For me, the biggest deal with Ryan Braun being suspended for the rest of the season is how quickly he owned up to it compared to what happened last year. He found a loophole in the process and exploited it well. Now he couldn't outrun lightning striking near him twice.
I'm not shocked when somebody cheats anymore. I also don't assume everyone is cheating either. I'm at that weird in-between where I just watch the game, trust my eyes more than my ears and let the process play out. I'm not about to call somebody a total fraud without considering the totality of their career.
Yet as a Dodgers fan, I'm not about to say Braun's MVP should be given to Matt Kemp. Why? Because I already argued a few times in 2011 why Kemp should've won and that argument hasn't changed in two years. In a close race, Braun won because his team went to the postseason.
MLB wisely doesn't strip folks of winning awards (for the record - I'm fine with it in the Olympics to a point). Doing that would insult what our eyes saw and pretend it didn't exist. PED-enhanced numbers existed on MLB's watch and it wasn't until the game became a cartoon that they stepped in to clean it up.
That all said, I've believed for a while that Barry Bonds got cheated out of an MVP (1991) as did Pedro Martinez (1999) and Albert Belle (1995). I'd rather argue that Kemp deserved it in 2011 and should've won it on his own merit regardless of what Braun did.
