Steroid/HgH Solutions

by Brendo on Mar 2, 2007 9:52 AM PST

WHat can/should be done?

So I've been frequenting HH for a while now (though my teaching schedule makes the offseason quiet for me 'round here) and I don't think we've had this conversation all that much. If we have, excuse me, but please consider that the current GMJr "scandal" is sufficient grounds upon which to re-engage in such a discourse.

What can/should be done about the pervasiveness of steroids and synthetics like human growth hormone in baseball/sports in general?

I think this is another case that pushes us closer to Buster Olney's idea: Take blood/urine samples now at the regular intervals expected through the testing policy, under the agreement that when a reliable test for HgH is created and implimented into regular use by MLB (not IF, WHEN) the old samples will also be checked and punishement retroactively applied.

The only legitimate case against such a policy I have heard is the invasivness of introducing needles and blood testing to the whole of MLB players, where now they are only used in extreme/volutary cases.

I tested this proposal on the national collegiate parliamentary debate circuit for the better part of a year, and found no better alternatives nor any reason deemed sufficient to deny the plan (assuming a paradigm of valuing the sport free of illicit substances.)

WHat are your thoughts?

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Comments

(shrug)

Rather than have cameras up the butts of players, I think the climate of investigating the supply chains and shaming the hell out of the players is the best balance of civil liberty respect / demands for appropriate behavior. While Bonds is shameless, a perjury indictment will be scarier to many players than a suspension or test that cannot detect hgh.

by Rev Halofan on Mar 2, 2007 9:56 AM PST reply actions

no blood

I am morally opposed to forced blood tests, unless it's some sort of life and death situation.

If they can't find it in the urine, hair or feces (yuck sorry), then too bad it can't be detected.

Imagine if you were required to submit to blood testing. Some of you may have no problem with that, but am skeeved by having a needle in my arm.

I do like enforcing this on the supply side, and the shame that a player could be outed like this one day is a deterrent.

by elricsi on Mar 2, 2007 11:23 AM PST reply actions

But

All people have conditions of employment, and it is the discretion of the employer as to what many of them are. We require bloodtests for work in the military or intelligence agencies, even if the potential employee is a civillian. I don't love the idea of blood tests either, but I also don' t love the idea of the obscene amounts of money players get paid either. I have a hard time sympathizing with the willing participants in a monopolistic industry who have the opportunity to make heaps of cash for playing a game.

I don't know where I stand on the issue personally, but that's a counterpoint to your hesitancy.

by Brendo on Mar 3, 2007 11:02 AM PST up reply actions

Still

It's wrong to force people to be stuck with needles, period.

And for what reason?

Look, I'm all in favor of the concept of honesty and fairness in competition and all, but this isn't an issue of national security. It's just baseball. We don't need to go to such extreme measures to guarantee a particular level of purity in the game. There will always be people who figure out a way to beat the system, so there's no reason for such a vicious system.

by jjackflash on Mar 4, 2007 1:45 PM PST up reply actions

call it a condition of employment

you don't like it, don't play ball. Whenever I start a job, I have to go through drug testing. When I applied for life insurance, we had to have blood & urine testing done. It's a part of life nowadays. Why don't they all piss and moan at the guys who made dope testing necessary?

As I have said before, it is absolutely pathetic that someone has to rely on this shit to be a good player. It isn't the person playing anymore, it's the chemicals and I am not going to pay to watch that. If I want to watch that kind of brain rot, I can go work in a drug rehab.

Come on already.....PLAY BALL!!!

by ladybug on Mar 2, 2007 12:13 PM PST reply actions

Part of Life

Perhaps, but that doesn't make it right. Jim Crow laws were once a so-called "part of life" for millions. It was wrong.

And unless it's a case where you'll have people's lives or dangerous machinery in your hands, employers shouldn't be testing for drugs.

Nevertheless, it disappoints me that someone on HGH, for example, takes a roster spot from a player who's clean, simply because of the edge he got from his chosen chemical enhancer.

by jjackflash on Mar 4, 2007 1:49 PM PST up reply actions

The player's lives are those at stake...

