You know you have to buy Jose Canseco's new book, Vindicated, if only to keep the characters and their plot lines straight.
So ... Mike Wallace was hitting on Canseco's wife at the gym? Alex Rodriguez was yelling, "Ow, that hurts" when Canseco stuck the needle in his butt? Who was this "Max" guy again?
But there's a much bigger reason for America to pay close attention to the sequel to Juiced. Because America was absolutely dead-on certain that Canseco's first steroid confessional/tell-all, from 2005, was as big a piece of fiction as Harry Potter -- and America was dead-on wrong.
And because it's way past time for those of us observing the entire performance-enhancer fiasco in baseball to get beyond picking whom we believe based on who looks believable. Or, worse, whom we want to believe.
No one wanted to believe Canseco three years ago, because much of his playing career had been a cartoon, a caricature of a bloated, ego-mad ballplayer -- bulging muscles, tape-measure homers, fast cars, fast women, colorful rap sheet and, finally, a fly ball bouncing off his head.
That might have made him a fool, but it didn't make him a liar. Not then, and not now. Heck, he was an established expert in the doping field, just like Roger Clemens' primary accuser, Brian McNamee. They might be snitches, but they know what they're snitching about.
So, even the parts in Vindicated -- due for release Tuesday but out with excerpts this week -- that sound like something out of a late-night telenovela have a thread of believability in them. The Jose/A-Rod/Jose's wife drama seems too soapy to be believed, until you see the reports that congressional investigators were told that the former Mrs. Canseco compared, uh, other physical enhancements with Clemens' wife at a now-infamous and disputed party.
Vindicated also reminds us that we're still suckers for marquee names. The book's thin connections between Rodriguez and steroids are being hyped all over, which has to thrill Magglio Ordonez, whom Canseco said he directly injected. Bet he doesn't mind being baseball's most underrated offensive player now, huh?
(Meanwhile, if Mike Wallace did pursue substances after the discussion with Canseco described in the book, then I can never watch 60 Minutes again. I'm taking out my syringe costume and my asterisk sign and heading up to the next taping at CBS's studios. Who's with me?)
