The Eyes Have It.

“If the andro that helped McGwire hit 70 home runs in 1998 was an unnatural, game-altering enhancement, what about his high-powered contact lenses? ‘Natural’ vision is 20/20. McGwire’s custom-designed lenses improved his vision to 20/10, which means he could see at a distance of 20 feet what a person with normal, healthy vision could see at 10 feet. Think what a difference that makes in hitting a fastball. Imagine how many games those lenses altered.” Drop the juice for a sec — Slate‘s Will Saletan wonders aloud if optical enhancements also constitute cheating in baseball, football, and golf.

3 thoughts on “The Eyes Have It.”

  1. I don’t wear glasses or contacts, but as far as I know there aren’t any significant health risks to doing so. If I found out that the other slick fielding but light hitting lefty competing for the last roster spot with me was wearing lenses that helped him see better, I would have no problem with that. I could go out and get my own contacts if I I felt it would help.

    On the other hand, if I found out he was slathering on ‘the cream’ and shooting up HGH, then I’d have a problem because I wouldn’t feel it was fair that to compete, I would need to risk my kidneys, gonads, and Elephantism (like Griffey, Jr. in that Simpsons ep). Plus, I don’t think you can go to jail for having a good opthomologist.

    In fact, if I had poor vision and they tried to hook me up with stuff that only let me see like the average person, when I could see even better, I’d be pretty pissed. So I should drive around in my car seeing just as well as someone defined how the ‘average’ person sees when I could see better?! I’d hate to be the doctor that gave out glasses that were just good enough for someone to get by when that someone killed themselves or someone else in a traffic accident that could’ve been avoided if their vision had been more clear for objects just 10′ further away.

  2. If McGwire’s record was for career hits, then I think there might be a problem. Seeing the ball well is an obvious advantage, but you can 20/05 vision and still not have the physical power to punch the ball out of the park. Hitting a dinger is about more than just seeing the ball; there has to be a series of events that converge…and in 12 years of playing, it only happened to me about dozen times.

    This article seems to me to be a ripple of the George Will effect…writers (who probably only played two innings in right field and got one at-bat for the three years they played little league) trying to guess what factors go into hitting a homerun.

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