Steriods and HGH are licensed for very specific and limited uses. Their use in any other way is a danger to the user (cf. FloJo et al), and I think it's worth remembering that while a level playing field is important, a person's health is more so.

While (some of) the players may not see it as such, sacrificing your health for the sake of a few (million) extra bucks is a fairly unintelligent thing to do if you want to have a long and healthy life after your ball-playing days are done.

It is the duty of MLB to protect the players, and frankly, the players union should be a little more co-operative about protecting the health of it's members too. And if that means they have to give a little blood, well, they get paid enough to put up with it a needle without crying about it. Most of us got past that part of our lives a few years ago.

by The Limey on Mar 5, 2007 7:31 AM PST up reply actions

excellent!

I would only add that as sports role models, no way in hell do I want a Roid King to be my son's hero. These kids already have too much of a sense of invincibility. They don't need steroids thrown in mix. It is already well documented boys in high school are already popping the crap. It's also documented that the steroids have contributed to many suicides and murders.

It's a no win situation no matter how you look at it.

Come on already.....PLAY BALL!!!

by ladybug on Mar 5, 2007 9:12 AM PST up reply actions

Lost innocence

I know, why can't players just go back to using cocaine?

We Played the Game: Memories of Baseball's Greatest Era.

by Bilko 420 on Mar 5, 2007 9:30 AM PST up reply actions

I remember

a big ol commotion when it was discovered how rampant coke was in baseball. I was a die hard Dodger fan then (late 70's/early 80's & when it was Tommy & the boys: Scioscia, Garvey, Howe, the Penguin, Sutton, Yeager etc etc) and Howe got busted for that & alcohol and all hell broke loose. (but then again, his life turned out real great too thanks to meth).

Come on already.....PLAY BALL!!!

by ladybug on Mar 5, 2007 11:01 AM PST up reply actions

Disagree 100%

They're grown adults, who have every right to make their own decisions. If a player chooses to forfeit 10 years of his life in order to make an extra $10 million, that's his choice. Not the choice I'd make, but I have no right to make the decision for him.

It is NOT MLB's job to "protect the health" of the players. It's the player's individual choice.

by jjackflash on Mar 5, 2007 12:44 PM PST up reply actions

Two points to make here...

It's against the law, so it is NOT the player's choice - I'm not talking baseball here, I'm talking the law of the land. Where exactly is the thin end of the wedge here - is it okay to dodge you taxes if that'll get you a few extra bucks, is it okay to rob someone to get a few extra bucks? How far to you stretch the boundaries? It's either a crime or it's not. The legal status around medicines is for the protection of patients.
Beyond the law, it is absolutely the duty of the player's union and MLB to protect the players from themselves both legally and medically. The assumption that these drugs are "safe", "harmless", "mild" etc is completely erroneous. In case you missed your classes at med school, the first rule of medicine is "Do no harm". You'll notice they indicted a couple of doctors today who breached that rule and they WILL do time, quite rightly, if found guilty.

by The Limey on Mar 5, 2007 2:42 PM PST up reply actions

No

MLB is not the government. If the government thinks people are breaking the law, it can investigate and charge accordingly. MLB doesn't need to do the government's job for it. It's none of MLB's business. And it IS the players' choice. And you look silly comparing a player's choice and exercise of free will to do something that will harm only himself with another's decision to rob someone else.
You're making my point for me. If the doctors are violating the law, prosecute the doctors. It's the duty of the doctors to decide what to prescribe and to whom; it is not the job of MLB or the Players' Union to tell players what they can and cannot do with their bodies. It's awfully presumptuous to imply that a doctor who prescribes HGH is "doing harm," when a very good argument can be made that they're doing quite a bit of good - helping a guy achieve success he could not have imagined. It has been suggested, for example, that Barry Bonds' eyesight has improved through the use of HGH. I'd sure like to get rid of my glasses. There are potentially adverse side reations to any treatment.

by jjackflash on Mar 5, 2007 3:02 PM PST up reply actions

you are talking in circles

a doctor IS doing harm if he is prescribing AN ILLEGAL DRUG. HGH is not for the use of an athlete trying to get better. It is for children who lack the hormone to grow. That's why it is called human growth hormone, not human play better.

