Selig announces no discipline for Giambi

Aug 16, 2007 - 4:33 PM NEW YORK (Ticker) -- Baseball commissioner Bud Selig announced Thursday he will not take any disciplinary action against Jason Giambi given his cooperation in former Senator George Mitchell's steroids investigation.

Giambi had admitted to the use of performance-enhancing substances in a newspaper article in May.

After negotiations between Giambi's representatives and Major League Baseball, the New York Yankees slugger became the first active major leaguer to testify before Mitchell.

"Jason was frank and candid with Senator Mitchell," Selig said. "That and his impressive charitable endeavors convinced me it was unnecessary to take further action."

On June 6, Selig said that he wanted Giambi to meet with Mitchell and to "cooperate fully" with the probe, which began in March 2006. The commissioner had hinted at a possible suspension if Giambi had failed to comply.

As part of the agreement hammered out between MLB, lawyers for Giambi and the players' union, Giambi agreed that he would not tell what he knew about other players.

MLB was hoping to learn information regarding Barry Bonds since Giambi knew Bonds' trainer Greg Anderson, who has been implicated in the BALCO steroids investigation.

Giambi told USA Today in May that he was wrong for "doing that stuff" and claimed MLB should have apologized years ago for its widespread drug problem.

In 2003, Giambi was one of nine players to testify before a federal grand jury because of his connection to BALCO.

The San Francisco Chronicle reported in December 2004 that Giambi told a grand jury that he had injected himself with human growth hormone during the 2003 season. Giambi publicly had denied taking performance-enhancing drugs, but his December 11, 2003, testimony contradicted those statements.

According to transcripts of testimony obtained by the the Chronicle, Giambi told the grand jury he had used several kinds of steroids obtained from Anderson.

That led Giambi to call a news conference in February 2005, in which he apologized but never addressed the reasons for the apology "due to legal issues." He never has failed a baseball-administered steroids test.