Bigger Penalty, Bigger Deterrent?

On Sunday afternoon I took some time to catch up on Dave Pinto's blog. I decided to concentrate my browsing, and started reading only through the posts in the "Cheating" category.

Dave discusses several interesting ideas on how to curb cheating in the majors, including the idea of holding all sides responsible (including ownership), as well as another idea of a reward-based voluntary system of testing.

As of now, MLB is not thinking so creatively, but they are definitely thinking more aggressively.

Jack Curry of the New York Times, wrote earlier this week about the MLB announcement that it will toughen the penalty for steroid use to a 50 game suspension starting next season. According to the new policy, the penalty will increase to 100 games for a second offense, and a lifetime suspension for a third offense.

This begs the question - will tougher penalties be a sufficient deterrent to once and for all eliminate cheating in the sport?

Obviously, the Commissioner thinks so. I am, however, somewhat skeptical. Where there is a will, there is a way, and other such clichés come to mind. The drug manufacturers will always manage to stay one step ahead of the system. Unless MLB chooses to invest a great amount of resources into the research of illegal drugs, and into consistent testing, there will always be players getting away without being caught. (And even if MLB does make an enormous and intelligent effort, the system will still have it's cracks, pardon the pun).

The nature of the game also makes fair testing of players very difficult. In an ideal situation, every player would get tested before every game. But, because baseball is such a prolific sport - every team plays a game almost every night - this is logistically impossible.

Like most fans, I don't see a clear way out of this scandal. I have always held a very idealistic, some would say, romantic, view of the game (think, Ken Burns, not Sportscenter). So, this has become a particularly distressing situation for me, personally.