Folks, Matt Hurst reprinted Gary Matthews Junior's statement to the press word for word:
L I N K -to post- S c r o l l -to- 10:23 a.m. post
No Angel player has begun on the wrong foot this poorly since Mo Vaughn.
UPDATE: HH posters The Limey and G Abbes pointed out a Smoking Gun, albeit one from 2004...
UPDATE: my take since blogs don't have to be gingerly polite like mainstream media:
Sounds like he has been juicing on something they cannot detect or is not covered in the MLBPA agreement. Everyone is innocent until proven guilty and I would hope he was just getting Tylenol. But I doubt this. There will be NO reprecussions against him and we will be stuck with the Gary Matthews Junior who was released three times as opposed to the one who "FIGURED IT ALL OUT" (to quote the genius Mike Scioscia). As a fan, frankly, I wish he had gone all Raffy on everyone and pointed his finger and boldly denied everything, seeing as there are no reprecussions for lying, but he gave us a disappointing non-answer in lieu of flipping the honest/liar coin.
BOTTOM LINE: Letting down your teammates and fans before they are even your teammates and fans has got to be its own private level of Dante's Inferno, so the Garbageman is no doubt suffering. Sadly, if he were to play a critical role on the next Angels winner, there will likely be the taint of HgH on any flag raised in Anaheim.
UPDATE... Stat Analyst Defends GMJ Against Juicing Assumptions:
Adam Morris has compiled a simple analysis of Gary Matthews Junior's numbers over the last five seasons:
L I N K -to- S T O R Y
The research reveals almost no change in Gary's Isolated Power, which weakens the assumption that Matthews was on something for his breakout '06 campaign, but further indicts Bill Stoneman as the entire big season is revealed to be little more than a positive fluctuation in Batting Average - the statistic most likely to regress to a player's standard production over the long haul.
Do you understand? He's our Garbageman...