Baseball *had* to do something with its sport in 1920. The Black Sox scandal, in its own way, improved the product, a political scandal that cleaned out the dirt. Even the people in the game (owners) who in many ways benefited from gambling the same way the owners today did from steroids, came out of the Black Sox scandal better for it. Steroids isn’t so simple a matter, and nobody has come out of this scandal viewed in higher public regard.

The difference is in the cynicism of today’s leadership that because fans continued to attend the sport, the damage to the game is somehow minimized. This is why steroids are worse, because though showing no outward signs of disease, the body is dying from within. People don’t believe in the game’s power as they once did. Gambling in many cases, was easier, because its danger _ people were buying fewer tickets _ was more obvious. The devaluing of the HR record in its own way undermined the victory of management following the Black Sox. Baseball’s place, its standing in the (sports) world is what has been lost (sound familiar?) The question that has not died is this: “Can you have an economic renaissance and a moral catastrophe at the same time? Which vision wins?” There was no such dilemma in 1920. What needed to be done was clear. Baseball today more resembles an inflated stock. The black sox scandal is only worse than steroids if you assume that MLB can only be judged by revenues and nothing more.