The latest "flap" in baseball is the trashing of one of baseball's heroes. And it does much to underscore the prevailing hypocrisy of the sport.

Rick Ankiel was a successful pitcher with the St. Louis Cardinals. Injuries and an inexplicable loss of control put him out of the game quickly, and he reinvented himself as an outfielder.

Now come the revelations that in his rehab, he used HGH, a substance that was, in fact, LEGAL at the time he used it (in 2004; the substance was not banned until '05). So, a big non story to begin with.

BUT, this revelation comes only days after Roger Clemens receives a cortisone shot for his aching arm.

So, it's ok for pitchers to "juice up" to get an edge, just not sluggers. I don't care how it gives you an edge; if it improves your performance, it can be said to give you an edge. And cortisone, the steroid of choice for pitchers, certainly accomplishes that.

Baseball needs to adopt an "all or none" steroid policy. Stop allowing use of performance enhancers in certain cases, while disallowing in others. And DEFINITELT stop acting so shocked when LEGAL performance enhancers are used.

But then this is the sport whose first commissioner banned the notorious "Black Sox" for alleged gambling, while refusing to ban Ty Cobb for gambling that was basically proven. We can't expect baseball to have improved from those roots.