Is Hank Aaron Restored (Did A-Rod Dope Too)?

[bijanc]

Ruh-oh!

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2009/b ... index.html

[bad hammy]

I'm shocked . . .

[Marlow]

This mess will never and can never be resolved. Revisionist history will constantly be rewritten, again and again and again. Who doped when and whose records should be asterisked or stricken? it's getting old, and I'm about to do an about-face and resolve that Pete Rose and Shoeless Joe and Ben Johnson and the EG girls and EVERYONE who ever cheated and got away with it, should just ALL be reinstated, because, at the end of the day, the truth is, we didn't catch all the ones who cheated and DID get away with it. I'm ALMOST there. Not quite. I'm praying for strength . . . :?

[tandfman]

This mess will never and can never be resolved. Revisionist history will constantly be rewritten, again and again and again. Who doped when and whose records should be asterisked or stricken? it's getting old, and I'm about to do an about-face and resolve that Pete Rose and Shoeless Joe and Ben Johnson and the EG girls and EVERYONE who ever cheated and got away with it, should just ALL be reinstated, because, at the end of the day, the truth is, we didn't catch all the ones who cheated and DID get away with it.

I suppose while we're at it, we should release murderers and thieves from prison because we don't catch every single felon.

Uh, I don't think so.

[gh]

steroids and murdererers in the same post? Must be time to invoke Hitler too.

[jazzcyclist]

As president of the Bonds-Haters, Mike Lupica must be the saddest guy in the world. He's been saying all along that order will be restored as soon as A-Rod breaks Bonds record. Whenever I'd heard that I would always wonder how he could be so sure that A-Rod was clean. You add this A-Rod news to the fact that the judge may throw out some key evidence in the Bonds case, and Lupica may have to be put on suicide watch.

Having said all this, I've never understood why steroids, the performance enhancer of choice of the modern athlete, is viewed by certain folks with so much more disdain than the performance enhancers of the athletes of yore (corked bats, spit balls, amphetamines, nail files, sandpaper). At least Bob Gibson and Mike Schmidt were honest enough to admit that they would have done steroids if they had been available during their era.

[gh]

It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest to learn that a majority of world-class track & field athletes would have no particular problem with using PEDs.

[MJR]

At least Bob Gibson and Mike Schmidt were honest enough to admit that they would have done steroids if they had been available during their era.

What? Steroids were only available to Weight Lifting, Bodybuilding, Track & Football? They should have just taken their heads outta the sand if they wanted to be druggies.

[gh]

Although baseball, as far as I can tell, has remained more steadfastly rooted in the past than any other sport I can think of (well, except cricket perhaps :-) )

I'll never forget that when John Elway was drafted by the Yankees that their head scout evinced great doubts about his arm strength because he had become "musclebound" from too much weightlifting. This at a time when he was tattooing Elway Crosses on his receivers from 50 yards away.

[Marlow]

It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest to learn that a majority of world-class track & field athletes would have no particular problem with using PEDs.

But it also wouldn't surprise me if tons of elite athletes aren't scared to death of taking them for reasons totally unrelated to their illegality.

[eldrick]

But it also wouldn't surprise me if tons of elite athletes aren't scared to death of taking them for reasons totally unrelated to their illegality.

the dangers are overblown, probably to put athletes off taking them

from a purely hypothetical point of view, if drug use is monitored with regular blood tests, liver/heart/kidney scans, etc, the majority of users shoud be able to use them without long term adverse effects

remember, this is precisely the case with a far more dangerous class of drugs than steroids/epo/etc - cytotoxic chemotherapy drugs used in cancer treatment or severe inflammatory diseases ( bad cases of rheumatoid, crohn's, behcets, etc ) - majority of patients can use them satisfactorily because of monitoring & if abnormalities show on tests, drug is stopped & alternative used

[Marlow]

if drug use is monitored with regular blood tests, liver/heart/kidney scans, etc, the majority of users shoud be able to use them without long term adverse effects

The 'if' negates everything after it.

[eldrick]

i don't think so

it was done 30y ago in DDR & therefore is not exactly a revolutionary approach contemporarily

[Marlow]

i don't think so
it was done 30y ago in DDR & therefore is not exactly a revolutionary approach contemporarily

That was a systemic approach that wasn't too concerned with the individual (hence the 'vitamin' lies). It would be a little tougher to do in an 'open' culture, where the authorities are NOT on your side.

[eldrick]

last i looked, iaaf had 212 member nations