Braun Suspended for Remainder of 2013 Season

[BarneyStinston]

The talk does begin to be a little tiresome. Braun is not the first person to be disciplined for substance use, and he won't be the last. He's not the first person in public to ever lie about anything either. We have had plenty of players with a history of being punished for use playing on the Brewers, and we will have plenty players in the future. Don't act like Milwaukee is too good to have Braun playing in their organization.

[jazzytrav]

So, he doesn't have herpes?

[Hitman_Hart]

Big Daddy Drew does it again. I love that Deadspin is the voice of reason in the media.

 

http://deadspin.com/hey-baseball-you-can-stop-overcorrecting-now-883673576

[DuWayne Steurer]

I liked Aaron Boone on Baseball Tonight getting all righteous with Rick Sutcliffe.

 

Dude, your brother went from a mediocre .700-ish OPS middle infielder to a .950 OPS guy at age 32 when he started playing with A-Rod. After hitting 20 dingers once in a season ever, he hit 120 homers in his age 32 - 35 seasons. Please get off yer horse Booney!

[vegasbrewcrew1993]

i don't blame him for accepting the plea deal. braun is rich, but not rich enough to fight the mlb. eventually those shameless jerks were going to get what they want. they have already ruined braun's reputation. might as well serve the suspension during a lost season. i'm still certain he didn't take the juice. he doesn't have the appearance of a ped user and his numbers have always been consistent. there has never been a sudden and mysterious spike in his numbers ala chris davis. davis went from a nobody to a guy that is on pace to set a legit record.

 

I'll get ripped apart for this, but I agree with everything you just said. I think Braun took something (most likely to heal after a long 2011 season filled with injuries), but I would bet that he didn't take a PED.

 

Mark McGwire, between his rookie year and 1998, when he hit 70 home runs, bulked up by 37 pounds. Ryan Braun, between 2007 and 2012, added 8 pounds.

 

His rookie year, he averaged a home run every 14.4 at bats. In 2012, he averaged a home run every 14.55 at bats (those numbers are from memory earlier this evening.) Where's the gains from these steroids he's supposedly taking?

Braun was a top 100 amateur talent per Baseball America. He was an All-American at Miami. Are we supposed to believe he was juicing in high school?

 

Exactly my point. His stats have always been consistent. His body size has always been consistent. It's not like one year he had normal forearms and then the next his forearms looked like thights. Someone with his talent could probably hit over 50 homeruns if assisted by PED's. I just think he got tired of MLB's vendetta and decided to give in. I don't blame him. This battle could have gone on for the rest of his career. Might as well get the suspension over with. ESPN and MLB have done a fine job of destroying his reputation. Now what bugs me is Jeff Passan's tweet that some Brewer teammates are happy about the suspension. Keep that stuff in the clubhouse...

[And That]

Too late, it's already out there.

 

You're right that being a Brewer fan, and specifically a Ryan Braun fan, is going to be hard knocks for quite some time, but what makes perpetuating name calling the right course of action? I don't see how referring to him as "Lyin' Ryan" helps the conversation, especially when we don't know what he was (or was not) lying about.

[jazzytrav]

Just throwing it out there, but is it possible that he saw a situation where MLB has so much secret power over the lives of every player, so rather than drag out a situation that he was 100% going to lose, regardless of whether he's guilty or not, he just decided to take his lumps so he can get back sooner?

[DuWayne Steurer]

Uhh, no.

 

If I'm caught vandalizing property but think I can beat the charge why wouldn't I try to beat it, even if I did it? It's nice that you want/expect people to tell the truth right away and own up to what they did but that's not human nature.

 

Of course it is.

 

Lots of people get caught speeding, pay their ticket, and drive slower next time.

 

Not everyone tries to fight it in court.

 

 

That's' a bit different. There's not a lot to lose if you just go in and pay the speeding ticket. 3-4 points, and maybe a hundred bucks. To a lot of people, fighting a speeding ticket in court isn't worth the day off of work they'd have to take to go to court. Braun was fighting a 50 game suspension. He had a LOT to gain by overturning that suspension, and nothing to lose if he eventually ended up losing his appeal.

[Warning Track Power]

Seriously, could you imagine if a #2 overall pick, Rookie of the year, and runner up for DPOY were to be busted for PEDs!

