Lebron lifts weights like crazy (not accusing him of anything), why would he do that if the added muscle didn’t help his game? Michael Jordan started seriously lifting weights the same year he won his first title. If there’s no advantage in bulking up, then I guess basketball players are really, really, really stupid for wasting so much time in the weight room.

I’m sure drug abuse happens in the NBA, but to what degree is really unclear.

Theo Ratliff must be the cleanest guy in league history.

until Congress flat-out told baseball and the player’s union: Set up a testing program, or we will pass a law REQUIRING one (and you’ll like ours next).

One wonders when David Stern, Billy Hunter, and a few players in suits get hauled up to Capitol Hill.

(While it’s a serious issue; it’s also a great way for congresspeople to grandstand before the camera…)

it’s no coincidence that the teams which have one of the names listed above win just about every close game that is shown on national tv.

They win close games because they are the best players in the league. They have superstar status because they are the best players in the league. They win because they are good. They are the face of the league because they are good.

The two are not mutually exclusive.

Chris Andersen and Carmelo Anthony beat Kobe Bryant on national TV. And early, I saw Brandon Roy and Greg Oden get beat by Ron Artest’s Rockets. What kind of piss poor conspiracy is Stern running here? He couldn’t even get the uber marketable Shaquille O’Neal and Steve Nash into the playoffs! Before that, what was he doing letting the boring and unlovable and small market San Antonio Spurs win all those championships the past few years? And that time the superstar-less Pistons won!?! Stern’s a real slacker machiavelli!

Just sayin’…

Stephentheth. PED’s are commonplace in all major league sports and really the focus should be on making sure athletes understand the risks to personal health and regulate the use of PED’s. The PED issue aside Stephen’s point is excellent.

A FAR more concerning problem in the NBA then whether or not LeBron takes roids is whether he has a MUCH more important competitive edge that of reffing bias. Since Donaghy was discovered and that form mafia busting FBI agent said he believes the league is corrupt their has been no independant investigation of the NBA and it’s reffing practices.
Before you say anything about his new business investigating sports related crimes this man is a former law enforcement agent who helped protect the country from the Gambino family and AL Qaeda so before you call him into question over David Stern you might want to think twice. The NBA has VERY questionable history regarding refereeing post the independant Ref’s union being dissolved by one David Stern.

are not “drugs” and I doubt the IV fluids given contain them either.

if defensive players were juicing too? just a thought.

P.S.: Here is an example of such a “whereabouts” online tool (you need a login, but you get the idea) http://www.usantidoping.org/ae/
The athlete can also see descriptions of banned substances (since they are responsible for everything that is found in their body, it’s wise to talk about anything with your doctor), and also can declare drugs he/she uses therapeutically – you would be amazed how many swimmers and other athletes suffer from asthma ;-)
To my knowledge the big US pro sports don’t require such strict information from their athletes, and thus controlling in training is harder to perform, if at all done.

Also interesting is this tool, where you can publicly see the testing history of athletes: http://www.usantidoping.org/what/stats/history.aspx
The following US NBA players were tested by the USADA in 2008 at least once (Olympic team):

Carmelo Anthony – 2, Shane Battier – 1, Carlos Boozer – 1, Christopher Bosh – 3, Elton Brand – 1, Kobe Bryant – 3, Dwight Howard – 1, LeBron James – 2, Jason Kidd – 2, Christopher Paul – 1, Michael Redd – 1, Dwayne Wade – 1, Deron Williams – 3

This isn’t much (especially if you know when it’s coming) – but better than nothing

rec!

mind me asking what you events you did in track? I’m also a fellow Track guy, I ran the sprints in college. But I never delved into the banned substance issue much. I knew that beer and hotdogs weren’t on the list so I wasn’t worried about it.

Norskie = God

Ethics: If you would allow it for everyone, the ethical part gets taken out. And that only mostly, because in some sports teenagers are competing who couldn’t yet completely decide for themselves if they want to take them. In some state systems children were drugged systematically, must notably the GDR (and probably others were the state didn’t later have the intention of clearing things up).

I has long been argued that if you could go to two stadiums, one where you know you get to see the best performance by athletes using PEDs and one where you get to see clean athletes that are slower/jump less high/etc., where would people go? The answer is not as clear-cut. I assume many would watch the better athletes, but a significant number wouldn’t.

And athletes would have to carry the burden to decide to use it. Which in a way they already do, especially in sports where they can safely assume a number of their competitors are doped (athletes know many of their competitors since they were teenagers, and know fairly well who can do what. Sudden jumps in performance are suspicious). I know athletes who struggled mightily with the psychological burden that they came out eights or sixth in important events (Olympics, World or European Championships) when they had trained their ass off and did everything they could, yet also could be pretty sure three of the guys in front of them did drugs but were not caught during competition. Or that they had been caught previously, but now were back after a two year suspension.

Most corporate sponsors want to be associated with successful athletes who also compete fairly. E.g. T-Mobile and several companies from the food sector have pulled out of sponsoring cycling.

Health: As I mentioned a few times, many of these drugs were developed for severely sick people where the negative side effects get outweighed by the positive effects they provide. Or not for humans at all (e.g. Clenbuterol was primarily developed for raising cows faster). That is not the case in healthy people, leading to nasty side effects:
Aggression, dependence, sometimes paranoia, severe liver damage including liver cancer which is fatal, severe lung damage, infertility (including small balls), some steroids get converted into estrogen in men resulting in breast growth, sudden heart failure from certain drugs or when mixing drugs (there were cases in cycling, most famously Kurt Jensen in 1960 and Tom Simpson in 1967 (amphetamine pills) near the top of the Mont Ventoux where there is a memorial the Tour De France passes every year.

