NEW YORK -- Johnny Damon has watched teammates both old and new endure a steroid gauntlet that is fraught with peril and ruined reputations.

It hasn’t gotten any easier for the former Red Sox centerfielder each time he’s watched it happen anew to somebody with whom he played ball.

The Yanks outfielder spoke with David Ortiz during batting practice at Yankee Stadium on Thursday night, and got the impression that his former Boston teammate hadn’t a clue that he was a member of the so-called “list of 103 players.”

Damon said that Ortiz was “shocked” when he learned he was on “The List” of players who failed a 2003 survey test for performance-enhancing drugs, and that the Red Sox slugger was still searching for answers as of Thursday night.

“Hopefully they figure it out for his sake. I talked to him a little bit and he’s just shocked that he’s on the list and that they can’t tell him what he tested positive for,” said Damon, echoing what many have heard since the results became public in a New York Times story last week. “Hopefully right now he’s not lumped into a category. He wants to be able to talk about it, but he needs to find out what the positive test was for. Hopefully it’s for nothing major and he can get on with his life and keep hitting the baseball.”

Damon said that after talking to Ortiz he was convinced that the Sox designated hitter was never notified by MLB or the MLBPA after failing the 2003 test, as supposedly every player on “The List” was by the end of Sept. 2004, according to the Mitchell Report.

Did Damon believe that Ortiz was going to get the information he was looking for, including the substance for which he tested positive and the reason why he was never informed of a positive test result four years ago, along with all of the other players on “The List”?

“Yeah, I think so. Unfortunately it’s a process and it’s something he has to deal with right now,” said Damon. “It’s a weird situation because we were told that everybody (who tested positive in 2003) was told that they tested positive.

“In Ortiz’s case, it seems like he wasn’t. It seems like that may not have happened. Only time will tell I guess.”

With Ortiz and Manny Ramirez both reportedly on the 2003 list of players who failed tests for performance-enhancing drugs, many have already begun grandstanding that the 2004 World Series title claimed by “The Idiots” was tainted by steroids. While not as monumental a piece to the World Series team as Ortiz and Ramirez, the bearded Damon was a vital leadoff cog and seemed to change his mind about a potential taint on their title after speaking with Ortiz. If the positive tests were just limited to Ortiz and Ramirez, then Damon hoped the court of public opinion could move past a black mark in the playing careers of both.

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But if there were more Red Sox players on the list – with perhaps even Bronson Arroyo, who already gave a preemptive strike admission that he might also be on “The List” – then perhaps “the Idiots” do have something to answer for when baseball’s historians cast their final judgment.

“Well, I think I had a different answer last week when I didn’t know the rest of David Ortiz’s situation,” said Damon. “I think when the rest of the list comes out and if there are more guys (from the Sox) on then perhaps (it’s tainted).

“But that was definitely a very special year for me and the whole city of Boston and that team. If they are the only two (2004 Red Sox players) on that list then hopefully we can move past it. But who knows? When that list comes out it’s probably going to be five or six years from now. It seems like every five or six months a new name comes out.”

Hall of Famers like Henry Aaron have chimed in about the slow-death leak of guilty names escaping from a sealed court document, and opined that all of the failed tests should be released at one time - a final day of steroid shame, so to speak, before Major League baseball players and their critics move on. Damon agreed it’s the most logical solution, but – like the rest of the players from the 2003 season that agreed to the test – he hasn’t easily forgotten the promise from MLB that a player’s identity would never be revealed after the fact.

That promise, like the reputation of so many great players from the part of this decade, has gone up in smoke.

“Why not…If not baseball is going to have that ‘wow’ factor or that black cloud hanging over the game until they do release all those names,” said Damon. “But I can understand why it can’t be released. If they release all that information after there was a promise made, then there could be some bigger problems.”

The biggest problem at Yankee Stadium on Thursday night was the perpetual dark cloud hanging over David Ortiz’s head while everyone – including Ortiz himself – waits for concrete answers. It seems that Papi’s painful wait is going to go on at least a little bit longer.