i think steroids should be banned, if only so some eager impressionable youngster doesn't ruin himself with performance enhancing drugs. think of the children! soon they'll be doin roids in the t-ball leagues!

tmidgett wrote:to the second part: legalization of steroids etc. would compel anyone who wants to compete at the highest level (particularly in track and field) to use.

I believe that's the crux of the slippery slope Russ refered to earlier in the thread. This alone makes for a pretty solid argument for outlawing steroid use with appropriate search protocols in place.

That said, many sports involve serious damage to the health of the participants at levels from high school through pro, and sometimes younger. Football is a great example, fun game to play but don't count on your joints nor connective tissues to stay in good shape. This is to say nothing of the training and dieting habits of all aesthetic and weight class sports and the incidence of concussion in contact sports -- female athletes with very low body weight (< 8% LBM I think)and restricted calory diets are often as at risk for osteoperosis by the end of college as women well into their elderly years; somewhere between 3 and 5 concussions should necessarily force one into retirement even from a lucrative and successful career.

I'd like to say let the pros abuse themselves as long as amateur sports stay regulated and open for everyone to not use drugs to be competitive, but I think the end result would be to pull an even larger audience away from amateur sports and increase the incident of amateurs abusing to jump ranks. Therefore, if it's regulated, regulate it.

I do care about steroid use in baseball for the simple reason that I now am forced to say, "Yeah, but..." after looking at the numbers being put up over the last five years or so.

Hey, Barry Bonds hit 71 homeruns in one year. Yeah, but...
Hey, Barry Bonds is a season away from breaking the all-time HR record. Yeah, but...
Hey, remember the McGuire/Sosa HR chase and how great it was for baseball? Yeah, but...

I also believe that hitters have an unfair advantage when juiced, beyond the obvious reason. Pitchers can't use steroids, nor even lift weights nearly as much as hitters can because too much muscle hinders a pitcher and the natural throwing motion. (Remember Bonds'/Sosa's arms in their prime vs. now? Night and day) This, combined with the fact that MLB is already watered down with six teams too many, gives the Sosa's, Bonds', et al the ability to "muscle" a jam-job out of the park almost at will.

I have little respect for the HR record now. I have respect for 61 being hit back before ANYONE even thought about lifting a weight - and being hit off of Major League pitchers who belonged in the Majors. That's a feat.

Who will ever watch Barry, Sammy, Jason... hit a HR again without shaking their head in doubt. Perhaps not as much now, seeing as they've been busted, but my point must be seen here to a degree.

In short. Anytime you witness a sporting event that isn't being played on the level, somewhere inside, you've got to, at bare minimum, feel a bit jipped.

I think we saw a great example of what will happen next season to all those who have been juicing, now that the cat is out of the bag, in Sosa this past season. He got off the 'roids, shrank in size, lost confidence, wasn't able to hit the end-of-the-bat ball out of the park anymore and eventually crumbled into a pitiful afterthought. Think we'll see the same happen to Bonds this year. He'll still hit over .300 - just because he's always been a great hitter - but HR-wise, I predict less than 40.

We'll see.

try to think about it in this context. when you want to get a job, even if it's working in sales at a mall or something, you sign a contract saying you're not going to show up to work geeked out of your mind on blow whenever you have a shift.

in the same way, baseball players have it in their contracts that they're not supposed to partake in similar practices that could effect their health (i'm unaware of the exact language, i'm by no means a legal expert).

if that mall employee shows up at work and keeps sneaking off to cut rails on the employee lounge coffeetable, they're going to get fired. it's a direct violation of his contract as an employee of store x.

if the baseball player is using what's described as a banned substance, they're subject to whatever the punishment may be. giambi and his teams attempt to void his contract seems to be an ok example. it's a direct violation of his contract as an employee of baseball team x.

Rules and regulations concerning steroids or other substances that might help the professionals to perform better came into being not to keep the game/sport clean or to establish equal conditions for all, but to protect the athletes.
When I was younger - it seems so long ago now - I was duathlon state champion and vice state champ in triathlon. Back then we took everything (still on the legal side) that was available to perform better. L-Carnitin, Anabol Loges, Vitamin E pills, Aspirin and caffein pills and some stuff that helped to regulate your weight. Not just a few pills but as much as you could possibly take to be still on the legal side. My left knee doesn't work as it did before because I decided to have some injections right next to the kneecap instead of a four weeks break. I have to admit, that was stupid.
My mother recently told me that one of my old team mates was banned from any national and international championships for 18 month after he was caught with some illegal substances in his bloodstream. Was I shocked? Of course not! The stuff he was taking isn't illegal for non-athletes by the way, just some cough juice with Aspirin.
I know some semi-pro cyclists who had needles permanently implanted in their chest veins for faster and easier EPO injections.
You have to see it from a realistic point of view.
Do you really think that people like Lance Armstrong can complete each year's Tour de France with an higher average speed than the previous year just because they have better bicycles? We like to see pros break all-time home-run records. Athletes have to run faster, jump higher, throw better and swim faster. Officials know that. That's why so few famous professionals get caught.
Is there a difference between Sammy Sosa playing with a corked batter or Sammy Sosa's muscle built up?
OK, the batter thing was way more entertaining and the muscle thing is probably less healthy on Sammy's side but in the end it's Sammy's decision.
Professional athletes might not be among the most intelligent men to walk on the planet's surface when it comes to decide about there health. But it's not about healthy living but about professional Baseball or Football or Cylcling or... Let them do whatever they want to do as long as they know about potential consequences.
There were some athletes in the former East German olympic team who didn't know what their doctors injected them or what pills their coaches gave them to swallow, but that's something completely different.

