When I was ten, baseball couldn’t have been more perfect. Everything about the game fascinated me. I loved to play it, watch it and read about the players who became my heroes. Even though baseball players could hit a ball 500 feet and throw 90 mph, I realized they were still human beings. I knew they made mistakes. I just didn’t realize how big those mistakes could be. October 1988: Washington Post baseball writer Thomas Boswell claims Jose Canseco is “the most conspicuous example of a player who has made himself great with steroids.” Canseco denies the claims. Canseco, the bronzed Oakland Athletic slugger, has just become the first player to hit 40 home runs and have 40 steals in a single season. He goes on to win the MVP award at the end of the year. This sets in motion the most devastating scandal ever to hit professional sports. Over its 141 year history, baseball has endured many hardships and weathered many scandals, from the notorious spitball era, when players would rub tobacco and dirt on the ball, making it impossible to see it, to the Black Sox scandal of 1919. Baseball has come out damaged but intact. It survived
