COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK- The recent raid of BALCO labs and its alleged connection to steroid use in Major League Baseball has placed increased pressure on officials to eradicate performance enhancing drugs from the sport, but several influential figures like player's union head Donald Fehr have so far resisted any moves in this area. In an effort to demonstrate the strength of his leadership, MLB commissioner Bud Selig decided to come out strong on the issue, issuing a statement on Thursday which underlined the league's policy on drug testing in no uncertain terms: "Whatever Don says."

Just this week Fehr agreed in principle to the idea of random drug testing for players as long as it was not random and did not test for drugs.

Six months prior to the event, players will receive a written notice of the time and place of the random test along with instructions on how long certain substances remain in the human body. "Normally, I'd say this is a violation of my civil liberties or something like that," said Mets shortstop Mike Piazza. "But for some reason, I just can't seem to get all worked up about this."

Under the League's tough new "Six Strikes and Your Sort Of Out" policy, players who test positive for steroids will be given a stern warning and told not to let it happen again. If steroids show up in their urine again, players will be made to sit on the time out bench for up to five minutes. Once performance enhancing drugs appear again in the player's system, league officials will come down quite hard, suspending him for half an inning and smacking his bare wrist most vigorously. If yet another incident occurs, Selig will personally go to the player's home and entreat him to stop using banned substances. "Please quit it," he will weep. "you're breaking my heart." At the point steroids show up for a fifth time, the League will finally get serious and issue a wake-up call of sorts, tearing up the player's Denny's discount card [good for two dollars off any Grand Slam breakfast]. If he happens not to be a revenue-generating franchise player, he will be suspended for up to six games, otherwise the whole thing will be forgotten and the player's infraction record will go back to step one. After that, the League will begin the process of suspending the player for the rest of the season, allowing the Players' Union to challenge the decision right up until the end of the World Series.

As to whether players themselves will go along with the idea, that is still to be decided. The trick, says Selig, is to compromise with the union without removing the program's teeth. After hours of tense negotiation, MLB officials have decided to allow certain star players to choose a "designated urinator" to take the test for them, but only in the American League.

Selig says the League's move to tighten down on steroid use isn't just about avoiding a Congressional investigation and subsequent indictments, it's the right thing to do for the sport. "It would be in the 'best interests of the game' if we went back to the days of big hitters generating up to 30 home runs per season," said Selig. "It would also be 'good' for baseball if MLB boxscores started to resemble that of the NHL. I just want to say for the record that I'm really 'happy' about all of this."