Eli Johnson Mr. Van Vliet March 14, 2013 5th Hour PE Performance Enhancing Drugs: Integrity in Sports?

The use of performance enhancing drugs (PEDs) in very common among today's professional athletes. It has historically been very difficult to track and test for with modern laboratory testing methods because many of the drugs used (anabolic steroids, human growth hormone, and even their very own blood) are substances with occur naturally in the body in smaller doses. The higher doses being used by athletes though lead to dangerous and avoidable health complications later in life. Many times they can be reversed, but many times they can not. In addition to this, a lot of current research shows little measurable benefit to the athletes. Should the use of PED's be grounds for removing an athlete from a professional ball team or even banning them entirely from the Hall of Fame? I believe it should.

Performance enhancing drugs are any drug that enhances the performance and ability of an athlete in any way. They include stimulants, pain killers, anti-anxiety medications, human growth hormones (HGH), and anabolic steroids. The biggest issues facing Major League Baseball (MLB) today are the use of HGH and anabolic steroids. These two drugs when abused allow the athlete to build additional muscle mass beyond what simply working out and weight lifting can create, particularly in the arms and upper body. This is both good and bad. The additional muscle allows the ball player to hit balls harder and farther, increasing home run likelihood. However, steroids are not known for increasing muscle mass in the lower portion of the body and the increased muscle mass in the upper body equals increased weight. That

increased weight without increasing lower body muscle means they player will probably run slower. Research is being done currently to determine if the use of steroids is actually benefiting and changing the records outcomes of athletes overall, but for now we just don't know so we have to err on the side of caution. Most importantly though, steroids in higher than naturally occurring doses do lasting damage to the human body. They can cause acne, mood disorders, rapid, aggressive mood swings called roid rage that often leads to violence. They can cause explosive tears to ligaments, tendons and muscles effectively ending an athletic career. In someone with a family history, they are known to cause type 2 diabetes. They decrease the effectiveness and the body's response to other potentially life saving medications. They also have particular effects on the male body. They can cause the male body to stop producing testosterone. (This drop in testosterone is our best current method of detecting steroid use in athletes suspected of abuse.) This drop in testosterone causes the testicles to shrink, hair to thin or balding, infertility and reduced sperm count, development of female breasts. Dangerously, they also increase the risk of developing prostate cancer later in life. When the abuse and use of steroids to impact athletic performance begins in adolescence and the teenage years, it leads to all of the above plus stunted growth, making the teenager shorter and decreasing their height permanently and accelerating puberty.

The MLB's substance abuse policy states that athletes are prohibited from using all drugs of abuse (illegal drugs and drugs that are available as prescription only unless the player has a valid medical prescription, such as adderal for ADHD or opiates for pain due to injury that is being monitored by physicians.) Each year, they have increased the consequences for players found to be illegally using these substances. But it's hard to prove. Barry Bonds and Roger

Clemmons both had amazing careers. Bonds, an outfielder from 1986-2007, held a record of 762 home runs and was a member of the exclusive 40-40 club. Only 4 players ever have been members of that elite group. Clemmons held a win-loss record of 354-184. Both were accused and tested for anabolic steroid use after the release of Jose Canseco's book Juiced detailed not only his own use of steroids but named names League-wide. They all testified before a congressional hearing; Clemmons and Bonds were both in the end charged with perjury. After the scandal broke, Canseco released the follow-up book Vindicated, which detailed his life, including his continued use of steroids which continued until at least 2009. Now the question becomes are they worthy of Hall of Fame inclusion? Users are losers, right? These baseball greats set incredibly high records for future athletes to live up to, especially if they are included in the Hall of Fame as standards of performance expectation. There are two main problems with this, though. One: what damage has been done to the Hall of Fame records? In the end, we know that abuse of substances to enhance performance reaches all the way back to Legendary players like Babe Ruth, Pud Galvin, Roger Maris... all have admittedly used PEDs. Babe Ruth even called the ban on steroids stupid. Their records remain in the Hall of Fame. So do any of the records or players in the Hall of Fame have any integrity at all? Would these baseball greats be greats without the PEDs? We'll never know. More importantly though, number two. In an effort to live up to their idols, how many teenagers and young adults are actively destroying their bodies in an effort to live up to records they cannot possibly reach without the drugs?

This is where I have a problem with steroid abuse in baseball. These are legacy athletes. They are the idols of our youth. They are how young athletes measure their ability and set their personal goals. These teens and young adults are seeing these incredible records and not

measuring up. Their passion to play ball is leading them to make irresponsible decisions; decisions they have seen their idols make before them. While the consequences are getting stronger, they're not strong enough. In January 2013, 54 players were tested and 37 were positive for steroids. The climate in baseball is still not anti-PEDs.

Performance enhancing drugs are dangerous. As more evidence stacks up, they may not even be beneficial after all, meaning the danger is not only avoidable it's absolutely unnecessary. This creates a question of integrity in sports. Are these records valid, reproducible without the use of PEDs? Or are our future athletes, today's kids, trying to live up to video game standards of performance that the mere human body cannot possibly measure up to? This all makes PED's a very risky business. These kids can and have started using and abusing steroids younger and younger. The necessary interventions of education, realistic role models, and realistic goals of personal performance are simply not being taught in the schools or local leagues. We know this because of the number of times these high school and college athletes get these drugs from their coaches and trainers. Coaches and trainers whose jobs are are on the line not to produce a healthy, quality athlete. But to provide a school with a championship record each year. The issues of PEDs run rampant and wide, through all areas of American Sports, from baseball to football, to.... bicycling? In our glorification of these altered records, we have created a monster.... There is no integrity, no personal responsibility and no reality in sports. So should these players and their records be banned? If that's what it takes to slay the dragon, so be it.