We should banish steroids? We do!
We should banish people cheating on their tax offices? We do!
We should banish bank robberies? We do!

People get caught and then they are so sorry

6-4-3 wrote:I also believe that hitters have an unfair advantage when juiced, beyond the obvious reason. Pitchers can't use steroids, nor even lift weights nearly as much as hitters can because too much muscle hinders a pitcher and the natural throwing motion.

For the record, a common misconception about steroids is that they are all, and only act as, androgenic substances. Even typical androgenic compounds have "value" as recuperation aids, which is really what pitchers are concerned with. It's not all about the muscle, for athletes, large and small, it's all about recovering from training quickly.

I really don't know why anyone gives a shit. There seems to be a prevailing notion that these guys are important - like airline pilots, law enforcement officers, or master electricians, and that the well being of our society depends upon their clean living. Get real. They're entertainers, nothing more. Their job is entertaining others with an uber-human display of athletic prowess. Big fucking deal. Let's take a look at other entertainers; should Judy Garland have been pulled off-stage because she had more pills in her than a Walgreens? Or Richard Pryor? Gary Busse should very likely be institutionalized, but he's still playing the game, so to speak. Everyone acts like these guys are doing something really important; they're NOT. They are playing a game for an audience for the purpose of entertainment. IT'S NOT REALLY IMPORTANT....

So now there's a movement to LEGISLATE these guys like what they do is something sigificant that the well being of society depends upon - like fly a plane with hundreds of people on it thousands of miles. It's complete bullshit. The act of conferring that kind of importance on these people is distorting and misplaced, and complete bullshit.

As someone who is not a fan of spectator sports, the act of raising these games to a level of such worldly importance strikes me as a gigantic misplacement of social priorities amognst Americans, and I believe to be one of the problems with the current social-polical state in this country.

As someone who is not a fan of spectator sports

could have fooled me!

as far as this being an american phenomenon, you haven't seen sports insanity until you've been in europe around the european football championships or the world cup

people love sports b/c they are dramatic and artistic and brutal. if you fail to appreciate that, well, that's just the way it goes. it's kind of like my dad not appreciating punk rock. there are specific reasons to like it, and there are specific reasons not to like it. but the entire thing isn't invalid just b/c you have no particular feel for it.

i will admit that the bloom on the red sox' championship fell off the evening of nov. 2nd, testament to its limits, but that doesn't discount the historical significance of it. there are over 100yrs of professional baseball in this country. it's older than almost anyone on the planet. it has been around as long as the telephone. it predates recorded music. it's had a very long time to become important to people.

I don't wish to offend anyone, nor trivialize Baseball's significance in American culture throughout the last 100+ years. What disturbs me is the irrational behaviour that fans, a'la "fanatics", feel they can justify - wrapped up in the "culture" as they are. To me, it is no different than the irrational behaviour and delusional state that evangelical Christians bring themselves to over their particular obsession.

I can appreciate the historical significance of Baseball in the pantheon of "Americana", and it is indeed a beautiful pastoral game. If there is anything I find dangerous about spectator sports in this country it is Football culture and the mindset that it precipitates in the form of fascistic, black and white political and social values - not to mention the 'Bread and Circuses'/'Beer and Football' parallels that could be drawn with late Roman society.

What really bothers me is the importance that "fans" are placing on what is essentially a trivial enterprise, to the extent that you would legislate the privacy and personal behaviour of a citizen because the are payed to PLAY a GAME for the enjoyment of others. And included in the detrimental nature of this act is the conferrance of a level of importance on this entertainer that is only placed on people whose 'straight and level' lifestyle is a matter of PUBLIC SAFETY.

I am a fan of the Symphony. I feel that Symphonic music is an important part of our European cultural heritage. It is and has been a barometer and a pinnacle of the western musical artform for the past 300+ years. I believe it is valuable to promote and preserve the existence and vitality of Orchestras in American cities, and that they be progressive, viable, and accessible to the community which they serve. In this manner I am no different than you in your feelings toward baseball. However, if a performer in an orchestra chooses to use a substance or device which enhances their performance, I don't care. Even if it provided them with an unfair advantage in obtaining a principal or soloist position; and if they fuck up, tough-shit, they're out of there. I don't believe it shoud be different for any entertainer - regardless of how they entertain...

The only problem I have with the original sentiment that began this thread is the players pretending like they're all natural and clean.

Be a man. Grow some fucking balls (oh, wait, they're all shrunken and useless now). Admit what you're doing.

The part that nauseates me is not that they use steroids, it's the collective ration of horseshit that the players and media serve up when we look at Bonds gaining 40 pounds of muscle in his late 30s and have to pretend it's not from 'roids. Wink wink, titter titter.

Drop the goddamn high and mighty routine, guys. It demeans us all to have Sosa stand there and say "I'm clean" without meaning it and the media and fans to repeat "He's clean" without believing it.

Human. Beings. Do. Not. Build. Muscle. Naturally. Beyond. 35. It's just a damn fact. Can you gain strength, you can pump up what you have, etc etc etc but it's just a physiological fact that you can't achieve the same sort of "gains" later in adulthood that you can as a younger man. So let's all stop pretending and I'll be happy.