This has nothing to do with Braun's actions but this is a seriously underappreciated part of the conversation about PEDs in sports. The NFL has a serious storm coming if they begin to test for PEDs. I imagine that HGH use in MLB in the late 90s early 2000s versus the PED use in NFL today still would lean in favor the NFL.

[danzig6767]

 

Yea, he's a recent MVP and one of the top players in the game, not someone like say Melky Cabrera. Take the NFL. Have someone like Peyton Manning or Tom Brady get busted for roids, it's simply going to be a vastly bigger story than if some random lineman or cornerback gets busted. Mix in that if Manning or Brady got busted, got off on a technicality, then forcefully lied multiple times to the faces of everyone, only to later get busted again, it would be a massive massive story that dominated news coverage for awhile.

 

Seriously, could you imagine if a #2 overall pick, Rookie of the year, and runner up for DPOY were to be busted for PEDs!

 

Von Miller is far from a household name. Like i said, have an MVP like Brady, Manning, Rodgers get nabbed though, get off on an appeal technicality, then forcefully lie multiple times to the faces of everyone, only to later get busted again, it would be a massive massive story that dominated news coverage for awhile.

 

I will grant though that the media in general has been harsher on baseball players getting busted for roids. There is some reason for that IMO. The whole McGwire, Sosa, and Bonds situation was just so incredibly high profile as those three and others were flat out eviscerating long standing important baseball records and benchmarks that it eventually lead to big time outrage in a sport where records and benchmarks are held in such reverence, more so than other sports.

 

So when some cornerback, safety, or lineman in football gets caught using PED's, it's more akin to a Melky Cabrera getting caught in baseball in the eyes of many sports fans. More yawning than huge story to them, regardless if that's technically unfair to bigger name athletes. Lastly, you can't ignore the full context of the Braun situation. Had he simply accepted being suspended 50 games after first getting caught and being quiet vs winning an appeal, casting doubt on the collector, and screaming that he's been wrong accused, the story would have been less explosive. It was Ryan himself who threw gasoline on the media fire with his previous forceful statements proclaiming his innocence, only to later be shown as a hypocritical liar.

[JimH5]

Just throwing it out there, but is it possible that he saw a situation where MLB has so much secret power over the lives of every player, so rather than drag out a situation that he was 100% going to lose, regardless of whether he's guilty or not, he just decided to take his lumps so he can get back sooner?

 

Secret power?

 

You mean like a ray gun or something, where they hone in on a guy and put the whammy on him? Then he becomes their slave, and can do dastardly things.

 

Yeah, I think they keep that in the back room at Gilles.

[Warning Track Power]

Lastly, you can't ignore the full context of the Braun situation. Had he simply accepted being suspended 50 games after first getting caught and being quiet vs winning an appeal, casting doubt on the collector, and screaming that he's been wrong accused, the story would have been less explosive. It was Ryan himself who threw gasoline on the media fire with his previous forceful statements proclaiming his innocence, only to later be shown as a hypocritical liar.

This, in and of itself, is why Braun will be and should be continually roasted. If the users of PEDs have learned nothing from the McGwire, Palmeiro, Bonds, Pettitte, Giambi and Sosa sagas then that is their fatal flaw. Admit guilt, accept punishment and show remorse and all will be forgiven. Brewer fans and MLB fans in general can accept someone's mistake if they fess up to them and admit wrongdoing. It's the grandstanding and profession of innocence, all while saying the "truth hasn't changed" that makes Braun all the more slimy and despicable. He made his bed and now he can sleep it. We as Brewers fans have to remember that we root for the name on the front of the jersey and not the back.

[brewmann04]

Dude, you have said this, probably a dozen times. I'm not trying to jump all over you, but you're just saying the same thing over and over.

Hey thanks for reading the posts ,but i not sure i am not the onlu one in these 50 pages that have said the same thing Multiple times.

 

PS Just remember it was me who said it.

[vegasbrewcrew1993]

i don't blame him for accepting the plea deal. braun is rich, but not rich enough to fight the mlb. eventually those shameless jerks were going to get what they want. they have already ruined braun's reputation. might as well serve the suspension during a lost season. i'm still certain he didn't take the juice. he doesn't have the appearance of a ped user and his numbers have always been consistent. there has never been a sudden and mysterious spike in his numbers ala chris davis. davis went from a nobody to a guy that is on pace to set a legit record.

 

 

Couple things.

