No double standard here.

First comment I heard regarding Manny was Peter Gammons incomprehensibly defending the man and also saying that Bud Selig really cares deeply about the integrity of the game.

I know the 2004 Dirt Dog Sawx are very, very important to a lot of people.

I just think you have to accept the fact that some of the players on that team were taking steroids. The teams they beat also had players who were taking steroids.

I suppose that ruins the good feelings for some fans, but I'm not sure that it should. I personally don't look to baseball players for moral guidance.

To be honest, Manny's suspension doesn't faze me too much. Do your fifty games, come back and hit homeruns for your team. Rob Neyer pointed out that the Dodgers should easily win their weak division, anyway, and Manny will come back rested and ready for the playoffs.

But all the Sox fans who celebrated the Mitchell Report because it focused on NY teams should have known better:

"The idea that there could ever be a moral line that Ramirez would not cross is funnier than 'The Family Guy.' Here is a man who each spring refused to walk 50 feet to say hello to the young patients from the Jimmy Fund Clinic, who declined to meet with the wounded troops at Walter Reed and who stiffed the kids at his old high school in New York City. He hit a young clubhouse attendant in Cleveland and a 64-year-old traveling secretary in Boston. He slapped one Red Sox teammate last season and quit on all the rest, and perhaps now we can better understand his belligerent behavior in his final days in Boston. I believe the technical term is ’roid rage.

...

So are we to believe Ramirez just discovered the joys of performance enhancing drugs when he reached LA? Not unless we’re as gullible as McCourt. The fact is there is no reason to believe Ramirez was clean for 7 years in Boston, and every reason to think he just figured out a way to beat the system.

Good timing. Good masking agents. A helpful heads-up from slimy union boss Gene Orza. Somehow Ramirez stayed a step ahead of the posse in Boston, which means the Sox escape without a scratch. It brings to mind a scene from the movie 'The Sting' when the mark can’t figure out how he keeps losing to Paul Newman. He asks Robert Redford how his partner keeps winning. 'That’s easy,' said Redford. 'He cheats.'

He just didn’t get caught, and until now, neither did Manny. Ramirez boasted in his statement yesterday that he passed 15 drug tests, which, of course, means nothing. Clemens and Bonds and A-Rod all passed many tests, too. It doesn’t make them innocent. It just means they were smart enough not to shoot up before peeing in a cup. Manny wasn’t so smart, and now everyone is asking if we were surprised that Ramirez got caught.

You bet we were surprised.

Surprised it took so long."