PEDs / Steroid in Sports: Where Do You Stand?

[Roy H.]

PEDs should be allowed for recovery but barred in competition unless all competitors have equal access to them - this is obviously unsustainable and unenforceable.

I think another member mentioned something like this, as well.

How do you define "recovery"?  What if it's something like Timelord's knee last season, where he's trying to play through pain.  At that point, he's both in recovery *and* in competition. 

I think there's obviously a use for PEDs when recovering from surgeries, but I'm also okay with them for day-to-day healing.

At a glance I would say that you'd probably have to come to a league-wide agreement around a mandatory minimum number of game's missed depending on the treatment, but that's mostly from a health perspective (playing through pain is an individual choice, but it's stupid - especially in 2022 when everyone is 'load managed').

edit: for example, Timelord takes Chemical X to help in his back recovery, the CBA says he has to miss X number of days/games after ending his treatment because Chemical X is a PED. I think that's much more honest and above-the-board than just a blanket ban.

That's a fair enough way of doing it.  It becomes sort of like the old-school DL, while players can receive medical care that heals their injuries more quickly.

[Celtics4ever]

They only help the guys who work hard and not everyone has the genes to get big on them.

I have never used them, but I seen quite a few guys try them and waste their money.

I think they have no place in sports save recovery as said above.

[dannyboy35]

  Steroids only bother me when it’s people wearing tee shirts that spell out how hard they work out or clowns on instagram bragging about hard work in the gym. Brag about your physique but not the hard work. I find that insulting. 

[GreenlyGreeny]

I’d say PEDs/steroids should be forbidden from all sports. It will ultimately lead to a more authentic product and send the right message to youth, who have been badly affected by the current tolerance of PEDs (many try them, but it’s a small numbers game to get in the pros so many who try them still don’t make it and have serious health problems in the wake). Even pain regulators should be heavily restricted to ibuprofen and marijuana (no more opioids, no HGH, etc.). Starting with college, everyone should be randomly tested extensively, including occasional follow-up tests to keep everyone on their toes so they don’t think their turn is over for a season after passing a test. A first-time penalty should be half a season. Second strike should be an entire season. Third strike should be a lifetime ban.

[Birdman]

LeBron & Tiger Wood would fail steroid test for sure

[tenn_smoothie]

In professional cycling, stage races like the three tours, Italy, Spain, France, the blood doping that Lance Armstrong did made a huge difference and gave him a ridiculous advantage. On mountain stages, he would just pedal away from the other leaders like he had a motor on his bike. I realize other cyclists during that period were doping as well, but not to the extent or in the way that Armstrong was.

I remember Greg Lemond said that in his last two Tours, he felt a big difference in the peleton than earlier years. Whereas, the early flat stages of the Tour were traditionally used to fine-tune fitness and to ease into the three week race, he saw riders at full speed right from the first few days. He attributed it to blood doping, which increases oxygen levels, vital in endurance competitions. Lemond eventually became a critic of Armstrong and publicly offered data to support his claim that the guy was cheating. Lemond was vilified, but in the end was proven right. He remains the lone American to win the Tour de France ('86, '89' 90).

[Moranis]

PEDs should be allowed for recovery but barred in competition unless all competitors have equal access to them - this is obviously unsustainable and unenforceable.

I think another member mentioned something like this, as well.

How do you define "recovery"?  What if it's something like Timelord's knee last season, where he's trying to play through pain.  At that point, he's both in recovery *and* in competition. 

I think there's obviously a use for PEDs when recovering from surgeries, but I'm also okay with them for day-to-day healing.

At a glance I would say that you'd probably have to come to a league-wide agreement around a mandatory minimum number of game's missed depending on the treatment, but that's mostly from a health perspective (playing through pain is an individual choice, but it's stupid - especially in 2022 when everyone is 'load managed').

edit: for example, Timelord takes Chemical X to help in his back recovery, the CBA says he has to miss X number of days/games after ending his treatment because Chemical X is a PED. I think that's much more honest and above-the-board than just a blanket ban.

