Today Ryan Braun admitted to PED use and took an unpaid 65 game suspension for the rest of this season and I'm here to tell you why he got off easy and should have gotten much worse.
Braun will only miss out on 3.7 million dollars the rest of this season, why did I say only you ask? Well he is still guaranteed the remainder of his contract that goes through 2021 which is worth a total of 128 million dollars! The Brewers are also 18.5 games back and going nowhere this season and he has been battling a thumb injury all season, making this the perfect time to take this deal that he was obviously offered.
This suspension in my opinion makes Major League Baseball look bad. Why would they offer him a deal like this? Why would they allow him to take this suspension during meaningless games, while he's been battling a thumb injury and right before he starts getting paid a significant amount of money?
If MLB wants to get PEDs out of their game they need worse penalties then they have now. Look at Bartolo Colon and Melky Cabrera from last year, both served suspensions and both got paid this offseason, so what's to stop these players from using? Why not risk losing 50 games if it means you will get a 2 year 16 million dollar contract after the season like Cabrera was able to do.
Now if the FedEx employee Braun ripped to shreds last year does sue him (which I'm praying happens) he may lose a little bit more money but it will be nothing compared to the amount of money he will be making for the remainder of his career.
MLB should have gone after Braun to get him suspended for as long as possible and make him the poster child for what can happen if you lie about taking PEDs, and now he is getting off easy and the MLB looks horrible. This makes it seem like they got less information from the Biogenesis case then they had planned and made this deal to try and save face and actually get a suspension. I would have respected MLB so much more had they gone after him for the entire 2014 season instead of the rest of this meaningless season, even had they lost and he got off without a suspension. I mean let's face it everyone who has a brain knew he took PEDs last year and got off on a technicality, so why save face?
All in all, Major League Baseball let Braun off the hook easy, and now they look bad and there still aren't tough enough penalties to keep players from using, and until they start truly fighting this and get tougher penalties we are going to continue to have a tainted game.
Written by Nick Calo, follow me on Twitter for more updates and sports thoughts @PRH1987
Braun will only miss out on 3.7 million dollars the rest of this season, why did I say only you ask? Well he is still guaranteed the remainder of his contract that goes through 2021 which is worth a total of 128 million dollars! The Brewers are also 18.5 games back and going nowhere this season and he has been battling a thumb injury all season, making this the perfect time to take this deal that he was obviously offered.
This suspension in my opinion makes Major League Baseball look bad. Why would they offer him a deal like this? Why would they allow him to take this suspension during meaningless games, while he's been battling a thumb injury and right before he starts getting paid a significant amount of money?
If MLB wants to get PEDs out of their game they need worse penalties then they have now. Look at Bartolo Colon and Melky Cabrera from last year, both served suspensions and both got paid this offseason, so what's to stop these players from using? Why not risk losing 50 games if it means you will get a 2 year 16 million dollar contract after the season like Cabrera was able to do.
Now if the FedEx employee Braun ripped to shreds last year does sue him (which I'm praying happens) he may lose a little bit more money but it will be nothing compared to the amount of money he will be making for the remainder of his career.
MLB should have gone after Braun to get him suspended for as long as possible and make him the poster child for what can happen if you lie about taking PEDs, and now he is getting off easy and the MLB looks horrible. This makes it seem like they got less information from the Biogenesis case then they had planned and made this deal to try and save face and actually get a suspension. I would have respected MLB so much more had they gone after him for the entire 2014 season instead of the rest of this meaningless season, even had they lost and he got off without a suspension. I mean let's face it everyone who has a brain knew he took PEDs last year and got off on a technicality, so why save face?
All in all, Major League Baseball let Braun off the hook easy, and now they look bad and there still aren't tough enough penalties to keep players from using, and until they start truly fighting this and get tougher penalties we are going to continue to have a tainted game.
Written by Nick Calo, follow me on Twitter for more updates and sports thoughts @PRH1987