Alex Sánchez gets suspended for steroids

Sometime around the mid-1990s, right after a player strike that had a catastrophic effect on the public's interest in baseball, marginal MLB players like Sammy Sosa and consistent veterans like Rafael Palmeiro started hitting 500-foot home runs. No one said anything, even as Barry Bonds' head tripled in size and the slugger transformed from a guy who was going to the Hall of Fame anyway into a combination between Babe Ruth, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and . . . well, Barry Bonds. After an enormous scandal, baseball finally instituted steroid testing in 2005. Apparently, though, Alex Sánchez wasn't paying attention to the news, because he tested positive for performance enhancing substances almost immediately after the testing policy was announced.

Why it was so dumb: Assuming you, of all people, are not going to get caught is dumb. So is apparently not realizing that baseball was cracking down on steroids. But Sánchez, a light-hitting outfielder whose primary assets were speed, bunting, and base-stealing, wasn't going to benefit in any real way from taking steroids. He claimed "I take some stuff I buy over the counter . . . I'm surprised, because look at what kind of player I am." The "I may be dumb, fellas, but I'm not stupid" argument may have worked for Charlie Sheen in Eight Men Out, but not Alex Sánchez: he barely appeared in the majors again after his suspension, and is remembered today only as the first player to be suspended under baseball's new steroid rules.