The Low-Down on the Mitchell Report

Live Mitchell presser. The ESPN ticker at the bottom of the screen reads:

Breaking News: Mitchell: "Illegal anabolic steroids have been in widespread use in baseball for a number of years now. Announces next investigation: corroborate roundness of Earth, existence of human life thereon."

Seriously, dude? That's your conclusion? I couldn't help but think of what the running equivalent would be: WADA calling a big press conference to say, Yes, indeed there IS doping in running, and announcing a failed drug test for yours truly. To all my fans, I'm sorry. Frankly, at the end of the afternoon we all learned one thing, and one thing only... Adam Piatt? Bart Miadich? Clearly, steroids and HGH are not necessarily performance-enhancers.

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OMG! WE HAVE STEROID NAMES! MAYBE!

In 30 minutes, the Mitchell Report will drop. Because we are one of those blogs CAPTAIN CHEEZ DOODLE, STEPHEN A SMITH, among others hate so fiercely, we are going to exercise that blogger-right for which they so hate us: rampant speculation devoid of any fact-checking. An alleged leak filtered several names down the pipe and I'm hearing that, "in addition to the big names" (I take that to mean those involved in the House committee hearing - Palmeiro, McGwire, etc) we will see the following among The Named... [after the jump, of course]

Ramon Castro
Lenny Dykstra
Mo Vaughn
Wally Joyner
Darryl Kile
Alberta Pujols
Johnny Damon
Jason Varitek
Kerry Wood
Mark Prior
Roger Clemens
Andy Pettite
David Ortiz

Some surprises in there. Believe it or not..... Mike Piazza? Explicitly, specifically NOT included. Finally, I also expect to see Brady Anderson named twice. Because, I mean... c'mon.

[ edit: the originator of this hearsay clearly got his "leak" from the fake list circulating the Internets as many of those names did not turn up in the Mitchell report. (actual list here, via Deadspin) Given that this guy is an employee of one of the MLB clubs most heavily involved in this whole business, though, I had my fingers crossed that it was grade-A, premium, don't-bring-that-Mexican-faux-bullshit-in-here dirt. ]

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