 

1. Braun was using synthetic testosterone. Let's not confuse what he was using with anabolic steroids like Winstrol that was so popular in the 80's.

 

2. Whats to say Braun wasn't using this stuff from Paul Bosch back to his Miami days? You even said his numbers have stayed the same the entire time. It's not hard to beat MLB's testing as long as you keep your T/E levels under 4-1. Braun most likely failed his test in 2011 because he just took his dosage which explains the 20-1 level he had.

 

The truth is that no one knows what went down. If Braun lying then oh well. I'm not going to accept MLB's story just because they are the MLB. Their test failed the first time. There's a reason why the test failed. It just proves that their testing system is not reliable. This was a vendetta plain and simple. MLB got angry that Braun showed that their testing system was weak. They were embarrassed and decided to go after him. Eventually they were going to win. MLB was going to stop at nothing to get their revenege, even if it meant kicking him out of the league. Braun likely doesn't want to miss out on millions of dollars, so he accepted a deal. The damage had been done anyways. MLB's slandering tactics worked. Braun's only mistake was being so quiet about it. He should have known that the MLB was going to slander him as much possible, so he should have told his story.

 

Quite frankly I don't give a crap about what Braun does in his spare time. I root for the team, not the players. As long as he is a member of the Brewers, I will root for him. The moment he leaves I will forget about him just every other non-Brewer. I don't have any personal attachments to these players. I don't know any of them personally and I don't care what they do in their personal lives. If they want to dope then that's their problem. If the enlarged heart and shriveled testicles aren't enough to scare them away from PED's then that's their problem. Most of the league is doing something to cheat anyways. Pitchers do their own little thing on the mound that helps them. Coaches and players steal signs all the time. Let's not get all high and mighty about this stuff anyways. In a perfect world baseball would be a clean game. Deep down inside we all wish it was clean. That's the way that it should be. Unfortunately it isn't. Players cheat all the time. It's no longer a big deal to me.

[danzig6767]

 

Exactly my point. His stats have always been consistent. His body size has always been consistent. It's not like one year he had normal forearms and then the next his forearms looked like thights. Someone with his talent could probably hit over 50 homeruns if assisted by PED's. I just think he got tired of MLB's vendetta and decided to give in. I don't blame him. This battle could have gone on for the rest of his career. Might as well get the suspension over with. ESPN and MLB have done a fine job of destroying his reputation. Now what bugs me is Jeff Passan's tweet that some Brewer teammates are happy about the suspension. Keep that stuff in the clubhouse...

 

How do you know that Braun hasn't been a long time user?

 

Not all steroid users can physically or would choose to bulk up to the levels that guys like Bonds, Sosa, and McGwire did. Plus, that would be a major red flag anyways.

 

We right now don't know what exactly Ryan took, when he started taking what he took, and for how long. He could clear that up himself by being honest instead of making cryptic statements.

 

Either way, some could be right and maybe Braun mostly just used PED's to help recover from injuries. Just as plausible though is that he's been a long term user who managed to have a regimen set up which allowed him to beat the testing system for a long time until finally getting busted. Hell, Lance Armstrong managed to beat drug testing for about a decade or longer. He wouldn't have to be built like Bonds and hitting 50 plus homers a year to be a long term user. PED's alone don't put on tons of muscle mass, just look at other players who have been busted and the levels/drugs a long term user takes can differ.

[Moose]

I have really enjoyed reading through everybody's posts. Yes- it is indeed difficult to be a Brewer fan at this time. I have been lambasted by friends who cheer for other teams and had a number of nasty things tweeted at me by people I don't know (my old twitter handle was BrewerMoose). I have been trying (the entire time) to take everything with a grain of salt. There is so much bias from everybody- the sportswriters and ESPN have a bias to make news and potentially over-exaggerate details or release unconfirmed information. MLB will have a bias to show that they are taking their stand on PED use or to nail the guy who "beat their test" to the wall. the MLBPA will have a bias to both support their player and the rest of the players. The other players themselves will have a bias to crucify Braun. Braun has a huge bias to either 1. hide his guilt or 2. confirm in innocence or 3. talking/associating with the wrong people/lying about it. I don't have access to all of the primary sources- only things leaked or released or said or covered up, I heard from somebody who heard. A lot of this comes down to sorting through all the information or somebody finally releasing what REALLY went down. Will Jeff Passan or Jon Heyman call A-Rod a cockroach and will yahoo sports create memes about Arod, Nelson Cruz, etc? Doubt it. In the end it will go down in baseball history- it will be like the 1919 White Sox (with Buck Weaver stating his innocence til his dying day), or Pete Rose stating that while he bet on baseball he always bet on his team. Too bad that this has to be connected to the team I cheer for. Feel free to tear me a new one if you would like.

