Dear Raffy,

I'm not a doctor, nor did I stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but I'm pretty sure I can help you out with your current situation. Seven months after you tested positive for steroids, you're still at a loss as to how that happened, exactly. Well, I've pondered it for a little while now and I think I've found the answer.

The steroids got into your body because... you took them.

That's it. Period. There's no convoluted "single bullet theory" to follow or any Zapruder film to study frame-by-frame. In a brief moment of weakness - or maybe several moments, depending on how often you shot up - you chose to inject yourself with a performance-enhancing drug. Which, although it is against the rules, is a forgivable offense. Yet you still don't want to come clean. And that makes it even worse.

It wouldn't be so bad if you hadn't given us The Point. You know what I'm talking about. The second you pointed your index finger at Congress during that March 17 hearing - much like a father scolding his young son - you had us. We believed in you - more than Jose Canseco who only appeared to be shilling his autobiography at the time. Little did we know that he was the most credible person in the room that day. We believed in you more than Sammy Sosa, who apparently forgot how to speak the English language once he sat in front of that committee. And we certainly believed in you more than Mark McGwire, whose "I'm not here to talk about the past" spoke volumes about the legitimacy of his numbers.

During The Point, you said the following: "Let me start by telling you this: I have never used steroids. Period. I do not know how to say it any more clearly than that. Never." Six weeks later, you tested positive for stanozolol, which just happens to be a steroid.

You weren't actually suspended until August, however. And once the suspension came down, all you had to apologize. Look at Jason Giambi. He did exactly what you did (except for The Point), apologized for doing it without ever explaining exactly what "it" was, and now he is back in the good graces of the majority of baseball fans. We want to forgive you, Raffy, but it may be too late - the more you evade and deny the questions, the worse it gets.

So now you're a baseball outcast with 500-plus homeruns who will have a difficult time finding a team this spring. And you can forget about the Hall of Fame. You pretty much shot yourself in the foot on that front when it became clear that you shot yourself in the... wherever with that "B-12" injection.

My advice now is just to admit what you've done and hope that by the time pitchers and catchers report in February, all of your indiscretions will be long forgotten. If you're lucky.

Here's to hoping that 2006 is a better year than 2005 was...

Regards,
the single blog