SlumfRod Multi-Millionaire

Being a parent can render itself to intellectual tedium at times, a constant game of "hurry up and wait" for those fleeting "teaching" moments, where parental wisdom is simultaneously required and ignored by its loving recipient.

My oldest son is a huge baseball fan, much to my vicarious delight. He's a statistical hound that brings innate analytical nuance to our great American spectacle, a byproduct of a naturally curious boy that is an amazing purveyor of patience, for which he has enough of to enjoy the methodical pace of a baseball game and seemingly endless season it's played in.

The boy has grown up taking a shine to the game during a time that has amounted to the most tarnished era the game has ever seen, an era now and forever known as the steroids era. Sure, baseball has weathered other distractions and controversies; racism and segregated leagues, gambling scandals and ugly labor disputes. Never before, however, has such an epidemic of cheating, scheming and lying ever gripped the sport the way steroids has. The result is a decades worth of questionable statistics that bring wary eyes to anybody looking at them.

Last season the boy and I were discussing the all time home run record now held by Barry Bonds, a man that is the crowned king of the steroid era. With every ounce of earnestness intact, I assured my son that in a few short years Barry Bonds would be rendered a pathetic footnote in the annals of baseball history, after a squeaky clean slugger named A-Rod (Alex Rodriquez) catches Bonds to take his worthy place as baseballs home run king.

Well, looks like I had some more splainin' to do.

A-Rod has now publicly admitted using steroids for three full seasons (2001-2003), one of which he was named the league MVP and another he used to position himself to sign the highest paid contract (with the Yankees - shocker!) in the history of the game.

Disgusting.

Time to dust off the classic Simon and Garfunkel's song, Mrs. Robinson, revise the words, but keeping the vibe; "where have you gone, Nick Punto, our nation turns its lonely eye to you."

Yesterday the boy and I discussed A-Rods' admission, and it turns out the wisdom I was ready to strategically dish wasn't needed at all.

"Well dad", the boy chimed, "there are a lotta players that don't use steroids."

"I know, son."

Then the boy put things into proper perspective.

"I don't use steroids, dad."

Baseball will be fine. Thanks to my boy, I'm now sure of it.