Exactly what is 'cheating' -- and where does it apply?

Cheater, cheating, or just plain cheat: these are all variations of a word I'm hearing a lot of in NASCAR circles these days and frankly, I'm not sure if I'm comfortable with it. Below is the dictionary.com definition of the word cheating.

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Cheating
• To act dishonestly; practice fraud.
• To violate rules deliberately, as in a game

Here is what I am haggling with: What is "cheating" in sports and, more specifically, in NASCAR -- and what are merely rules infractions worthy of punishment?

The problem is that once we label a driver or team a "cheater" it introduces a sort of rhetorical absolutism that I believe is hard for that driver or team to come back from in the eyes of the fans. Seriously, if someone is a cheater would that be something you would ever forget? Forgive maybe, but would you forget it?

Think about the words in the body of the definition of the word cheating -- "to act dishonestly, practice fraud; to violate rules deliberately." If you really believe drivers, crew chiefs and teams are cheaters -- willfully violating the rules -- will you ever trust them again?

When news came down on the Friday before Sonoma that Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson were in violation of NASCAR Car of Tomorrow guidelines, a tidal wave of Hendrick bashers collectively screamed "I told you so!" The emotional outpouring was visceral in the chartroom's that I've visited and it made me re-examine the entire "cheating" debate. It also made me question why the No. 8 team didn't receive such a negative backlash for their earlier COT infractions.

In fact, The Associated Press announcing that Hendrick Motorsports wouldn't appeal the suspension used the words "caught cheating." I'm not here to question the AP, but the words "caught cheating" regarding penalties does hint of a sensationalistic approach.

Back to my main question: What is cheating in sports? For starters let's compare the poster boy for cheating in American sports, Barry Bonds, with the guys at HMS. To be fair, Bonds is merely suspected of using steroids to morph his body from a "legal" doubles, homers and RBI machine, into a freak show of home runs that have, in truth, forever ruined the baseball record books where it relates to home runs. Baseball people are now talking about "the steroid era." Could "steroid era" be an asterisk that sticks? In my mind, I don't even take Bonds chase of Hank Aaron very seriously. I'll be watching to see if Ken Griffey gets to 755.

The bottom line is that Bonds is suspected of illegally modifying his body to get more bat speed. If the allegations are true, Bonds acted dishonestly and practiced fraud thus rising to the level of the definition of cheating.

Like Bonds, the 24 and 48 teams (and often conveniently forgotten by HMS bashers, Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s squad earlier in the year) were penalized for illegally modifying their cars' body to get more speed. All of the actions in the making of these cars, we suspect, were intentional so is that also cheating? I know there is "gray area" and mistakes are sometimes made, but think about it -- in both cases bodies were illegally (in Bonds case, only if the rumors are true) modified to increase some sort of speed. The violations are frighteningly similar when you write them down -- illegally modified body leads to increased speed/strength. Do you look at Bonds, Gordon, Johnson and yes, Earnhardt, in the same way? I know I don't, but why?

Here is what Chad Knaus, Jimmie Johnson's crew chief had to say in his defense following the violations:

"We're not denying the fact that we did go out there, and we were trying to get more front downforce out of the Impala," he said, quite honestly. "We needed a little bit more, especially at a road course where downforce is so important. But we didn't do anything that we thought was illegal or outside of what they wanted."

Clearly, Knaus either is lost when it comes to the rules or has found that the penalties from NASCAR don't slow him or the 48 team down all that much. Since 2001 he has been suspended four times.

My problem is that using the aforementioned definition of cheating, we could apply the label of "cheater" to so many more athletes in so many different sports and do we really want to go down that road. Is the expression "rules violation" enough? Consider: (Continued)