Berkman practical about Braun case

If any group of Ryan Braun's contemporaries figured to be upset by Thursday night's big news, it was these guys here at the Cardinals' complex, who may be the defending World Series champions but are not the reigning National League Central winners.

Thanks to a Milwaukee urine sample collector's bad judgment, St. Louis' task grew tougher overnight. Milwaukee went from a demoralized group -- having lost Prince Fielder to Detroit and getting set to have Braun sit out the first 50 games -- to a revitalized contender.

"He's a big part of that offense," new Cardinals manager Mike Matheny said. "He's certainly going to help the Brewers."

New Cardinals rightfielder and former Met Carlos Beltran said: "I know [Braun] from the [2011] All-Star Game. I think he's a great guy. He should be happy that he came out of this situation good."

For another take, let's turn to Lance Berkman, who is moving from rightfield to first base to replace the departed Albert Pujols.

"If he got off on a technicality, then I'm not in favor of it," said Berkman, a Yankee for a couple of months in 2010. "But if he truly didn't do it, then I don't want him to have his name [dragged] through the mud over it."

Two life mantras commonly applied to baseball -- "No sense worrying about things you can't control" and "Nobody's perfect" -- come into play here. Berkman embraced those in discussing the Braun case. His teammates should follow suit, and folks in general probably should relax.

"Like anything, there have been people that have gotten off in our judicial system that there's been a high degree of suspicion about because of some technical procedure of the law that was violated," Berkman said.

"So it happens. I'm not saying that it happened in this case, but I know it has happened in our judicial system, and it's not inconceivable that the same could happen in this case."

It has been a bad couple of days for Major League Baseball, whose executive vice president for labor relations, Rob Manfred, "vehemently" disagreed with the ruling by independent arbitrator Shyam Das.

As reported Thursday, two people familiar with the situation confirmed that Braun prevailed because the collector did not follow proper procedure with Braun's urine sample. It was shipped two days after collection, calling into question the sample's chain of custody and the conditions in which it was stored.

MLB is threatening to take this case to a higher court, which I'd bet never happens.

Maybe, however, this fascinating episode can produce positive consequences.

For starters, perhaps commissioner Bud Selig will stop boasting about baseball's tough drug-testing system and cease implying that the game is free of cheaters. There's little to be gained by such braggadocio. There's much more to reap from simply doing a good job, which baseball largely has done in this area.

Secondly . . . OK, so Braun found an escape hatch. Good job by him. That hatch surely will be closed now, as the owners and Players Association will better spell out what a sample collector should do if he or she thinks the FedEx outposts are closed. The next guy with a failed test will have a tougher time winning an appeal.

In other words, Braun raised the bar for his fellow players.

"I wish there was a 100 percent way for people to know that guys are clean," Berkman said. "And if there are guys that aren't clean, I want every one of those guys outed. That's the way I feel about it.

" . . . I'm a big advocate of, let's level this thing. Make sure that not only the fans but the players themselves are confident that, when they go out there to compete, that they're competing on their own ability and their own effort and their own work ethic and not having to compete against someone that's chemically enhanced."

We'll never attain that "100 percent way," and Berkman knows it. So he'll get back to work, like the rest of the Cardinals.

They overcame plenty last year, and Braun's good fortune is just one more obstacle.