Originally posted on AirAmerica.com

Major league baseball continues to grab front page headlines with the game's highest paid player, Alex Rodriguez, admitting to using banned performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs). Many believe this era of baseball (unofficially being called the Steroid Era) has tainted the game. Baseball, more than any other professional sport, is a game where performance statistics are meticulously recorded. The PED revelations have called into question the veracity of these "numbers."

Steven Goldman, contributing editor to Baseball Prospectus, believes that each era of baseball has had an X factor which has given baseball players some sort of advantage.  Baseball Prospectus is a yearly publication that employs advanced statistical analysis to predict the future performances of individual players as well as their teams.  The statistics take into account a wide range of data: how many times does a player get on base?  Which ballpark do they play in?  Air America’s Tim Einenkel sat down with Steven Goldman to discuss whether steroids have changed the future of statistical analysis, how much of an advantage PEDs give a player, and Alex Rodriguez’s Hall of Fame chances.

TIM EINENKEL:  What are the positives and negatives regarding how the MLB and the player's union have handled the steroid era?

STEVEN GOLDMAN: The main positive, in terms of how the steroid era has been handled is that after a long period of ignoring the problem, baseball is doing what it can to get the PEDs out of the game. The problem is that they’ve handled the perception of what they’re doing poorly, in part by failing to manage the seemingly constant drip-drip of players being outed for offenses that predate the testing regime. Contrast that drumbeat, which may yet be augmented by the other players on the 2003 fail list with Alex Rodriguez, with the number of players who have failed a test in the NFL. You can’t, because the NFL doesn’t release that information.

TIM EINENKEL:  The Alex Rodriguez steroid revelations came out after the publication of the book. If you had found out before the book came out, would these discoveries have had any effect on the PECOTA (Player Empirical Comparison and Optimization Test Algorithm, a sabermetric system for forecasting Major League Baseball player performance) projection for him this season and beyond?

STEVEN GOLDMAN: No. As Nate Silver, the inventor of PECOTA, discussed in our book Baseball Between the Numbers, the statistical footprint of PED usage is almost too small to detect. In addition, PECOTA is more interested in Rodriguez’s recent performances, not what he did five years ago.

TIM EINENKEL:  Unlike Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens, does the Alex Rodriguez confession help his case? His legacy?

STEVEN GOLDMAN: No. It dents it badly. Rodriguez was always unpopular, at least in New York, for personality issues and other things only tangentially related to his playing career, or perceptions of his failings that weren’t necessarily reflected in his performances. Now those same haters have an additional reason to dislike him.

TIM EINENKEL:  What is Alex Rodriguez' chances of getting into the Hall of Fame?

STEVEN GOLDMAN: It’s tough to predict a vote that might not come up for another 12 or 15 years—we could learn a lot more about the effects of PEDs in that time, or Rodriguez’s usage, or both. If the vote happened today, he probably wouldn’t get in.

TIM EINENKEL:  How many more players do you think will be outed as steroid users? Will this have a continued negative effect on MLB or has the MLB reached its low point?

STEVEN GOLDMAN: It depends on whether the other 103 names on the 2003 are released… Whether we’ve reached the low point or not really depends on who is outed. The public hasn’t cared much about the vast majority of players who have failed tests because they’ve been fringe players. If a Derek Jeter or Albert Pujols were accused, the damage would be extraordinary.

TIM EINENKEL:  If steroids truly give a player an advantage, why aren't there 100 plus Alex Rodriguez's in baseball? How does he differ from the rest?.

STEVEN GOLDMAN: The problem here is that “if.” They probably don’t. They’re also expensive, dangerous, have nasty side effects, and there is (now) a stigma attached to usage. Prior to the beginning of testing, they were still all of these things, but without the stigma of exposure and publicity. .

TIM EINENKEL:  Is it fair to say that each period of baseball has had some sort of X factor which has caused a performance advantage? How so?.

STEVEN GOLDMAN: You mean in terms of pitchers using the spitter and the emory ball? Ty Cobb and his sharpened spikes? Corked bats? Sign stealing? Weight training? Aspirin? During his 1941 hitting streak, Joe DiMaggio chain-smoked cigarettes in the dugout to calm his nerves. That was an artificial advantage. Bill Veeck used to move his stadium fences out when the Yankees came to town. That was, too. When the National League integrated more rapidly than the American League, they had a wider field of talent to choose from. Then there were amphetamines, whose usage was almost certainly more prevalent than steroids. There has never been an even playing field. Heck, genetics are the ultimate unfair advantage. Barry Bonds’ father was a great player in his own right. Few players start with that kind of advantage. Obviously, that last is taking things past the point of parody, but it gets at the chimerical nature of fair play in sport. PEDs happen to be where we draw the line right now, but it could easily be drawn any number of other places. It’s an arbitrary decision..

TIM EINENKEL:  Do you think its statistically possible to predict steroid usage?.

STEVEN GOLDMAN:  If you actually mean “predict” as in “anticipate who will use,” then no. If you mean “detect,” the answer is also no. Again, as far as we can tell right now, PED usage doesn’t influence player performance very much. These drugs help build muscle. How that translates into changed performance is still very much an open question.

Originally posted on AirAmerica.com 

Steven Goldman is a contributing editor to Baseball Prospectus.  In addition to writing the historical analysis column “You Could Look It Up” for BaseballProspectus.com, he has edited and contributed to the BP-authored books.  He has contributed to the BP annual since 2005 and has been the co-editor of the last four editions.  He is the creator of the long-running “Pinstripe Bible” column for the YES Network and is a commentator on the network’s Hot Stove television program. He previously wrote for the New York Sun, and currently blogs about politics and history at wholesomereading.com.  He lives in New Jersey with his wife, Stefanie, daughter Sarah, and son Clemens.