Anthony Amobi: Davis, chatter about PEDs and fairness

We all as fans know that Chris Davis is having a season for the ages. This weekend, while driving around the Baltimore area in my SUV and driving to the Washington area, I flipped one of the prominent sports talk radio stations in the area. The talk on that station centered on the Orioles' poor road trip to Chicago and New York, plus Davis. However, the talk on the muscular first baseman was not all positive. Almost every other call I heard on the station centered on whether or not Davis was using performance-enhancing drugs. This lasted for the hour-plus that I drove on the Baltimore-Washington Parkway. Luckily, most of the callers into the station were local baseball fans and pretty much discounted him using performance enhancing drugs since he is an Oriole, plus has always had freakish power and is a stand-up guy. I believe the same. However, a good friend who lives in New Jersey (and is coincidentally a Yankees fan), texted me Saturday afternoon and asked point-blank, "Do you think Chris Davis is on PEDs?" I can definitely understand the cynicism, but I quipped, "Probably not. He is too good of a hitter, and his minor league numbers show that." "Nothing surprises me anymore, but I would I be if that was the case with Davis," I added. Davis was asked point blank by a fan on Twitter the other day, as ESPN's Rick Reilly noted. Davis told the fan no. I can certainly understand the skepticism. Although Davis struck out four times during Monday's game against the Rangers, he has made a game that most fail at look like a video game. Through 91 games, Davis has 33 home runs on the year with 85 RBIs with a 1.079 OPS and a 4.0 WAR according to BaseballReference.com. Those are some amazing numbers for any player before the All-Star break, but especially for a player like Davis, who did not have much of a national profile until recently. In turn, that has led some to believe that Davis's amazing performance perhaps could be aided by performance enhancing drugs. Anthony Amobi blogs about the Orioles at Oriole Post. His observations about the O's appear as part of MASNsports.com's season-long initiative of welcoming guest bloggers to our site. All opinions expressed are those of the guest bloggers, who are not employed by MASNsports.com but are just as passionate about their baseball as our roster of writers. Editor's note: After today's post, you'll notice a new Thursday guest blogger beginning July 25. Andrew Stetka of Eutaw Street Report will be taking over Thursday duties for the remainder of the season. We thank Anthony Ambobi and James Baker of Oriole Post for their contributions over the past three seasons and hope they'll continue to contribute on occasion.