With new developments surfacing late last month in the 2003 Carolina Panthers-steroid scandal, the NFL and player’s union are pondering whether or not to tighten the league’s drug-testing program.
A report from the AP that was posted on ESPN.com today, stated that the NFL could add more drugs to the banned list already in place. More frequent testing could also be put into place and the affects of both of these changes could happen as soon as this season.
“We are in the process of re-evaluation, trying to determine if more is better, if it’s the right time to add substances, to add more tests,” Harold Henderson, the league’s executive vice president for labor relations, told the paper. “It might make sense to do some tweaking.”
The NFL does approximately 10,000 tests for performance-enhancing drugs a year and there are about 2,000 players in the league. Players are randomly selected for testing and can be tested during the offseason.
The NFL announced in June that it added amphetamines to the list of banned performance-enhancers starting this season.
In my opinion, two arguments can essentially be made about this news.
One way to look at things is that the NFL is recognizing they have a potentially severe issue on its hands and is quickly trying to rectify the problem before the situation gains even more public appeal. It’s nice to see that a massively popular league like the NFL is trying to keep its game as clean as possible and air on the side of caution while the MLB wallowed in its own garbage until the issue smelled so bad they had to clean it up.
The second thought on this matter is a little too conspiracy theory for my taste, but certainly a point that can be argued. Many believe that although the NFL boasts of a clean program, players are often made aware of when they will get tested and therefore know how to beat the process. So the fact that more testing and banned substances could be added doesn’t hold much water considering the NFL will do whatever it has to do to protect its image.
Either way, it appears that the NFL has figured out they have a bigger problem on its hands than originally thought.
