Mark McGwire does not deserve the position of hitting coach for the St. Louis Cardinals organization. In fact, McGwire does not deserve a position in any baseball organization.

It has been all but confirmed McGwire took steroids. Every time he is asked, he declines to comment or says, “I am not here to talk about the past.” Jose Canseco, a former teammate, admitted to injecting McGwire personally with steroids in his book, Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant ‘Roids, Smash Hits, and How Baseball Got Big. In the same book, Canseco says McGwire had used steroids since he entered the league in the ’80s.

My candidates for a better hitting coach include Michael Jordan – during his baseball sabbatical of course – Willie the Wildcat or any of the kids on my little brother’s Little League team.

Having McGwire as your hitting coach is just as bad as having Tim Donaghy referee the next flag football game between Gamma Sigma Phi and Galaxy or having Bill Buckner teach you how to field a groundball.

If McGwire is allowed to come back and coach after doing something illegal, than why can’t Pete Rose or Shoeless Joe Jackson be in the Hall of Fame? They both performed illegal acts and were or are banned from baseball.

Not only should McGwire not be allowed back in baseball, but also the Cardinals should be punished for hiring him. What would happen if, say, Albert Pujols gets in a slump and can’t seem to break out of it? It is the hitting coach’s job to get his swing back on track or maybe change up his footwork at the plate – unless his hitting coach is the poster boy for steroids next to Barry Bonds and Rafael Palmeiro.

Picture this: Pujols comes to his new hitting coach asking for help. McGwire says, “I just found these needles from my old stash. I broke the single-season home run record with this same stuff. If you take this, you will break out of your slump.”

The Cardinals and Major League Baseball have just made a huge mistake.