The Major League Baseball Players Association protects those who are murdering the game.

The union shields cheaters, making it impossible to separate the innocent from the guilty.

The union must endorse blood testing. The union must lead the push to banish steroids and human growth hormone (HGH) and all the other exotic substances polluting America’s Pastime.

On June 6, federal agents opened the door at 10792 E. Fanfol Lane in Scottsdale, Ariz., and walked into the home of journeyman pitcher Jason Grimsley. So began another of baseball’s weird, wicked tales.

The agents went to Fanfol Lane to confront Grimsley, and he quickly admitted he had abused HGH, steroids and amphetamines. He also, allegedly, revealed that “boatloads” of other players employed performance-boosting drugs.

HGH is nasty stuff. It raises blood pressure, increases the risk of diabetes and causes abnormal growth in the hands, feet and face.

Here’s the scary part: What if our children believe gobbling HGH helps them become elite athletes? What if HGH replaces steroids as the preferred method of cheating?

It’s time to open the door on a new era. It’s time to unload the cheaters’ boat. As Grimsley trudges away from the baseball, we see it’s not only the elite who abuse chemicals. The mediocre do, too.

The players union must do its part to toss all this performance-enhancing garbage out of the game.

Sports should be about the power of human possibility – natural human possibility. If baseball sinks into a demonstration of the power of drugs, we might as well switch the channel to World Wrestling Entertainment. At least the WWE is honest.

It’s all fake, and proud of it.

Baseball must return to the proper balance between offense and defense. Baseball must return to its subtle essence. This isn’t a home-run derby.

Part of this march back to sanity will include stringent drug testing. The baseball union can moan all it wants. The union can defend those who don’t deserve defending, but the union will lose if it takes the stubborn route.

Congress is making noise about policing baseball if the sport can’t police itself. Fans will grow weary of watching a drug bazaar disguised as a game.

The players association is filled with honest men who have followed the narrow road. They don’t cheat.

They don’t fill their bodies with junk that pumps them up now and ravages them later.

The innocent must help expose the guilty. The good guys in the union must save their game.