Those familiar with the ongoing Ryan Braun PED saga tend to believe he's a cheater. That his suspension was overturned on appeal is irrelevant because he, as his many detractors will say, won on a technicality. His public image was not helped by his name appearing in the books of known PED peddler Anthony Bosch. The smoke-fire idiom is in full effect with Braun and it's difficult to argue in his favor. But as a overly charitable soul and avid Brewer fan, that's precisely what I'm going to do.
Ryan Braun donated urine prior to Game One of the 2011 NLDS for drug testing. Upon examination it was determined his sample had an absurdly high testosterone-epitestosterone ratio. This generally happens when people take PEDs, which in Braun's case was cause for a 50-game suspension. He miraculously avoided suspension after winning his appeal. The convention wisdom is Braun got off on a technicality and the independent arbitrator that ruled in his favor was insane (and later fired by MLB). You fail a drug test because you cheated, end of story. Then again, maybe not.
Where there's smoke, there's fire, but the fire might be different that you would expect. Though I cannot prove Braun is innocent (and I have my doubts) that fact he won his appeal warrants far more favor for his case than it currently receives. Maybe, just maybe, his victorious appeal is evidence of innocence. Just as you don't fail a test without cheating, you don't win an appeal without a good case. The Braun saga is especially complicated because both things happened to him. Even so, he at least raises a reasonable doubt to his guilt. If you are still adamant that Braun is a cheater that got off on a technicality, I would question your contention that technicalities are bad. In fact, the opposite is true.
The implication of drug testing is that players are guilty until proven innocent. Though this diametrically opposed to the American legal system, the prevalence of doping in high stakes athletic competition makes it a defensible evil. It also makes it extremely important that the rights of the players are vigilantly protected. With massive lumps of money and reputations on the line, strict adherence to due process is absolutely critical, even if it means a guilty person goes unpunished (though I'm not referring to Braun as he's clearly innocent).
The crux of Braun's argument was that the chain of custody with his urine sample was broken. Instead of immediately going to a FedEx it spent the weekend hanging out in the basement of the sample collector. The protocol is that samples are to immediately be taken to FedEx to be shipped the next day. Does this process matter? Yes, and quite a bit. What if the sample was in his house for one week? One month? One year? What if you, humble reader of the blog, failed a drug test at work and later learned your sample was hanging around some dude's basement for a weekend? Does that mean you did not take drugs? No. Does it mean your sample is valid evidence of wrongdoing? Absolutely not. Your right to a fair trail is of utmost importance and anything that compromises that must be discarded. This is how Braun won his appeal, and guilty or not, is absolutely what should have happened.
Finally, let's all just cool it on declaring people cheaters. Gio Gonzalez of the Nationals appeared in the same books as Braun and quickly issued a denial. Those that appeared in the Biogenesis books did so because they were taking PEDs, except for players like Gio Gonzalez that did not receive and PEDs from Biogenesis. Sometimes people actually tell the truth about not cheating. Until everyone is undoubtedly lying, maybe we'd be better holding off judgement until they're proven guilty.
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