A comment, naive perhaps, on your Feb 11th Insider...

Surely the right answer to that group of young men would be "It's not 2003 any more. Right now, nobody can do anything on 'roids and get away with it, for long enough to make a difference to their career."

Or is that not the case? Assuming the testing science can keep up with the cheats, it would seem that the procedures in place now, starting in both college and the Minors, will reduce the opportunity to use steroids to something negligible for a young player now entering the system.

What's done is done. Sure, many more players will be outed in the coming years, but baseball just needs to accept that. It's a fact. Perhaps Darcy Elliot is right in saying that all players testing positive should be exposed, but that's not really the point. It might be a catharsis, but that's all.

I reckon the message that should be going out loud & clear, at all levels from MLB down, is that "It's over. This is a new era".

Otherwise, fans, the general public and young players alike, will have that message lost in the white noise of shock, recrimination, buck-passing and politics. And in the never-ending parade of headlines that march across our TV and computer screens day after day. After all, let's face it:- it's that white noise that makes punchy headlines, not the vague promise of a brighter future.

We all know MLB and the Union have made a colossal mess of this whole issue dating back two decades at least, but that's history. As long as the media and baseball itself keeps confusing the history with the future, everyone will keep reacting the same way as your kids did the other night.

In truth, their response should have been something like "Yeah, isn't it great that kids our age will be among the first for a quarter century to be able to stay clean and still get drafted". Why wasn't it? It's not the kids' fault:- they're entitled to their own perceptions. But WHY are they still getting that message, 4+ years after MLB did something useful and a full 7 years after MiLB did something similar {some would say "better"}?

You described steroids as a "spreading epidemic in youth baseball". I would have thought that the opposite should be true these days. Surely the epidemic is one of discovery and publication of past sins, rather than actual current substance abuse? Isn't it a growing public awareness of just how deep the problem went, and a reluctant acceptance that a whole generation of fans and statisticians have been had? It's natural for anyone who's been duped to need to lash out at whoever betrayed their trust, and the media hysteria on this issue perhaps give a voice to that need.

Before closing, I guess I have to touch on HGH. As I understand it, there's no urine-test available for HGH, but a blood test will reveal its use. However, we can't blood-test MLB players because the Union won't allow it. EXCUSE ME? How absolutely, monumentally ridiculous is that? If you, or I, or any genuine baseball fan needs a reason to take huge rocket-propelled potshots at any arm of MLB on anything, surely this is it! I said earlier that I hoped "...the testing science can keep up with the cheats ..." and I accept that in the area of HGH, baseball is behind the eight-ball right now. However, that has nothing to do with science. It's pure politics.

So, with appropriate humility from a nobody in the colonies on the other side of the planet, here's some unsolicited advice to my American friends in a sport we all love:- challenge the Players Union to explain why it opposes a testing regime whose only possible purpose is to enforce a rule that's been in force for four years {HGH went on the banned substance list in Jan 2005}. I guess the answer might be that the Union doesn't want to expose its members to the danger that they might face from a tiny prick. In the arm during a blood test, of course. No, stop me here:- there are too many ways I could re-arrange those words to form something offensive.

In closing, I guess there's not much that Australian baseball can teach the spiritual home of the sport. Except perhaps, one small thing ....

Our National Under-18 tournament involves perhaps 100 athletes of high-school age. Of those, something like five per year might end up getting signed to US clubs, and another dozen or so will end up with US college scholarships. In each age cohort, two or three might end up playing professionally. Of those, maybe one every three or four years might end up in the Majors. Of those who do play professionally in the US, I can't remember the last time when such a kid/guy was not part of the U/18 National tournament in the year or two they were eligible.

These days, drug testing is a routine feature of competing in the Nationals here. Kids expect to be tested, and understand that their career will be flushed down the toilet if they return a positive result to anything at all. Including EPO and HGH, narcotics, stimulants and a host of masking agents for all sorts of nasty stuff.

The penalty for a first offence is a 2-year ban. Yes, a FIRST offence. That might sound harsh, especially for a 17-year-old, but the message is quite clear:- take banned substances and get caught, and you might as well queue up at the local McDonald's store for a career, because you ain't getting back into baseball. Ever. Unless you have such a prodigious talent that you can come back at age 19 or 20 and still make the cut. If that's true and you're that good, then why on earth would you need to take banned drugs at age 17? You ought to be head and shoulders above most of your peers anyway.

You're risking selection in an Australian amateur team, all funding direct or indirect, you'll forfeit any right to compete in baseball anywhere in Australia at any level, and you can't even hold a non-playing position in the sport. Most importantly, you will be beyond the radar of the scouts and have zero chance of signing professionally.

A second offence involves a lifetime ban.

We in Australia make no attempt, other than education, to control the use of banned substances for a player ranked about #101 or lower in the critical U/18 age-group:- the one that covers the transition from high school to college.

We do threaten those ranked #100 and above with some truly draconian penalties if they get caught.

The result is that of the elite kids, absolutely none risk getting caught, and I believe none take banned substances. I might be proven wrong sometime, but not so far. If a kid ranked #101 or lower is dumb enough to take the risk, then all he can hope to do is get good enough at age 19 or 20 to be noticed by a scout. After that, he'll enter the US NCAA/MiLB system and be tested anyway. He ought not last more than 5 seconds in that regime if he isn't clean.

So here's the thing ...

If high-school players in the US know they will be tested the instant they enter the college or MiLB system, then surely it can't be hard to educate them that drug-taking is a no-win proposition? If 2nd-tier players want to take drugs, then it's probably not cost-effective to test them in high school. BUT:- by making a big deal about what happens next, then surely that's enough to discourage the talented ones from offending. A small enhancement might be to subject draftees to testing from Day #1 (assuming that doesn't already happen anyway).

- Peter Schmidt, President, Hills Juniors (Australia)