Jhonny Peralta And Nelson Cruz Probably Won't Play In The Postseason

Per Pedro Gomez, Jhonny Peralta and Nelson Cruz won't be seeing any action this MLB postseason. The 50-game suspensions for their roles in the Biogenesis scandal aren't holding them back, but their respective teams are.

Both teams have filled those positions with trades; the Rangers picked up Alex Rios in lieu of Cruz, and the Tigers acquired Jose Iglesias to replace Peralta. It still doesn't make sense to keep two solid players on the bench when they'd be fully available at that point. Yeah, Melky Cabrera was suspended last season, and the Giants kept him out of the postseason. The Giants ended up winning the World Series anyway, but a weird sense of morality wasn't how that team earned a championship.

Iglesias and Rios could maybe go off and make everyone forget about Cruz and Peralta—who are both free agents after this season, so the process of disassociating them with their clubs is easy—but say someone gets hurt during the postseason. Are the Rangers going to overlook using Cruz, who had an .841 OPS before his ban, for no legitimate reason? Maybe the Tigers need a hit in a crucial situation; Peralta's OPS was .822 this season. Are these clubs saying that even if Peralta and Cruz were the last players available in their respective dugouts, they'd rather forfeit the game than have either player take an at-bat?

The suspensions will have been fully served by the postseason. No one's escaping any punishment. What more do the angry masses want out of Peralta and Cruz? Do they need to cry on TV? Write a handwritten letter to every fan apologizing? It seems that in the MLB, even when the cheaters are caught and serve their time, it's not enough. Is it ever?

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