TAMPA, Fla. -- A third strike for cocaine landed Darryl Strawberry a one-year suspension Monday, and left the New York Yankees and most of baseball wondering: Will he ever play again? Commissioner Bud Selig imposed the penalty, and did not make any provision for the troubled slugger to return early for good behavior. "This was a very difficult and painful decision for me to make," Selig said. "The meeting I had with Darryl and his wife, Charisse, last Tuesday was an emotional experience for all of us. I had no doubt that his remorse and sorrow were genuine, and I worried about the effect my decision would have on his health and the welfare of his family. "In the end, I could not ignore Darryl's past infractions and concluded that each of us must be held accountable for his or her actions. I am hopeful that he will use this time away from the game productively and will care for himself and his family."

Strawberry, like all addicts, needs recovery, recovery from a disease he doesn't know he has, nor what to do about it. But, this action by baseball also sends a message to all other addicts - you will be punished for your addiction - as if the addiction itself isn't punishing enough. Can you imagine baseball suspending a player for a leukemia relapse, an arrhythmia relapse (like Bill Bradley's paroxysmal atrial tachycardia-rapid heart beat), or a high blood sugar in a diabetic?

I'm sure this won't hurt Strawberry financially and it may focus him on his recovery more acutely. On the other hand, this punishment may kill him. The punitive treatment of addiction is what keeps addicts underground where they get worse. It makes them feel resentful because they know they didn't relapse on purpose. Moreover, in the current hit or miss paradigm of recovery, where only a small percentage of addicts who attempt recovery get it without a few relapses, punishing a relapse may well push an addict away from the people whom he actually needs to help him/her. It definitely increases self-hate which can be lethal.

Under the current paradigm of addictions the relapser doesn't have a clue why he relapses, except to believe he must have willfully done something wrong and that he's a loser rather than a sick person living at a time when addiction treatment is a fraud, not based on any real understanding of addictions. Yet, this fraud is forced on addicts as "recovery or else." The addict believes the fraud the same way the experts do. Thus, they both believe the relapser is a failure and not sincere, requiring remorse and forgiveness. One more failure and you may as well die. That is too frequently the result. In fact, this lethal senario is very frequent. Despite this, we continue to use it. No other disease known to man punishes its victims.

You will probably hear the addiction experts repeat in unison, "Treatment Works." As long as they continue this delusion and conscious lie (they have no data to show this) they can sleep at night while countless addicts go to jail, the streets, and die.

When will we open our minds to the fraud and at least look at Hypoism as a possible real paradigm that holds forth a possibility of radical changes in the current mess we today call etiology, treatment, recovery, and policy for addictions.