Especially for one group of athletes: Women, the younger and the more long-term the more damaging
Steroids have a number of physical and psychological damaging effects for them. Including but not only unnaturally deep voices, negative effect on breast development, acne, hair growth typical for men, menstrual changes, possibly lung problems and cancer for earlier versions (oralturinabol), stunted growth.

As for the technological changes you mention: I wouldn’t compare improvements in technology to improvements in PEDs. And both get regulated by the governing bodies.

Skis have developed for extreme purposes to the point that most mere mortals couldn’t control them anymore without risking severe injury, and thus the FIS is trying to rule them in by e.g. not allowing exceptionally high binding plates. F1 cars get changed every season to adapt aerodynamics, engine power and other changes to still allow for an interesting fair and safe sport. Team sports issue jerseys that fulfill norms. Ski jumping and swimming suits get tested for how much water/air they let through.

Needs a bit of an injection. Help him out.

We human beings (and I’m being charitable in some cases here ;) have been altering our biochemistry for thousands of years. Even if we could, say, completely regulate what these athletes ingest or inject it wouldn’t create a level playing field because everyone has a different genetic endowment and so reacts to various substances in different ways or to different degrees.

The case against allowing cyborgs to participate in professional sports might seem a bit clearer, but I predict that eventually we will be discussing the right of man-machine hybrids to compete. Then, with mature biotechnology available as well we might see an NBA finals featuring the Tampa Terminators against the Pomona Predators.

that what you are seeing is real. That is to say that it isn’t scripted or altered by drugs that change your bodies chemistry (i.e. hormone levels). Once you cross that line then you are in the realms of “sports entertainment”. If an enterprising businessperson were to try to create a league where anything went in terms of PEDs then that would be a completely different discussion about the legal/moral implications of such activities. But as long as the NBA bills itself as basketball then it should ensure that its players aren’t tweaking their body chemistrys.

Also a league where any and all PEDs were allowed (or even encouraged) would probably have to contend with something like this at some point:
www.hulu.com/watch/4090/saturday-night-live

Don’t think because we might find out our guys are juicing? As a boyhood fan of the Oakland As it really hurt to find out about the Bash Bros. after the fact and makes me see their achievements in the late 80s as fake. If you want to live with your head in the sand that’s fine but I’d rather have more information than less.

i will come right out and admit i juice on sugarfree rockstar and centrum silver.

I have to be the best at what I do on my own, to a fault even. I don’t know how many competitors out there are like me, but I’m sure some exist.

and it was really hard to listen to George Micheal, not singer-song writer, make one logically falacious argument after another was pretty disappointing. The debate seemed to be dominated by emotional pleas from the anti drug side rather than rational arguments, which was a bit of a shame, but that is what happens when you try and prop up George Micheal and Dale Murphy (who wasnt that bad) as experts. It seemed like they could have dug a little deeper for experts on the anti doping side.

Not saying he doesn’t use roids, but lots of people have tempers, especially during competition.

Has been tested for like everything possible and is clean. It’s her insane state of the art training + freakish natural abilities that are allowing her to be so good for so long at the highest level possible.

Asthma drugs or EPO might help recovery by providing more red blood cells to transport oxygen and remove “waste”. But even that is not their main use.

In Europe and especially in Germany there have been many studies on the damaging psychological and physical effects of PEDs, especially ephedrine derivatives and the steroid Oralturinabol (4-Chlorodehydromethyltestosterone) that was used in the GDR – and there again especially for women. Some even while the system was still in place because doctors of course were also involved. http://www.clinchem.org/cgi/content/full/43/7/1262

And yes, of course you have to continue working out to have a significant effect from PEDs. And yes, likely only a fraction of bulky athletes use PEDs. But I would say it’s fairly certain lanky guys like Tayshaun Prince are less likely to use them than some other athletes that look like Ben Johnson and have bloodshot eyes and cystic acne. (Carl Lewsi admitted “inadvertent use” of ephedrine, so he wasn’t really better than Johnson.) As I said above that athletes in the NBA in the 80s and 90s did not look as bulky as today and in comparison to their international counterparts could be a good sign, or just a sign that it reached the NBA later.

Why I don’t believe that improvements in nutrition and training are the sole reason for faster stronger athletes in the past 2 decades:
Hazel Clark, Tony Dees, Torri Edwards, Chryste Gaines, Justin Gatlin, Sandra Glover, Mike Gravelle, Mickey Grimes, Alvin Harrison, Calvin Harrison, C.J. Hunter, Regina Jacobs, Marion Jones, Dennis Mitchell (claimed his too high testosterone level had to do with having had sex 4 times before a test), Tim Montgomery, …
All caught in the last few years, most for ephedrine and steroids. And that’s just athletics and just some of the US athletes caught up to the letter M. I would have to make a statistic how many medals Team USA had to give back, but it was a lot.

I could make a list who I would suspect, but that would be just lobbing rumors since I know none of them.

Unless you strike out, you hit the ball. And even then, you may have hit some foul balls.

Getting a hit and hitting the ball aren’t the same thing. PEDs only help you hit the ball if they help your coordination, reaction time, and bat speed. (Guess what, they can do all 3 of these.) PEDs help you GET HITS just by adding strength/bat speed. Doubles turn into home runs, deep routine fly balls turn into home runs, grounders turn into harder grounders, which can find holes, line drives get faster, and so on.

In basketball, strength does not help you shoot 3s unless it’s half courters at the buzzer, and even then strength isn’t that important. (I’d challenge any center in the league in a half court shootout.) Basically, comparing hitting a baseball and shooting 3s is ridiculous on so many levels…

His comments make it sound even more likely.

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