Bad News Bears

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Jason Giambi’s bulging biceps and Pedro Martinez’s rippling pecs may set hearts thumping in Major League Baseball’s animated All-Star Game spots, but the pumped-up ads (a “super human showdown!” exclaims one) were too much for New York Times columnist Richard Sandomir, who accused MLB of glorifying steroid abuse.

Sandomir laid into MLB and McCann-Erickson in New York for the rendering of baseball’s best, charging the league with “[displaying] a willful ignorance of recent events.” Revving up his indignation like Randy Johnson winding up a sinker, Sandomir declares, “In a presteroid, preandrostenedione era, it might have been cute to hawk your biggest, baddest, Bunyan-esque stars as amalgams of the Incredible Hulk and Popeye.”

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