[thebruce44]

Too late, it's already out there.

 

You're right that being a Brewer fan, and specifically a Ryan Braun fan, is going to be hard knocks for quite some time, but what makes perpetuating name calling the right course of action? I don't see how referring to him as "Lyin' Ryan" helps the conversation, especially when we don't know what he was (or was not) lying about.

 

It sounds like you are advocating being responsible adults here. I suppose I could get behind that.

[thebruce44]

Seriously, could you imagine if a #2 overall pick, Rookie of the year, and runner up for DPOY were to be busted for PEDs!

This has nothing to do with Braun's actions but this is a seriously underappreciated part of the conversation about PEDs in sports. The NFL has a serious storm coming if they begin to test for PEDs. I imagine that HGH use in MLB in the late 90s early 2000s versus the PED use in NFL today still would lean in favor the NFL.

 

I HATE to throw names out there, but a large part of me is really curious to see how the people that want Braun off their team would react if a several game suspension came for their favorite defensive player in Green Bay from PEDs.

[vegasbrewcrew1993]

 

Exactly my point. His stats have always been consistent. His body size has always been consistent. It's not like one year he had normal forearms and then the next his forearms looked like thights. Someone with his talent could probably hit over 50 homeruns if assisted by PED's. I just think he got tired of MLB's vendetta and decided to give in. I don't blame him. This battle could have gone on for the rest of his career. Might as well get the suspension over with. ESPN and MLB have done a fine job of destroying his reputation. Now what bugs me is Jeff Passan's tweet that some Brewer teammates are happy about the suspension. Keep that stuff in the clubhouse...

 

How do you know that Braun hasn't been a long time user?

 

Not all steroid users can physically or would choose to bulk up to the levels that guys like Bonds, Sosa, and McGwire did. Plus, that would be a major red flag anyways.

 

We right now don't know what exactly Ryan took, when he started taking what he took, and for how long. He could clear that up himself by being honest instead of making cryptic statements.

 

Either way, some could be right and maybe Braun mostly just used PED's to help recover from injuries. Just as plausible though is that he's been a long term user who managed to have a regimen set up which allowed him to beat the testing system for a long time until finally getting busted. Hell, Lance Armstrong managed to beat drug testing for about a decade or longer. He wouldn't have to be built like Bonds and hitting 50 plus homers a year to be a long term user. PED's alone don't put on tons of muscle mass, just look at other players who have been busted and the levels/drugs a long term user takes can differ.

 

How do you know that he is a long time user? Just because MLB got a dirty snake in Bosch to say something? Seriously Bosch is their star witness. That guy would say anything to save his sorry butt. No one knows the truth and I doubt we ever will. Both sides are sketchy. The only proven thing is that MLB's test failed. That's all that we know. After that everything is speculative. Where is MLB's overwhelming evidence? Bosch as the source?

[JimH5]

How do you know that he is a long time user? Just because MLB got a dirty snake in Bosch to say something? Seriously Bosch is their star witness. That guy would say anything to save his sorry butt. No one knows the truth and I doubt we ever will. Both sides are sketchy. The only proven thing is that MLB's test failed. That's all that we know. After that everything is speculative. Where is MLB's overwhelming evidence? Bosch as the source?

 

MLB presented all its evidence to Braun. Then he was the one to approach them about making a deal.

 

Whatever they showed Braun was enough to convince him that they had a solid case.

 

Are you going to hold out hope that this was all a big conspiracy, and he was set up from the start-- like in a movie?

 

If so, be prepared to take some ribbing on that.

[vegasbrewcrew1993]

How do you know that he is a long time user? Just because MLB got a dirty snake in Bosch to say something? Seriously Bosch is their star witness. That guy would say anything to save his sorry butt. No one knows the truth and I doubt we ever will. Both sides are sketchy. The only proven thing is that MLB's test failed. That's all that we know. After that everything is speculative. Where is MLB's overwhelming evidence? Bosch as the source?

 

MLB presented all its evidence to Braun. Then he was the one to approach them about making a deal.

