Womack: Former MLB commissioner Fay Vincent talks PEDs, Buck O’Neil, gambling
From SABR member Graham Womack at The Sporting News on January 12, 2016, with SABR member Fay Vincent:
One thing that was striking about this year’s Baseball Hall of Fame election was how much better players suspected of steroid use did in the vote. Mike Piazza, who never failed a steroid test but is thought by some to have used, was voted into Cooperstown. Jeff Bagwell, who’s faced some of the same unsubstantiated rumors as Piazza, fell just short of induction. Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds are starting to look like they could be voted in by the BBWAA as well.
Many writers and fans have mellowed about the Steroid Era, though it remains a controversial issue. One person who hasn’t mellowed? Former Major League Baseball commissioner Fay Vincent, who I spoke at length with over the weekend. Vincent was commissioner less than three years before owners forced his resignation in 1992, not long before the time the Steroid Era got going in baseball.
The 77-year-old Vincent lives in Florida now and is far removed from baseball in any official capacity, though he still had to much to say, good and bad, about the state of the game.
Read the full article here: http://www.sportingnews.com/mlb-news/4691007-fay-vincent-pete-rose-gambling-peds-hall-of-fame-buck-oneil?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter
Originally published: January 12, 2016. Last Updated: January 12, 2016.