That's a fair enough way of doing it.  It becomes sort of like the old-school DL, while players can receive medical care that heals their injuries more quickly.

I know in the UFC, you can go off of the USADA testing.  You have to go back on a certain amount of time before your next fight (it is several months given the nature of the sport and shelf life of the drugs).  The testing in the fight game is far more frequent than the other sports and more regulated, but I do think something like that could be implemented for the other major sports.  So if you are out of competition, you can use, but need to go back into testing a certain period of time before you compete again.  What that time is may be sport related, but it does seem like something that could be looked at, especially for season ending or off season recovery from injuries. 

It would also help with infertility issues as one of the drugs given to someone to boost fertility are PED's.  I know a few players have alleged that is why they failed tests in the past.  If you could do that without issue in the off season, that would be nice.

[Roy H.]

Shocker:  A-Rod is a rat

The memory has faded after nine or so years, but there was once a time when Alex Rodriguez was at war with MLB over his ties to the infamous Biogenesis clinic, which supplied him and a number of other players with performance-enhancing drugs.

A detailed report from ESPN published Wednesday unearthed a previously unreported episode from that contentious time in 2013 and 2014, in which the New York Yankees star — who now enjoys a broadcasting gig with ESPN and Fox, as well as co-ownership of the NBA's Minnesota Timberwolves — walked into the DEA's Miami office and started naming names.

Specifically, Rodriguez reportedly named Manny Ramirez, Ryan Braun and one unnamed All-Star player as PED clients tied to Biogenesis. The unnamed All-Star has reportedly never tested positive for PEDs or been suspended by MLB. The DEA reportedly already had Ramirez and Braun on its radar.

The meeting on Jan. 29, 2014, was reportedly part of a "Queen for a Day" arrangement with prosecutors. The gist was that anything Rodriguez told the authorities could not be used against him in future legal proceedings, but he had to tell the truth or face potential charges of lying to federal agents.

In addition to naming Ramirez, Braun and the unnamed player, Rodriguez reportedly admitted to the following:

Paying Biogenesis head Anthony Bosch $12,000 per month for a doping protocol of testosterone creams, testosterone gummies and human growth hormone between 2010 and 2012.

Receiving performance-enhancing drugs from his cousin, Yuri Sucart Sr., for at least a decade until firing him for allegedly spending $250,000 to $500,000 in a frivolous manner.

The identity of the married Sucart's girlfriend.

Paying Bosch to hide his involvement with funding sources that included petty cash from the Yankees' team secretary.

Lying to Yankees president Randy Levine about knowing Bosch in November 2012, a month before the Biogenesis scandal was reported.

Illegally receiving Cialis and **** from Bosch for "fun."

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/alex-rodriguez-reportedly-ratted-out-manny-ramirez-ryan-braun-as-biogenesis-clients-to-dea-040335164.html

[Donoghus]

The ESPN article that came out yesterday was pretty wild too.

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/38089564/tony-bosch-biogenesis-treated-wwe-star-big-show-boxer-shannon-briggs-others

But what has not been publicly known until now -- found in more than 1,400 pages of unredacted federal investigative documents obtained by ESPN -- are the names of other athletes and figures, from world champion boxers and wrestlers to fitness gurus, entertainers and even law enforcement officials, who surfaced during the investigation of the largest doping operation in U.S. sports history.

Among them are former WWE star Paul "The Big Show" Wight; former boxing champion Shannon Briggs; one of the most well-known trainers of prominent athletes in David Alexander; and Ernest "Randy" Mims, a longtime friend and business manager of LeBron James.

While reporting this story, ESPN was told by federal authorities that they found nothing to suggest that Alexander -- who has trained James -- or Mims provided any PEDs to any athletes. But because both had a relationship with James, their involvement in the investigation caused investigators to look at whether James might have been involved in any activity related to PEDs -- and they concluded that he was not: "There was never any indication that LeBron James did anything wrong," the lead DEA investigator said.

