Commissioner Rob Manfred has said his office is investigating circumstances involving the positive drug tests that resulted in the recent 80-game suspensions of four major league players. Manfred has also said his office will not investigate the recent disclosure of confidential information about the drug and alcohol relapse of Josh Hamilton.

Manfred did not need to say why baseball’s investigators are looking into the circumstances surrounding the steroids suspensions. He might have performed a service for fans had he said why he would not look into comments baseball officials have made about the Hamilton development.

Less than three months into his tenure as commissioner, Manfred has become faced with – excuse the expressions – a new drug scandal, the kind Major League Baseball stumbled onto when documents were leaked to a south Florida weekly newspaper detailing steroids activities of an anti-aging clinic.

The recent test failures, all occurring in a 16-day period, undermine the efforts of Manfred to wipe out use of performance-enhancing drugs. As Bud Selig’s chief deputy, Manfred was the prime mover behind the south Florida investigation that resulted in the year-long suspension of Alex Rodriguez and the successful effort to get the union to agree to strengthen baseball’s drug-testing program.

Manfred’s efforts were so effective that five years ago Selig was prompted to declare the steroids era over.

“The use of steroids and amphetamines among today’s players,” Selig said in a statement, “has greatly subsided and is virtually nonexistent, as our testing results have shown. The so-called steroid era – a reference that is resented by the many players who played in that era and never touched the substances – is clearly a thing of the past….”

Given the developments of the past couple of weeks, this statement requires a great big OOPS!

Before Ervin Santana and three other pitchers were suspended for 80 games each under the disciplinary program that took effect early last season, no major league player had been suspended for steroids use since March 24, 2014. Suddenly four players test positive for the same steroid, stanozolol.

“Other than the similarity of substance, I have no reason to believe right now that they’re connected,” Manfred said. “Having said this, whenever we have a series of tests for a single substance, we undertake an investigative effort to determine whether there’s a connection and what that connection might be. If you look back, the very beginning of Biogenesis was the fact that we had a series of testosterone positives that began our investigative process, so we’ll follow that same model.”

The Biogenesis investigation was the one that snared Rodriguez, Ryan Braun and 12 other players.

Besides Santana, who had been scheduled to start for Minnesota, the stanozolol four include Mets closer Jenrry Mejia, David Rollins of Seattle and Arodys Vizcaino of Atlanta.

Will steroids ever be a thing of the past, no matter what Selig says? Apparently not as long as there are chemists who continue to try to develop drug-taking methods that they think will elude the drug testers and players who are desperate enough to gamble on the chemists’ ability to come up with undetectable drugs.

The stanozolol quartet certainly didn’t hit the drug jackpot, and more positive tests may be on the horizon.

Now in the infancy of his commissionership, Manfred has four positive tests fall into his lap in the space of 16 days. The burst of illegal activity makes a joke of Selig’s declaration that the steroids era is over. It is not surprising that Manfred would order his investigators to investigate the resurgence of steroids.

But why won’t Manfred investigate the violation of the confidentiality provision of the joint drug agreement? Perhaps an investigation would turn up information that the disclosure about Hamilton was leaked by an executive of his team, the Angels, or some other management source, and then Manfred would have to discipline that person.

Suspending a player is easy for a commissioner. Disciplining a club or league executive, especially an owner, is not as easy.

Manfred has not explained why he isn’t looking into the Hamilton leak, and the best explanation I have received is speculative, that it came from Hamilton’s side because he told people about his relapse. In fact, Hamilton’s father-in-law has been quoted talking about it.

However, a union official speculated that that explanation was coming from the management side, and management, he said, always says such things to deflect suspicion from itself.

“”I have no reason to believe the Angels did anything inappropriate,” Manfred said.

Matters that come under the joint drug agreement are supposed to be confidential, but whether or not the Angels disclosed Hamilton’s relapse, the club’s owner, Arte Moreno, and two top executives, president John Carpino, and general manager Jerry Dipoto, all have made comments or issued statements about Hamilton that can be viewed as violating the agreement.

Even Commissioner Manfred and Major League Baseball have made comments that could be questioned under the joint drug agreement.

All of the comments and statements came after an unnamed arbitrator ruled that the Angels could not discipline Hamilton, who has a history of addiction and suspensions and who reported this relapse himself.

“The Office of the Commissioner disagrees with the decision,” MLB said in a statement, “and will seek to address deficiencies in the manner in which drugs of abuse are addressed under the program in the collective bargaining process.”

I find that statement disturbing. When an arbitrator rules in favor of a club or MLB, he’s right and his decision is correct. When the decision goes against a club or MLB, the arbitrator is wrong, the decision is bad and there’s something wrong with the system.

In this instance the Angels found that it was Hamilton who had the problem. “The Angels have serious concerns about Josh’s conduct, health and behavior and we are disappointed that he has broken an important commitment which he made to himself, his family, his teammates and our fans,” Dipoto said in a statement.

The Angels might have been influenced by the $83 million they owe Hamilton for the last three years of his 5-year, $125 million contract.

“It defies logic that Josh’s reported behavior is not a violation of his drug program,” Carpino told the Los Angeles Times.

Owner Moreno, who gave Hamilton the huge contract as a free agent, seemed to be most upset, but he should be upset with himself for not including a stipulation in the contract under which a drug or alcohol relapse would cost Hamilton some of his salary.

Now Moreno is left with threatening not to pay Hamilton. He said he “would not guarantee” that Hamilton will play for the team again. If Hamilton, who is on the disabled list recovering from shoulder surgery, were not to resume playing for the Angels, they would nevertheless have to pay him.

“I think, more than anything, we look at accountability,” Moreno told the Orange County Register. “All of our employees, all of our players have to have accountability. I think that’s the word here.”

The Angels have come to think so little of Hamilton that they did not reserve his clubhouse locker for him and they removed Hamilton apparel from Angel Stadium stores.

Yet Manfred said, “I have no reason to believe the Angels did anything inappropriate.”

One thing I think the Angels have done that is inappropriate is allow the 33-year-old outfielder to rehabilitate his shoulder during and after spring training at home in the Houston area rather than with the team. That might be his choice, but he belongs with the team, especially having slipped back into addiction only a few months ago. There is probably a greater chance of his slipping again being alone than being with teammates.

But the Angels evidently don’t care what happens to Hamilton. If he does something that could enable them to get out of his contract, they would be delighted.