DownSwinging.com

37-year old Phillies outfielder Raul Ibanez seemed pretty pissed about alleged accusations that his exceptional start to the 2009 season has been as a result of performance enhancing drugs. Ibanez is hitting .329 with 19 HRs and a 1.062 OPS through 55 games in 2009, dominating in his first season in Philadelphia.

The controversy started when an article was written at MidWestSportsFans.com in response to a comment that the site had received suggesting that the veteran has been on the juice which is why his numbers have spiked so far in ‘09. Now, don’t get me wrong, I think Ibanez is perfectly right to be upset that his name was linked to steroids in any manner. I find it particularly unfortunate that any time a player has a good season, people automatically suspect that something can’t be right. I remind everyone, before the existance of PEDs, there were breakout seasons, there were slumps, there were slow-starters, and there were guys who inexplicably were successful in their mid-to-late 30s. It happens, its natural.

But Ibanez, who attacked the blogger by saying that he was a coward who types in his mother’s basement, maybe should have taken an actual look at the article. To be fair to this “blogger,” this was exactly what he was not intending. In fact, when he set out to write the story, his mission was to find evidence that proved why Ibanez’s power surge was due to other reasons, like his new hitter-friendly ballpark etc. The fact that he ultimately realized that he would not be able to prove Ibanez was having a good season naturally by no means that the “coward” concluded that Ibanez was using steroids or any other drug. In fact, I am quite confident that the writer sincerely hopes that Ibanez is clean, and believes so himself. This may be, and most likely is, just one of those cases when a player is just seeing the ball well and its dropping in for him. So good for you Ibanez, keep up the good work, but don’t be so quick to judge.