MLBeat

So Terry Frai tries to write a column for ESPN.com wherein he defends the NHL's drug situation in part by hiding behind the drug situations of other sports:

(a) 27 strikes and you're out -- and such belated implementation that records should be divided into "juiced" and "non-juiced" eras;

Let's stop right there. Are records divided into "dead-ball" and "non-dead-ball" eras? How about "raised mound" and "regular mound" eras? Do we sort the all-time statistics for triples to account for the huge Forbes-ian fields of yesteryear, or for the ongoing love affair with Astroturf that has only recently begun to fade? Did we wipe all the slates clean when the league became integrated? Or when Baltimore's Camden Yards ushered in a phase of new ballparks built with significantly smaller dimensions? What about when the spitball was outlawed?

Major League Baseball has never been the same and it never will be. It is a centuries-long novel, surviving on a cast of thousands that arise out of the dust, only to inevitably break down and return to it. It is older than the United Nations, the airplane, and the Spanish-American War. Where in that novel is it written that records are required to be equal-opportunity across generations? Did you know that twelve of the top twenty single-season batting averages came before 1900, and that you have to go all the way to 37th to find a season after 1950, and even that was Tony Gwynn in a strike-shortened 1994? Are people really going to put the book down because the most recent chapter was mildly unsettling, or are they going to turn the page and read the next one?