YES, prosecute the doctors but I hate to tell you this: those guys are humans, not gods (despite what some of them think). Wave several thousand dollars in their face, they bite. But prosecute the receiving party too. They are the ones using the crap

And MLB is the governing body for baseball. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mlb

Why are you trying to justify all this? Murdering pedophiles is a good thing too-gets them off the street and keeps us from having to support them in jail. Murder is murder. Illegal drug use is illegal drug use. You can't change the rules just because you like the outcome.

p.s. and if you think using it to improve your eyesight, think again. Initially there can be an improvement but then all those nasty side affects can kick in: acromegaly, kidney failure, liver failure, permanent change in brain chemistry. Indeed, you will be able to see very clearly from that dialysis chair. if you live that long

Come on already.....PLAY BALL!!!

by ladybug on Mar 5, 2007 4:03 PM PST up reply actions

Not at all

a doctor IS doing harm if he is prescribing AN ILLEGAL DRUG.

Not necessarily. If a doctor prescibes a drug for a use for which it is not approved (and here we get into highly technical regulations: a drug can be prescribed for reasons other than its "technical" use), the doctor is breaking the law. And again, we're talking about doctors issuing prescriptions in the U.S.; other countries have different regulations. But breaking the law hardly equates to doing harm. I shouldn't need to explain that.

Sure, breaking the law is breaking the law. But some laws are wrong.

Right now, Barry Bonds can see better than he could previously. Will he suffer any particularly negative adverse consequences from what he used? Maybe, maybe not. Time will tell.

Cigarettes are dangerous. But not every lifelong smoker develops cancer.

by jjackflash on Mar 5, 2007 4:57 PM PST up reply actions

The point about the licensing of drugs is...

...that for unlicensed uses, the safety and efficacy have not been established, the appropriate dosage has not been defined and the risk:benefit equation has not been evaluated. Anything that the physician then does falls in to the 'uncontrolled experimentation' category and I'd prefer my highly paid elite athlete to be more than a guinea pig. Medical ethicists frown on that sort of thing, and as a sports fan, so should you.

It is not for you, the layman, to decide what laws are right and wrong. It is for the experts - medics and that branch of the government, in this case the FDA - to determine. That's why we employ them.

More to the point, the ball player is no expert either, which is why there are laws to prevent him from acquiring these drugs and there are tests to ensure that he doesn't use them.

The moral arguments against him using - both in terms of an unfair sporting, and subsequently a financial advantage - are sound, but, and here I would refer you to the very first point I made, the most important argument is about protecting the health of these players, because some of them are clearly too dumb to look after themselves. That is very much the resposibility of both the law AND the game itself - to protect its integrity and its image and its stars.

by The Limey on Mar 6, 2007 1:50 AM PST up reply actions

It is absolutey NOT

the responsibility of the government to protect us from ourselves. Nothing could be more wrong.

Yes, some players are dumb. They're allowed to be dumb. Nevertheless, they have free will as individuals, and should be entitled to make their own decisions about what to put into their bodies. It's their business.

Incidentally, as an attorney, I am as qualified as anyone to expound upon what the law should be. In my particular line of work, I make decisions every day on how laws should be applied and what they mean. I have spent far more time than most people considering the subject.

by jjackflash on Mar 6, 2007 10:18 AM PST up reply actions

it's their business, sure

if they were private entities but they don't own their lives anymore-they signed on the dotted line. They are signed sealed & delivered to MLB. There's don't fly, don't ski, don't use a motorcycle, don't do anything dangerous clauses in these contracts. But it's OK to use drugs for illegal, unethical and immoral purposes? It's OK to give a special few an unfair advantage over those that have standards? These guys want to kill themselves slowly, do it on their own time. They aren't getting paid millions to cheat.

Come on already.....PLAY BALL!!!

by ladybug on Mar 6, 2007 2:55 PM PST up reply actions

Millions don't matter

The amount of money they're being paid should not affect their privacy rights.

