Juiced

I read the book Juiced by Jose Canseco, who played Major League Baseball from 1985-2001. In the book he talks about how he took steroids to become a better athlete and a better baseball player. Canseco was born in Cuba, but his family came to America when he was young. They lived in Miami with a lot of other Cuban people. Jose says he was always an average athlete in high school, and that he didn’t even play on the varsity baseball team until he was a senior in high school. He took steroids for the first time in 1984, when he was playing in the minor leagues for the Oakland Athletics and he instantly became addicted to them. After he started to learn about them, he started injecting some teammates with steroids, including Mark Mcgwire and Ivan Rodriguez. He admits that steroids helped him be a better baseball player. But he also says, “If I had it all to do over again, would I live a steroid-enriched life? Yes, I would” (2). He doesn’t regret taking steroids one bit, even if people do call him a cheater.
I respect Jose Canseco for admitting that he took steroids. He almost sounds proud to say that he took them. He claims that he was the “Godfather” of bringing steroids into baseball, and I believe him. Before the late 1980’s no one ever mentioned people using steroids in baseball. Throughout the book Jose did tend to brag about his accomplishments and how he was such a great baseball player, and a big time ladies man. It is great that he hit lots of home runs, and even talked to Madonna a lot, but he could mention those things a little less. If a person knows anything about Major League Baseball, they will know that Jose Canseco was a great baseball player without him mentioning it so much throughout the book.
The thing about the book that I found most interesting is when he talked about all the players that he injected with steroids, or told them a person about who could sell them steroids. He mentioned players that I would have never even thought about taking steroids before the famous Mitchell Report came out. Rafael Palmeiro, Ivan Rodriguez, Juan Gonzalez, and Roger Clemens are among the many that he talks about. I sure would be mad if I were one of the players that Jose called out, but in my opinion, they should have never taken the steroids in the first place.