Major League Baseball has taken another giant leap forward in it’s efforts to stop the use of performance enhancing drugs with an aggressive alteration to the league’s drug policy. While before, if a player tested positive for PEDs and served out his suspension before the postseason began, that player could then be used on the postseason roster by his team.
According to USA Today’s Christine Brennan, a new chance to the policy would ban any player who tested positive during a given season from the playoffs, no matter if his suspension has been served or not.
"Major League Baseball’s modified drug policy, which is yet to be finalized, will bar from the postseason any player disciplined for performance-enhancing drug use during the regular season, a person with direct knowledge of the negotiations told USA TODAY Sports."
Up until now, it has been a club decision whether to leave a player who has tested positive for PEDs off the postseason roster. The San Francisco Giants left Melky Cabrera off their 2012 postseason roster even though he had completed his regular season ban. The Detroit Tigers decided to put Jhonny Peralta on their postseason roster and he hit incredibly well for them.
The new policy yeps crack down on PED use and also eliminates the element of rewarding a player with a postseason trip even after his season should have already been over.