Cleveland Indians All-Star third baseman
Jose Ramirez has played in 49 games, exceeded 210 plate appearances and is currently hitting
.198 with 4 HR's and 16 RBI's. Of all the players in MLB, I've been checking his name in the box scores first (before Bellinger, Harper, Jeff McNeil, Trout, .ect) each day this season. And he's been consistently awful to this point!
Why my fixation with this diminutive (listed at 5' 9", 165 pounds) Dominican infielder that looks like a miniature David Ortiz, you might ask? Easy, to me,
Ramirez is MLB's poster boy for Steroid usage. In my opinion, if baseball ever really clamped down on 'Roid's a significant percentage of Latin players would find themselves in the minors or totally out of pro baseball in fairly short order.
In 335
minor league games over 5 seasons and
1539 plate appearances, Jose Ramirez whacked a
total of 13 HR's and had a total of
126 RBI's. Again, that's over 5 seasons
in the minors! Fast forward to last season, Ramirez hit 29 HR's, drove in 70 runs and was batting over .300
at the All-Star break. He looked like a certain A.L. MVP finalist and possibly a potential triple-crown winner? Even with sudden drop in his stats last season after the "
rumors", he still struck 39 HR's, drove in 105 and hit .270.
So what happened? A few weeks after a MLB insider Blog in the Dominican accurately broke a story that
Robinson Cano was going to finally be suspended for steroids (last May), they reported Ramirez would also be busted. It made too much sense: How can one of the smallest corner infielders in baseball, who
averaged about 3 HR's a season in the minors, be on pace for a
49 HR and 130 RBI season in 2018 at the age of 25?
But Jose pleaded his innocence and he was never suspended. The DWF's in Ohio jumped for joy, as their little hero was off the hook! The Dominican blog was right about Cano, but wrong about Ramirez the DWF's in Cleveland exclaimed!
But where they really wrong? According to a knowledgeable Cleveland beat writer, players can test positive for Steroids, but not be suspended if they can squirt away on a
technicality of some sort and it will never be made public. Is it possible that's what happened to Ramirez?
That is what happened, I believe. He might've skated away on a technicality, but baseball likely informed him they would test him more rigorously and frequently. Considering Ramirez signed a guaranteed $26 million deal at the young age of 24 (when many whites make their debut), he probably ditched the Roids, fearing he'd lose a bundle. Smart move, as Cleveland has to pay him all the remaining cash on that $26 million contract, regardless if he hits .195 with 10 HR's and 47 RBI's this season or .345 with 49 HR's and 130 RBI's.
If I were to guess, I'd say the majority of the players from Latin American are loaded to the Gil's on Steroids. Simply no other way to look at it. Top rated, enormously hyped
African American prospects are failing at alarming rates in baseball, but similar black and mulatto's from Latin America are dominating in the sport because they were
signed at 16 and trained for a year or two at an "academy", before being assigned to the low minors in the U.S at 17 or (mostly) 18?
Yea, right. Don't buy that excuse at all, remember Steroids are legal in most of Latin America and can be purchased as easily as Pop-Tarts and Candy Bars in the U.S.!
Links regarding Dominican Players and Steroids:
https://www.foxnews.com/sports/domi...aseball-culture-fuels-steroid-use-experts-say
https://www.newsday.com/sports/baseball/in-dominican-you-buy-steroids-at-local-pharmacy-1.895652
http://dr1.com/articles/steroids.shtml
