How can a problem be so publicized, so scrutinized and so downright shoved down our throats by the media get so much attention in one sport but not another?
It was the late Ken Caminiti who opened up a lot of people’s eyes in a 2002 Sports Illustrated cover story that steroid use in sports was perhaps a bigger issue than what most people thought.
It would be a vast understatement to say that since then, the media has run with the story.
Current major league players such as Barry Bonds and Jeremy Giambi along with former stars like Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa have come under rapid fire over the years about their involvement with performance enhancing drugs.
The players are criticized for using, commissioner Bud Selig is chastised for possibly being aware of the steroid use in his league and overall the sport is under a constant microscope by fans and analyst.
Back to the original question, though: how can one sport’s problems with performance enhancing drugs be brought to light by the media and fans, but not another?
In a recent blog written by C.W. Nevius on sfgate.com, Nevius wonders aloud if anybody really cares that the NFL might have just as big of a problem with steroids as the MLB does.
In the blog, he writes that since the NFL is a league that is basically adored by the public and crushes other programs in television ratings, that people are simply don’t care.
Nevius uses the newly uncovered facts released by The Charlotte Observer that several players of the ‘04 Carolina Panthers team used performance-enhancing drugs on several occasions that season, as a backdrop for his argument.
The Observer quotes Dr. Gary Wadler, a well-known expert on performance enhancing drugs, who prepared a report for the U.S. Attorney General’s office.
“Several of them were using disturbing, particularly alarmingly high amounts with high dosages for long durations — some in combinations,” Wadler said. “This wasn’t just a passing flirtation with these prohibited substances. When I see (prescriptions) `renewed five times,’ I say, `What are you trying to accomplish?’ ”
It certainly seems like it. Wadler’s report, based on the players’ medical records, showed that Steussie and another player picked up prescriptions for drugs just days before leaving for the 2004 Super Bowl. (The Panthers lost that game, 32-29 to New England.)
Dr. Wadler identified former Panthers’ Todd Steusie, Jeff Mitchell, Kevin Donnalley and Wesley Walls as players who were known to have taken steroids.
Those weren’t exactly practice squad members – every single one of those players contributed to Carolina going to the Super Bowl that season.
Let it be known that it wasn’t all of the Panthers players involved in the drug use, but the point is that the NFL is seemingly ducking a lot of scrutiny by use of smoke and mirrors.
By suspending a few players each season, the NFL is making the public believe that its drug testing is on the up and up. But are we to believe that the majority of the NFL is clean?
Nevius details in his blog that the average linebacker 20 years ago was 225 pounds. Now the average LB is upwards of 265 pounds and can still run the 40-yard dash in 4.4 seconds.
Now I love the NFL. To me, there is no more organized and classy league out there. Come Sunday’s in the fall, there is no better feeling than waking up to a full schedule of football games and nothing to do but sit back in watch.
But how can we as fans berate one league (going as far to say that Barry Bonds’ stats should have an asterisk by them in the record books), but simply turn away from another league when there is full documentation stating that players were using steroids during a Super Bowl run?
The 2004 Panthers are simply not discussed, while news reports and debates on national radio and TV stations bring up ‘riods in the MLB virtually every day.
Now, I don’t equate players using steroids to enhance their performance as say, someone who is handed all the answer to a test, but it is still wrong. It is still someone using an unfair advantage over the next guy.
It is still cheating – and we as fans should start paying attention to the rug that is being pulled over our eyes by the NFL.
