Admit it. If you played any Backyard sports game, Pablo “The Secret Weapon” Sanchez was one of the first guys to go off the draft board when forming a team. He could do it all! The back of his baseball card even says he, “can steal bases like Lou Brock, catch fly balls like Willie Mays, and hit homers like Reggie Jackson.” He played baseball, soccer, football, hockey, and basketball. He had literally the best walk-up music baseball has ever heard:
It didn’t matter the sport. He was a stud across the board. He was a fan favorite and a first-ballot Hall of Famer. While this fact may shatter many of your childhoods, it’s time you faced it: Pablo Sanchez was using steroids throughout his entire career.
The first shred of evidence is the amount of sports he played. After making his Backyard Baseball debut in 1997, he played 5 different sports in the neighborhood. Regardless playing sports every time of the year, his playing ability never diminished and he never got hurt. With the grueling backyard sports schedule, this is the first sign that something was not right with Pablo. While the other kids in the neighborhood were specialized for different sports and could not carry the consistency across the board, Pablo Sanchez did it with ease.
While Pablo Sanchez is the smallest kid in the neighborhood, he had power that rivaled Barry Bonds, a cannon for an arm like Brett Farve and Yoenis Cespedes, a hockey shot better than Sidney Crosby, a three-point shot that rivaled Steph Curry, and the legs of Kenny Lofton. He literally defied physics and and the bio mechanics of the human body. Need evidence? Look at this bomb he hit in batting practice!
723 feet?! Aaron Judge and Mike Stanton have nothing on this guy! That kid shouldn’t be able to get the ball out of the infield let alone the ballpark!
What is also important to consider is the kids that he hung out with in the neighborhood: Sammy Sosa, Mark McGuire, Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguez, and Jason Giambi just to name a few. Now, at 10 years old, kids are very susceptible to peer pressure. It would not be surprising to see him fall into a bad situation. Drug testing was only implemented in 2003; Sanchez’s prime was right before he would have been caught. Considering the fact that drug testing was still in its infancy, Sanchez would have had the ability to cheat the system and take substances like HGH and Deer Antler Spray without having those being detected.
The most damning piece of evidence in the entire equation is Sanchez’s lack of diminishing ability over time. Sanchez’s baseball career began in 1997. When you look at his rookie card from 1997 and his ability, here is how he ranked:
| Batting |  |
| Running | |
| Pitching |  |
| Fielding | |
Now, due to inconsistencies in how ability was recored in the neighborhood, you will notice slightly different scales depending on the season. Now, during the 1997 season the most a player could be given in an ability category was a 4. Pablo Sanchez was ranked as one of the best players in the neighborhood as a rookie and an above average pitcher. What you will notice is that Sanchez only gets better with age.
During his prime in the 2001-2003 seasons (note this is before drug testing was implemented), Sanchez was one of the most well rounded players in the neighborhood:
| Batting |  |
| Running | |
| Pitching | |
| Fielding | |
In those seasons, the most that a player could have in any category was 10. That means that Sanchez was ranked as a perfect hitter, fielder, and one of the fastest kids in the neighborhood. Sanchez had literally no change in ability over a seven season period. The same could be said for his 2005 season:
| Power | |
| Contact | |
| Pitching | |
| Running | |
| Defense | |
While we add another category and we are able to separate power and contact with these stats, you see Sanchez develop into a traditional player that used steroids. Players like Barry Bonds, Mark McGuire, and Sammy Sosa shifted away from worrying about defense and focused all of their attention towards hitting. Here, you see Pablo Sanchez following this trend. His defense diminishes from a 10 to a 7 (still an average defender), but he does have a 9 out of 10 ranking in both contact and power and shockingly he jumps from a 9 to a 10 in running! What you are looking at is a 9 year period where Sanchez has little to no diminishing ability, which is very suspect.
Pablo Sanchez retired from baseball following the 2005 season to focus on football and other sports and because of the toll playing 5 sports takes on a person. He made a shocking return to baseball in 2015. With literally zero change in size and still being the smallest guy in the neighborhood, it was heartbreaking to see him fall into the stereotypical DH player that many at his age are forced to do:
| Pitching |   |
| Batting | |
| Contact | |
| Fielding | |
| Running | |
His running, defense, and pitching ability has vastly deteriorated, but his contact is still at the same level it was 10 years previously and his power has only diminished from a 9 to a 7. While many players age gracefully over time and are confined to the DH role towards the end, Pablo Sanchez’s lack of diminished hitting ability over an 18 year stretch is both incredibly suspect and highly unlikely. When you combine the strain of playing 5 different sports and literally not growing a single inch over an 18 year period, Pablo Sanchez’s maintained ability level can only be attributed to the use of performance enhancing drugs.
You’re probably wondering why this matters. We need to be teaching this generation of kids that steroids are damaging to a person’s health and reputation and that they have no place in backyard sports. Backyard sports should be about having fun with your friends, not cheating your way to meaningless championships and trying to impress your friends. If you play the game the right way, you can be one of the all time greats. Pablo Sanchez should be an example of what happens when you use steroids. He had a chance to be an all time great, but cheating never pays. Many of you have chosen to look past Sanchez’s PED-use for decades, but it’s time to face the facts. Your childhood hero was a cheater.
Standing Room Only 
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