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On Thursday, most of the baseball world was rattled with the news that Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz tested positive for performance enhancing drugs in 2003. Sure, we were all half expecting the news would come some day, but that doesn't mean we wanted it to be true.

Now that the cat's out of the bag, former teammate Bronson Arroyo added a comment about performance enhancers yesterday. Admitting to using amphetamines and androstenedione while with the Red Sox from 2003 to 2005, Arroyo said he would not be surprised if he was on the list as well.

"Before 2004, none of us paid attention to what we took. That's why I said anybody could be on the list. Back then, nobody knew what was in stuff, because the FDA wasn't regulating all of it."

Arroyo had started taking andro in 1998 while in Pittsburgh's farm system. Arroyo said he didn't see a sizable boost in performance, yet continued to believe it helped.

"I'd take anything I could get from a nutrition store if you tell me it would make me better on the field."

After androstenedione was banned in 2004 and amphetamines in 2006, Arroyo said he now only takes legal supplements; protein, vitamins, ginseng, and a caffeine drink he said was introduced to him by Curt Schilling.

So there we have it.

Back to Ortiz, would it now be possible to consider that the "performance enhancing drugs" that Big Papi took were simply amphetamines or andro? Of course. There is still no word of precisely what substance Ortiz tested positive for.

All we know at this point is that Ortiz tested positive for something, but we don't know what. We know when, but now we want to know how many other instances there were, if any.

With a majority of the facts surrounding the situation yet to be revealed, one need look no farther than the Boston Globe to see Big Papi, the fallen hero, chastised and crucified by Boston's own.

In his piece "Big Papi Revealed as a Myth," Tony Massarotti says, "Now we know, with 99.9% certainty, what we have long suspected and feared: Big Papi is a myth." 'Mazz' goes on to suggest that "the World Series trophy is nothing but a hologram, generated by science and appealing to the eye but impossible to touch."

"He wasn't just a slugger, he was a good guy, too," continued Massarotti.

Well, 'Mazz,' why isn't Ortiz a good guy now? Sure the news was just broken this week, but Ortiz tested positive in 2003.

Since 2004, David Ortiz has almost singlehandedly delivered a World Series trophy to the city of Boston, established the David Ortiz Children's Fund to benefit critically ill children in New England and the Dominican Republic, was issued the 2008 UNICEF Children's Champion Award, and has done work with the Boys and Girls Club of America and other charities for children.

If that's not a great guy, I don't know what is. Just because Ortiz made one mistake is no reason for Ortiz to be vilified the way he has been by the Boston Globe.

David Ortiz may be a myth to the Boston Globe now, but for me it doesn't change the fact that he is a New England hero. What he did won't be affected in my opinion whatsoever.

No matter what drug he took.

Excuse me, Mr. Massarotti, but if David Ortiz is nothing more than a myth to you now, does that mean you won't be accepting any more royalties from his autobiography, that YOU co-authored?

I didn't think so.

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