Normally, I’m pretty happy with events that serve to embarrass the Yankees and in the sense this latest fiasco with Alex Rodriguez is likely to pay off with season after season of awkward distractions, managerial firings and general dysfunction, I couldn’t be more pleased. It’s exactly what they deserve, after all.

But anyone with a sense of justice can’t be comfortable with how the entire steroid era in baseball has became nothing more than a bold-name witch hunt and fodder for some of the worst journalism ever committed, to say nothing of the shameful violations of privacy that ensnared Rodriguez.

Since I’ve long since given up on seeing any writer of influence to make the following point, please indulge me. As a baseball fan I could care less who did steroids four or five years ago. It’s obvious that many of them did, and they did it because the guys who were gunning for their jobs did it, and the pitchers trying to get them out did it, and their peers who made the most money did it (which incidentally is why so many high-profile users wound up with the Yankees).

Condemning those unlucky enough to get caught while holding up those who weren’t as victims seems a brilliant waste of energy. The message we ought to have by now is that everyone was a suspect then: That’s what an epidemic is. And now that a culture of awareness has developed and testing and penalties are in place, we can go after the bad guys with righteous fury. These calls to go back in time and erase stats or threats to withhold future Hall of Fame voting (Bill Madden’s favorite hammer) practically beg for some perspective. I like Joe Sheehan’s suggestion that writers making Hall of Fame proclamations for steroid tainted players who failed to even investigate the issue until it exploded in their faces ought to be banned from voting.

I’m certain the Questionable Training Methods Era should stand along the Segregation Era or the Dead Ball Era as points in baseball history we’ll need to mentally adjust for to truly understand. And move on.

In the meantime, I think my Daily News today, amid 12 pages of A-Roid coverage, mentioned something about Met pitchers and catchers arriving this week. I’m off for a short break for a few days but will be back to kick off MBTN’s 10th Anniversary Spectacular, probably around the time position players arrive.

Uh, sorry for the rant. Feel free to tee off.

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