I was too young at the time to even know that he had spent many years with the Boston Red Sox before coming to Chicago -- I remember being very confused the first time I saw that memorable shot of his home run in game six of the 1975 World Series -- but I wasn't too young to realize that baseball players were getting stronger as Fisk's career came to an end.

I'm not sure what exactly tipped me off to steroid use in baseball at such a young age, maybe my dad had said something about it, but I do remember making jokes with friends about Jose Canseco and his shrunken testicles in junior high.

So if I was aware of what was going on, then surely other people had to be too.  Fisk knew what was going on as well, and after reading his quotes in the Chicago Tribune on Tuesday morning, it's pretty apparent that Pudge wasn't a proponent of the stuff.

"I didn't just find this out," Fisk told the Tribune Tuesday from Florida. "I worked hard in the gym to look like I did and feel like I felt. (Catching) took a toll on me, too. A lot of people knew. Nobody wanted to really address the issue.


"But when you have some of these obscene numbers being put up by people who shouldn't even be there. … I mean, you know what's going on. … The people it should have been most obvious to are the people who covered it up by not addressing it.


"You don't blame people for not ratting them out; you blame the people who abused the pharmaceutical world. It's not like you are taking a couple of aspirin and you don't know what's going on. (Non-prescription steroid use has been) a federal offense for a long time, regardless of whether baseball was recognizing it and putting rules into place. The people who did it … they were breaking the law to start with. It doesn't have to be a baseball law. They knew what they were doing and the reason they were doing it. Now they are sorry because they are getting called out."

 Fisk goes on to criticize Mark McGwire, and Roger Clemens in the article, taking some nice shots along the way.  Though if I had to pinpoint my favorite quote it would be this one about players using steroids to help their bodies recover from injuries quicker.

"Try having your knees operated on and catching for 30 years," Fisk said. "Do you think you feel good when you go out there? (McGwire) had to stand around and play first base. So excuuuuuse me."

That's five "U"s worth of sass right there!

As for Fisk's opinions on steroids, I don't disagree with most of what he said.  There is plenty of blame to go around when it comes to the Steroids Era in baseball, and it doesn't all lie at the feet of the players.  It's just that, personally, I don't have that much of a problem with steroid use in baseball.

Maybe it's because I was so aware of it when I was growing up with the game that I just accepted it as part of the sport.