No, believe it or not, Tim McCarver was not the one to bring that particular truth bomb to the world. Johnny Damon was. 

Yesterday, in that display of Yankee support we’ve been hearing so much about, Damon spoke out in A-Roid’s defense, saying, “Yeah he did some bad things. He took a steroid. Definitely do not condone that, at all, but there could be a lot worse things he could have been doing out there. He hasn’t done a crime. So there’s worse things that he could have done but you know I’ve known Alex since he was 15 and he’s always been super nice to me and so I’m going to support him and try help him through this time.”

When asked what would have been worse, I can only imagine Damon sense of self-satisfaction when he came up with his answer: “Murdering someone.”

Oh, SNAP.  In your face, journalist.

And a lesson to us all.  Don’t judge the morality of a person’s actions in isolation-only in comparison with other, much more heinous actions. 

(But note to Damon: A-Rod actually has “done a crime.”  It’s called the use of illegal steroids.  Thanks for playing though.  You’ve been a great, albeit, borderline brain damaged contestant.)

But, still, Johnny Damon did not defend A-Roid’s steroid use.  Like he said, he definitely does not condone it at all.  And you want to know what I do not condone at all, Johnny Damon?  Your use of hair product.  I mean, oy vey, man.

I know that you mean well, Johnny, but I think that A-Rod is managing this particular situation without your “help.”  If A-Rod needs someone to say something stupid in his defense, rest assured that he can say it himself.

I got a chance to start The Yankee Years, but I’m not going to comment on Torre or A-Fraud or any of that.  I will reserve judgment on the more tawdry aspects of the book until I’ve finished it.   But I do want to share something that struck me as I was reading.

In 1998, the Yankees’ blowout season, the season they won 114 games, the one we look back on all starry-eyed and wistfully, no one on the Yankees hit more than 28 home runs.  That’s right.  No one.  But they did manage to lead the league in runs.  And walks.  Yeah, I know.  Walks.  Pretty boring.  Especially back then-before every walk at the Stadium was sponsored by Johnnie Walker.  (You stay classy, New York Yankees.)

I point this out merely because this was the same year that people were going loco over Sosa and McJuicer.  The year that they were battling it out for the home run record, and in so doing, supposedly “saving baseball.”

Super heroes for the new millennium.

But at the end of the day, Sosa and the Cubs got eliminated in a three game sweep in the DS.  McJuicer’s Cards didn’t even make it to the playoffs.  Not even close.  There can be no doubt that getting juiced and going for long balls can do quite a bit to boost a player’s personal stats and gives the fans a little something to get worked up about.  But it doesn’t necessarily make for a winning team, or good baseball for that matter.

Hell, remember the Giants back when Bonds was trying to break Aaron’s career home run record?  Watching that team was about as fun as watching paint dry.  But without the benefit of knowing that you were going to end up with something freshly painted at the end of the game.

We may get a certain sense of instant gratification from the big hits. A sacrifice bunt or an RBI single don’t give us quite that same surge.  But, when combined, the payoff is often greater.  It’s just that it comes a little later on. In October.

And at that point, I think that most of us agree that it’s always well worth the wait.