Scott Boras.
His agency does far more than represent professional athletes--he is also involved in the minutiae of his clients’ careers. He provides every service imaginable for his stable including psychological counselling. There are doctors, trainers everything required for building up a player to max out whatever talents exist in a given player’s body.
For all his faults, the man provides an incredibly high level of service for the men he represents. He often boasts about how involved his agency is in the professional lives of the players under the umbrella of Borascorp.
Some of the high profile names that have been part of all this in recent years include A-Rod, Ivan Rodriguez, Eric Gagne, Kevin Brown, Rick Ankiel, Gary Sheffield and Barry Bonds.
All have been linked to the sport’s steroid era either through BALCO, positive tests, the Mitchell Report and Jose Canseco’s literary masterpiece “Green Eggs and Deca” (AKA “Juiced”).
For a man so involved in the physical and psychological upkeep of his stable could he possibly have been so ignorant or so blinded to what the players were taking?
It’s not only Boras--this isn’t the first time the action of agents have affected players in this regard. The Hendricks Bros that represented both Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte apparently didn’t pass along key correspondence from George Mitchell regarding the evidence that was uncovered that linked them to either steroids or HGH; both Any Pettitte and Roger Clemens testified regarding the multiple letters sent by Mitchell that (1) Pettitte was informed of one over the phone and (2) Clemens was completely unaware that Mitchell had tried to get in touch with him.
Of note…
One agent, who told me that he has instructed his staff to refer to Boras as “he who shall not be named,” then requested that his own name not be identified, for fear of recrimination from the union. “Gene Orza is a figurehead,” he said, referring to the chief operating officer of the Players Association. “Scott Boras is the union.”
While the comment can easily be taken as an over the top bit of snark it does illustrate that the working relationship between agents and the union is a lot cozier under Don Fehr than it was under Marvin Miller.
It does beg the question about how much various agencies knew about their clients’ steroid use. Do not forget that Kirk Radomski said he dealt with about 300 major league players not including those that networked from the original (300)--these players have agents as well.
Since Rodriguez is currently the hot topic one has to wonder when you consider that he and Boras were once BFF on the scale of Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie before “The Simple
During their bromance is there any way that the Shrivelled-Rod (well, this one is inevitable, I’d best get it started before the NY Post) wouldn’t let Boras know that particular “FYI”?
Sadly, while I know Bob Costas is blaming the naughty, naughty MLBPA for all this it’s good to bear in mind who their partners were if they decided to tackle steroid use in the game--that’s right, the owners that kept their of anonymous testing about as well as the other pledges they make--so it’s not difficult to understand that their reticence wasn’t strictly motivated by avarice but it does beg the question how much influence the agents do have considering that both parties have an interest in pushing up the salary bar by any means possible.
As I wrote back on THT after the Mitchell Report came out:
Here is where Fehr and Orza blew it—what they failed to understand (or simply ignored) is that by trying to keep an environment where players could use performance-enhancing drugs without concern of sanction, they were doing ownership a huge favor. Steroid-fueled performance was incredibly profitable and ownership didn’t want the gravy train to end. Players were risking their health by taking substances that possibly came from dubious sources and manufactured in unsanitary and unhygienic conditions.
Management didn’t care; player turnover is a fact of life in baseball. Somebody is always available to take the spot of somebody not performing should someone become injured due to steroid usage. They found an indirect ally in the MLBPA; higher profits translated into higher salaries and the interests of the salary bar were being served. Citing privacy issues, Fehr and Orza long resisted drug testing. This suited ownership just fine and it finally took government action to get both to deal with the issue in a substantive way.
Who was protecting the players now? Both sides were allowing them to take risks with their health to play in the major leagues.
Fehr and Orza’s ideologies created a multi-tiered playing field between players who used and those who did not, but also between players who could afford substances that were more sophisticated and manufactured in sanitary conditions and those who had to look to the black market to get what they needed to get or retain a job in the big leagues. Beyond this, players on the 40-man but not on the 25-man roster weren’t subject to testing while players not on the 40-man roster were subjected to regular testing.
What it boiled down to was that an aspiring major leaguer had to choose to use cheap anabolic substances created under dubious conditions or allowing players who were doing precisely that to get an available job. A lot of players gained MLBPA membership because they were willing to use these drugs to reach the major leagues. Further, two players on the same Double-A/Triple-A team competing for a 25-man roster slot may have been in a rigged contest if one was on the 40-man roster (and not subjected to testing) and the other was not.
A union that potentially creates/allows a situation where ingesting potentially toxic substances is a prerequisite to employment has lost its way. The MLBPA should be the one insuring that its membership have a healthy, safe, fair environment to work in. Pathetically, it appears that management is the one trying to create that safe workplace but is meeting resistance by the organization that should be protecting the workers it represents.
…it may be time to include agents in the group of those that exploit players. Let’s face it, they too profited handsomely from the steroid era and it seems that they were hand-in-hand with the owners and the union in seeing the money ball roll on even if it endangered player safety.
My point?
In the immediate future you’re going to be reading a lot of small, petty, jealous and vindictive editorials regarding the cheating and greedy A-Rod just as you have been about Barry Bonds; never, ever lose sight of the fact that this was an institutional failure--everyone was complicit in the steroid era. It’s just there has always been a lot of resentment toward the “spoiled, pampered, greedy, overpaid player” and we’re about to face a new round of it in the media and the comments section of the articles written.
Everybody profited big time from this: Bud Selig makes almost $18 million a year, Don Fehr is among the wealthiest union leaders in the country, player agents like Scott Boras looked the other way and reaped obscene commissions off the players that injected themselves with these substances and there is no escaping it--the “steroid boom” caused revenues to spike and this in turn showered money on all parties.
The dollar will never fall as low as the means people will stoop to acquire it. Greed won the day and it wasn’t just the players that were responsible--they had a lot of accomplices.
Never forget that.
It’s all about me!!
Field of Schemes (SMSN Sports)
THT EXCLUSIVE : Feds raid dog house on spinster’s property (For you snarkologists this was inspired by something funny my boss at SMSN did--you might wish to read this to understand that this isn’t about BLB for me--it’s about Selig; it’s just a pity that you cannot see through your own media inspired hatred of Bonds to discern that.)
Best Regards
John
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