Grotesquely muscled men. Meaningless records. Suspicions of drug use. Sounds like professional wrestling ... or is it Major League Baseball?

During the Red Sox' improbable World Series run, it was easy to forget about steroids and revel in America's national pastime. Thanks to some leaked testimony from Barry Bonds and Jason Giambi, however, the honeymoon is over. If baseball wants to start crawling back into the category of legitimate sport, it needs to make major-league changes to its current mockery of a steroids policy.

The blame for the steroids situation lies squarely with the baseball players' union. Last year, Commissioner Bud Selig and the baseball owners woke up to the steroids problem and demanded a testing program. The union strongly resisted, protecting the game's cheaters at the expense of all the players. The drug testing policy that the union approved only reluctantly has more holes than Chuck Knoblauch's glove. Players aren't tested during the off-season and must fail five steroid tests to warrant a one-year suspension. Last year, the union successfully discouraged even voluntary drug-testing for players who wanted to prove themselves innocent.

Nobody has ever accused the leadership of the players' union of having the best interests of the game at heart. But this time, they're dangerously close to full-fledged sabotage. For starters, the union should allow the innocent players to exonerate themselves. Second, the union should lead the way in implementing the most aggressive drug testing program this side of a rehab clinic.

Estimates of the percentage of baseball players taking steroids range from Jose Canseco's 85 percent to the bare minimum of 7 percent who actually tested positive during the first round of testing last year. A strong testing program might identify the abusers, help fix the problem and restore confidence in baseball. So what is the union afraid of?