One should not have to subject oneself to being stuck with a needle simply to pursue a career in baseball.

Contracts contain many prohibitions, such as the ones you mention. The thing is, they're on the honor system for everything except the drugs.

Those other restrictions are based only upon the team's financial interests. If that's the reason for the restriction on drug use, fine, but "morality" doesn't really enter into the picture.

by jjackflash on Mar 6, 2007 6:54 PM PST up reply actions

OK jack, I'm blue.....

you're the lawyer, I'm the nurse--I'll agree to disagree...hugs, kisses and we can buy each other a beer sometime.
make mine an IPA

Come on already.....PLAY BALL!!!

by ladybug on Mar 6, 2007 8:00 PM PST up reply actions

Fair Enough

I tend to favor a whiskey sour over a beer, but I seek out the Sierra Nevada vendors at the Big A!

by jjackflash on Mar 6, 2007 8:10 PM PST up reply actions

I'm torn

I could hem and haw and piss and moan about the integrity of the game and all that. I can even make myself believe for a moment that I would be above that, but the reality is if I had the opportunity to live out my dreams and make a small (or large) fortune playing in the bigs but I needed some "help" to get there, I'd climb Everest to get it and never look back.

My hypocrisy goes only so far.

DarkAngel hath spoken....

by darkangel01 on Mar 2, 2007 1:07 PM PST reply actions

great point

like how many big name sprotswriters did not at some point in their career get down and suck a manager's dick or date a supervisor's ugly-wallflower daughter in the name of getting the big gig.

And how many mainstream writers have not at sompoint wrote a compromised piece hacking hacktastic for a friend or -worse- someone with a backroom payoff for ink.

If you want to talk about an allegedly sacrosanct lair that is filthier than paris hilton's coochie on Sunday morning, the average sportswriter's agenda would be a perfect place to start.

by Rev Halofan on Mar 2, 2007 2:50 PM PST up reply actions

Agreed

Breathalyzers for both sportswriters and Paris' vagina.

by Bilko 420 on Mar 2, 2007 3:43 PM PST up reply actions

See

That's why I included that caveat of moral pardigm at the end. I don't know that I really care about players using stuff either, but its helped in my case that I don't really care about the sanctity of "all-time" numbers. If I realy did, I'd get far more worked up over Bonds or the other bullshit.

That said, should acknowledged juicers be allowed intot the HoF in your world? How about those whose accomplishments are clouded by allegations or mountains of circumstantial evidence as to illicit substance use?

by Brendo on Mar 3, 2007 10:59 AM PST up reply actions

HGH test not that far off

I recently (within the last week) read an interveiw with an official from WADA who stated that a reliable test for HGH will be available within the year. The article I read was in print, (can't remeber where) here's a link to similar info. I also read that owners are contributing funds to domestic labs, hoping to develope a test. I wonder how strong the motication is for either side to get something done.

http://www.nydailynews.com/02-09-2007/sports/story/495980p-417944c.html

I want a dolphin to be my pet.

by rjcicc on Mar 3, 2007 12:24 AM PST reply actions

the more and more i think about it,

i care less and less.

i really don't care about steriods as much as most people. Everyone does it, so who cares?

i'm sure, over a 162-game season, plus playoffs, players will use BOTTLES AND BOTTLES of anti-inflammatories, asprin, Melatonin, etc. you don't think those things enhance their performance?

When Kirk Gibson hit his famous homer off of Eck in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series, he was loaded with so much vicodin, he was probably high out of his mind. he couldn't have stood up, let alone hit a dinger and round the bases without the pain killer.

and i'm sure there are many more examples of players taking "performance enhancers".

john RIP samo

by angels4adam on Mar 4, 2007 9:47 PM PST reply actions

Precisely

There are 1000s of chemical performance enancers that players are free to use at will. Selecting a handful and deeming those "unacceptable" is hypocritical at best.

Suppose we find out that eating 10 hot fudge sundaes per day over the course of a year will guarantee a 15-point increase in batting average. Do we ban hot fudge sundaes?

by jjackflash on Mar 5, 2007 12:47 PM PST up reply actions