Why baseball's "steroid era" will not stain baseball for long

It has been some of the biggest news to come out this week. The Mitchel report (An investigative committee set up by major league baseball to get to the bottom of the steroid matter currently hanging over the integrity of the game) has been released and it is naming names. Among the players both past and present that it has claimed were involved in steroid use are Roger Clemens, Andy Petitte, Barry Bonds, and Gary Sheffield. While some of these names are no surprise others are. One thing is almost certain though. Despite the fact that this is a hard period for baseball it will likely as a sport ride out the controversy and thrive beyond all of our lifetimes. Baseball has been through hard times before.
In 1919 the famous "Black Sox" scandal. in that year players from the Chicago White Sox team were accused of taking bribes to throw the world series in which they were appearing that year. The scandal was serious but ultimately baseball recovered and the sport entered into a golden period in the 1920's.
Some people lament that these kinds of scandals hurt the integrity and the history of the game. It screws around with the legitimacy of the stats from era to era. If you have players now who are bulking up with performance enhancing drugs then that will bulk up their stats artificially and then you cannot fairly compare them to the stats of baseball's former great players who did not bulk up to achieve their numbers. In the past some of baseball's greatest players have however benefited from some advantages all be it not by their own design. The most notable in my view is Babe Ruth. He benefited twice in a big way. Many casual followers of baseball are not aware of the fact that Babe Ruth began his career as a pitcher. He almost won 100 games and set a record for scoreless innings pitched that lasted for decades before he converted to an outfielder and began hitting everyday and went on to set the all time home run record with 714 which too was a record that lasted for decades. He accomplished his pitching feat in a period known as the "dead ball" era. So named because at that time the baseball that was used was considered "dead". The string inside a baseball back then was not woven around the core of the ball as tightly as it was in later "era's" and the result was that the ball would not travel as far when hit. Home runs in baseball were rare by any hitter in this period. This phase was followed by a live ball era at about 1920. The way baseballs were made was changed and the result was that the ball traveled farther when hit and this set the stage for Ruth as well as others to start knocking the cover off the ball and acheive their heddy home run numbers. All this happened just in time for Ruth who converted to being a hitter in 1920. It was like Ruth had the luck of the gods.
As time goes by the scandal will fade. Believe it or not one day Pete Rose will be inducted into the hall of fame too despite the fact that he illegally bet on games in which he was involved. You know why? Because eventually time heals all wounds. He may or may not live long enough to see it but its eventuality is certain. Over time a new generation of kids will be introduced to baseball by their fathers and they will have no memory of this scandal and baseball will be reborn in their eyes anew. Scandals fade, life goes on and it will be take me out to the ball game all over again. Every new baseball season is a new beginning.