 

Whatever they showed Braun was enough to convince him that they had a solid case.

 

Are you going to hold out hope that this was all a big conspiracy, and he was set up from the start-- like in a movie?

 

If so, be prepared to take some ribbing on that.

 

If MLB has any evidence then they should release to the public. They should back up all their talk with facts instead of having BSPN do their talking for them. No one knows what went down. All we have is MLB's claims that they had enough evidence to fry Braun. What if Braun decided that he was tired of the situation and decided to give in? 2 years of dealing with non-stop questions. MLB could have kept this going forever.

[FVBrewerFan]

Don't you think that's part of the agreement? That Braun agreed to take the suspension with the agreement MLB would NOT release the details. Seems to be enough talk that his use goes far beyond a one-time thing. And if you take emotion out of it, it probably makes the most sense that he used PEDs for quite a long time, maybe ven going back to his days in Miami. That would make more sense than deciding to do it just one time, in my opinion.

 

Also, it wouldn't be in MLB's best interest to keep this going on forever. They would have made their decision this off-season and handed down the penalty. Braun, on the othe rhand, has already proved that he would drag it out unless there was overwhelming evidence. He was more than willing to role the dice on the bad test rather than come clean.

 

You all get all over MLB for leaks, so you can't have it both ways. They could very well have multiple failed tests, or who knows what other detailed evidence he was using PEDs for who knows how many years. But it's pretty clear they had far more than a scribled note from a clinic. Do you honestly believe Braun would have agreed to this deal if that's all they had? I mean honestly...really?

[Invader3K]

I've been a huge Braun fan and still will be when he comes back. I don't think anyone can logically say this was part of some vast conspiracy. The reporting, while sometimes malicious and over the top, has been pretty consistent in the past 24 hours. MLB had overwhelming evidence against Braun, and he knew the jig was up. Usually the most logical explanation is the correct one.

 

In thinking about this whole thing even more this afternoon, I really hope Braun doesn't just disappear until spring training. He needs to do some huge damage control. Maybe do an interview with Bob Costas or something like that (admittedly I sort of mocked that concept earlier). Get out and do some positive things in the community. Maybe donate part of his salary next season to some worthy cause. Most importantly he needs to admit he screwed up big and say things like, "I want to come back and help my team win again, I owe it to the fans to be better", etc.

 

There will always be many that will never take him at his word again, boo him wherever he goes, etc. He can still make strides to win back those he's disappointed among the Brewers fan base, and he at least needs to make the effort.

[JimH5]

Of course that's the way it "went down"! How dumb of me. . .

 

Don't forget about the part during the meeting where Bud Selig was wearing a monocle, stroking a white cat on his lap, and the cat had a diamond necklace.

 

 

Darn it! All those questions! What's a guy to do?!?

 

Clearly the only way out of such a diabolical scheme is to forfeit $3+ million in salary, your personal and professional reputation, a chance at the Hall of Fame, product endorsements, etc.

 

The rest of us are just rubes for thinking it was that Braun was caught cheating.

[danzig6767]

 

You're right that being a Brewer fan, and specifically a Ryan Braun fan, is going to be hard knocks for quite some time, but what makes perpetuating name calling the right course of action? I don't see how referring to him as "Lyin' Ryan" helps the conversation, especially when we don't know what he was (or was not) lying about.

 

It sounds like you are advocating being responsible adults here. I suppose I could get behind that.

 

How responsible was Braun yesterday?

 

Putting out some cryptic statement where he only quasi admits guilt for something, bails out of town without answering a single question, and instead leaves it all for his manager, GM, and teammates to face the fire of all the media questions. How swell of him.

 

I guess we'll find out going forward if Ryan is going to be willing to put himself out there to face the same tough questions which his manager, GM, and teammates had to face yesterday or if instead he'll just refuse to give clear and honest answers to many questions which deserve to be asked of him.

 

He alone is one who can provide some real clarity to everything instead of leaving things mostly up to speculation. What exactly he took. When he started taking what took. How long he took any banned substances. Why he chose to lie so forcefully. Why he thought it was ok to cast doubt on the collector. Until the day comes that he faces the music in an interview where he's truthful and answers many tough questions without a bunch of vague answers, i don't think he has a right at all to complain about any reporting which may have inaccuracies, fans jumping to certain conclusions, or inaccurate speculations. His silence will only be fuel to all of that if or until he chooses to provide the real answers.