Bosch, the key target, told authorities he treated or supplied nearly 100 athletes, among them non-baseball players such as MMA fighters, a Sri Lankan cricket player and a WWE legend.

During an April 9, 2014, interview with authorities, Bosch discussed treating Paul "The Big Show" Wight of WWE fame -- a monster of a man at 7 feet tall and somewhere in the neighborhood of 400 pounds. At the time he saw the wrestler in 2009-10, Bosch operated out of a small room in the rear of a Coral Gables tanning salon with then partner Jorge "Ugi" Velazquez. Bosch told authorities he first treated Wight's wife as a "body sculpting" customer before he was introduced to The Big Show by Velazquez.

Bosch also told authorities he once attended a Thanksgiving dinner at the Wights' South Florida home, where they were joined by numerous other pro wrestlers, Velazquez, and Dodd Romero, one-time fitness guru to Alex Rodriguez, the most famous Bosch client. At the gathering, Bosch said, he learned that Velazquez, who emerged as a major South Florida supplier of black-market steroids and was convicted in the DEA investigation, was giving Wight additional performance-enhancing drugs "behind [Bosch's] back." Bosch said Wight also advised him that wrestlers wanted stronger substances, such as Winstrol and Deca-Durabolin -- which didn't mesh with Bosch's doping protocols. He said Romero sided with the wrestlers.

After the dustup, Bosch told federal authorities he stopped treating pro wrestlers, although he did see Wight a few more times. He said Velazquez continued providing substances to the wrestlers.

Ricky Martinez, former chief financial officer for Bosch's clinic, told federal authorities, according to the documents, that Bosch treated boxers and other athletes, including Juan Dixon, a first-round NBA draft pick by the Washington Wizards who had led Maryland to the 2002 NCAA men's basketball championship. After leaving the NBA, Dixon played in Europe but was banned after testing positive in 2009 for the steroid nandrolone. Dixon served as head coach at Coppin State from the 2017-18 season until his firing after this past season, finishing with a 51-131 record.

Bosch told ESPN he had provided PEDs to perhaps as many as 15 current and former pro men's tennis players, although when pressed for details, he offered none. The only name to publicly surface has been that of Odesnik, who was initially busted after Australian customs agents found vials of human growth hormone in his misplaced luggage on the eve of the 2010 Australian Open. Odesnik enjoyed a career-high world ranking of No. 77 in 2009 on the ATP Tour.

During a 2013 interview with federal authorities, Odesnik acknowledged having suffered a shoulder injury late in 2009 and seeing Dr. Felipe Del Valle, who at the time operated the Body by Chemistry clinic with Bosch. He said that Del Valle wrote him a prescription for human growth hormone but that he didn't get it filled. Instead, he said the HGH he brought to Australia had been purchased "off the street" at a Miami gym.

[Roy H.]

The Big Show?  Next you'll try to tell me that Hulk Hogan used to juice.

[Celtics4ever]

These people are rich and their livelihood depends on their bodies in a finite time of earnings.   I think there is more going on than we realize in this regard.   

They have people who can outsmart the testers with their money.

I too think LeBron was a big time user in the NBA.

MMA fighter Chael Sonnen  claimed both LeBron and Tiger took them because they have the same supplier who knows?

[Kernewek]

It's a few years old now, but the documentary Icarus (on Netflix I believe) is a really interesting look at a lot of things involving doping: including how much of an impact it can have on even 'normal human beings', let alone the top 0.1% of athletes.

[ChillyWilly]

The older I get the more I think about doing PEDs just so I can through the day 

[kraidstar]

I'm glad LeBron is finally getting outed.

Next up is the Miami Heat organization. The are the St Louis Cardinals of basketball. Aka dirty even by sports standards.

[green_bballers13]

People want to rely on the information from cheaters who probably lie in other areas of their life?

How are some people so confident that they know what type of drugs people use? If you don't like someone and they are big, they must use steroids? This all seems crazy subjective.