I had a chance to meet Jack in person at the Swisher's Wishes fundraiser.He also spent itme iwth the fans at the Coliseum Field Irish Pub after a game. He was so nice and so charming. HIs allegations are hearsay. And,even if he did it ,it was several years ago. I'm sure he is mortified about the report.

send me the jersey and the receipt and I'll pay you for it.

don't even be trying to get the jersey. I called it first.

I'm pretty certain Jack Cust has done steroids among other things. He isn't a "bad" person, just a long-term contract risk.

Until MLB makes better rules the players can do as much steroids as they want.

Not sure if I saw it on AN yet, but Jack Cust did make a statement about the steroid allegations.  It is available on his father's baseball academy site:

http://jackcustbaseball.com/Home.asp...

Personally, I wouldn't really mind if it were true, so long as he put it behind him and decided it was wrong.  I can't imagine what it must be like being a career minor leaguer (as he seemed to be before last season) and the pressures one would feel to make good for their family and kids and whatnot.  Not saying I would make the same decisions, but in the lax moral environment of the time it could have been different.

In any event, he didn't make it to the majors to stay until the current testing regime was in place for a few seasons.  These allegations shouldn't tarnish his story because the happy ending came clean.

Merry Christmas everyone.

A few points if I may.

1. Your parents love you very much, how can I tell? because you didn't get darn gift card for Christmas, no you got something that they put some thought into.  I don't know about you but my parents aren't exactly rolling in the Benjamin's. Your parents probably put in 2 full 8-hour work days just to be able to give you something that you would enjoy this christmas.  The shame of throwing something like that away, of letting such a sacrifice from loved ones go to waste, for me personally would be far greater shame than baseless hearsay  allegations of what someone did or did not do years ago and in the minor leagues.

2. I too was saddened when I heard about Cust, but I think too many of us (yes, I'm including myself here) are too trigger happy when it comes to passing judgement.  We forget that all of us make mistakes (and some really really sh**tty ones too) and we also forget that none of us have been in a situation such as say, Jack Cust.  Lets say what was said about Cust was true, that at one point in the minors the guy was taking steroids. Now lets consider the following.

You are due to interview for a new job position at your company. You only completed Junior College, and know over half of the candidates are in the same boat as you, but they are going to lie, they are going to say they graduated from CAL. You know that the chances of anyone calling their bluff is slim to none.  What do you do?  Do you pretend you went to graduate school at Stanford?  Many  people would not think twice about lying, because it would bring more money in, and they could take better care of their families, and a little white lie never hurt anyone right?  

My point is that most of us faced with the opportunity to make more money, to provide for our families, most of us would do what we could to compete, to get that promotion, to play  in the big leagues. baseball players make these mistakes too, theirs just appears to be different but its not. If Jack Cust did what the report says he did, then he obviously made a mistake in his life, which we all have, but we can not let that overshadow all of his other accomplishments.  We would not consider it fair for people to judge us on one mistake we've made and forget all of our other accomplishments and thus we shouldn't do the same to others.

3. No one outside the A's is paying much attention to Cust. Everyone's got their head so far up the A** of Clemens and Pettite that Id be surprised if anyone thats not a diehard baseball fan even knows Cust is in there. So wear it, and dont see it as shameful thing but rather see it as you standing up for your boy, for all those good memories he gave you last year. Itll be your own little way of paying him back. :-)

(off my soap)

go ahead and wear it.  At least he is still on the A's.  My Haren All-Star Jersey is now worthless.  Never fails, whenever I get an A's all-star jersey they get traded, or leave.  Zito, Hernendez, Mulder.  I'm never buying one again.