Anyone watching the live steroid debate?

[tnf]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7219464/

Interesting to watch them dance around the issue so much. Frustrating thing is that anyone who knows and has experience with the drugs knows that there is no doubt that Sammy, Barry, McGwire, have all been juicers. I guess anyone with a decent knowledge of biology/physiology/biochemistry can also tell...but you don't have a lot of people with that knowledge involved here. A couple docs and a bunch of congressmen.

The agreement that governs baseball's steroid policy is a joke. THere is a clause that renders the entire thing null and void if the government investigates its effectiveness and enforcement.

Might as well legalize them all...

Drugs don't make the ballplayer. If they did, there would be a lot more Barry Bonds walking around.

[R00k]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7219464/

Interesting to watch them dance around the issue so much. Frustrating thing is that anyone who knows and has experience with the drugs knows that there is no doubt that Sammy, Barry, McGwire, have all been juicers. I guess anyone with a decent knowledge of biology/physiology/biochemistry can also tell...but you don't have a lot of people with that knowledge involved here. A couple docs and a bunch of congressmen.

Sounds familiar for a Washington 'investigation.'

The agreement that governs baseball's steroid policy is a joke. THere is a clause that renders the entire thing null and void if the government investigates its effectiveness and enforcement.

Might as well legalize them all...

Drugs don't make the ballplayer. If they did, there would be a lot more Barry Bonds walking around.

I would almost agree. I do agree that drugs don't make the ballplayer, but if they legalized their use, then that would almost be like forcing other players to use them, just to stay competitive, wouldn't it?

[shaft]

cowboy the fuck up McGwire.

[Fender]

Couple of good articles on the subject and why this is none of the governement's business:
http://www.reason.com/sullum/012304.shtml

Bush on Steroids
Why must sports be drug-free?
by Jacob Sullum

In one of the more puzzling parts of his State of the Union speech, President Bush offered his opinion about how professional sports should be run. He did not criticize the instant replay rule, condemn the use of designated hitters, or tell returning head coach Joe Gibbs how to restore the Redskins to their former glory. Instead, he asserted that athletes should not be permitted to use "performance-enhancing drugs like steroids."

Bush stated this principle as if it were obviously true, as if no reasonable person could disagree that "team owners, union representatives, coaches, and players" need to "get rid of steroids now." Yet the more you think about it, the less sense there is to a rule that prohibits athletes from using drugs to enhance their performance.
(continued)

http://www.reason.com/0301/fe.dp.pumped.shtml

Pumped-Up Hysteria
Forget the hype. Steroids aren’t wrecking professional baseball.
By Dayn Perry

Had Ken Caminiti been a less famous ballplayer, or had he merely confessed his own sins, then it would have been a transient controversy. But it wasn’t. Last May, Caminiti, in a cathartic sit-down with Tom Verducci of Sports Illustrated, became the first major league baseball player, current or retired, to admit to using anabolic steroids during his playing days. Specifically, he said he used them during the 1996 season, when he was named the National League’s Most Valuable Player. And his truth session didn’t stop there.
(continued)

http://www.reason.com/links/links120804.shtml

George Bush vs. Barry Bonds
The government's effective smear campaign against baseball's best player
by Matt Welch

The United States government has sent the impressionable Youth of America an unmistakable signal: Do not, under any circumstances, break any sporting records after adding 18 pounds of muscle at age 36.

If you do, Uncle Sam will use the awesome powers at his disposal—grand jury inquisitions, illegal leaks, even the State of the Union address—to humiliate you in public and pressure your union to accept year-round random urine testing, even if you will never be charged with breaking a single law.
(continued)

[tnf]

Yea, but here is the deal - as a highly trained athlete, you just don't "add 18 lbs of muscle at age 36." Not naturally. You just don't. I've been around weight training for over 10 years. I've been around steroids off and on for over 10 years - you gain a 6th sense over time.

Also, poor McGwire - not a bad guy, but he so concerned about maintaining his squeaky clean image that he can't just fess up. He's getting drilled, turning red and flustered. They can't get a straight answer out of him...he is dodging shit more than anyone else.
The only response he really has is "I am here to talk about a positive future. Not the past..."

He also got drilled about his use of androstendione, another question he couldn't really answer without inciminating himself. A guy asked him what brought him to the point where he was using a supplement like this, and was he counseled that it would have effects similar to those of steroids...heh.

[Guest]

You know what someone should do? Somone should have a big ass competition for athletes that DO use drugs to compete. So that way you could see what the actual limits are of the human body, WITH the help of science.

So you'd have pumped up steroid freaks competing instead of those pussy natural athletes

[tnf]

THey already do have those competitions...they are called baseball games, football games, bodybuilding, powerlifting, the world's strongest man...etc...

[Guest]

No but I meant an athletic competition in an olympic type of format.

[tnf]

i know, i was being sarcastic...meaning that their use is so widespread that we already have competitions with steroid users..

[Fender]

Keep your sentences short and simple tnf. Don't confuse him.

[Guest]

i know, i was being sarcastic...meaning that their use is so widespread that we already have competitions with steroid users..

:icon26: Yeah I got the sarcasm part of your post, although if you really think about it you're right and as sarcastic as it was meant is still true nontheless. However, in those sports it's not really acknowedged as much, I'd rather see a sporting event where they actualy TELL you what kind of drug buddy's been pumping to run the 100m in 5 seconds flat

[Nightshade]

They did an All-Drug Olympics skit on SNL a few years back. Phil Hartman played a powerlifter that was on a cocktail of steroids and other crap, including a fish tranquilizer. He was trying to clean-and-jerk like 1800lbs. Ripped both his arms out at the sockets. :lol:

If it weren't for the effect that it has on younger athletes (high school kids, etc.) I'd say let pro athletes juice themselves to the eyeballs. Hell make it mandatory for all I care. But, there are a lot of kids that are fucking themselves up on 'roids, so I say they have to go. The current situation doesn't make for a fair and level playing field, so to speak. Those athletes that choose not to poison themsleves simply aren't competitive.

edit: Unless they're Negroes.

[shaft]

im not going to talk about the past.

[shaft]

edit: Unless they're Negroes.

yeah you gotta watch out for those Negroes.

[Guest]

Yeah youth abusing the drugs is a problem, well anyone abusing any drug is a problem. However, it'd be neat if the drugs were administered by the sporting association, so you'd have a regulated organization so that every athlete would have access to the same drugs and same ammounts.

[R00k]

I also think there's something wrong with not allowing hollow plugged bats, but allowing sterioid monsters to play. Would we let them use bionic implants if they were available?

[Hannibal]

Drugs don't make the ballplayer. If they did, there would be a lot more Barry Bonds walking around.

They may not 'make' the ballplayer, but they sure as hell will artificially inflate said ballplayer's stats.

[tnf]

Drugs don't make the ballplayer. If they did, there would be a lot more Barry Bonds walking around.

They may not 'make' the ballplayer, but they sure as hell will artificially inflate said ballplayer's stats.

I don't disagree with you there...I think it kind of boils down to this:
Take a GREAT ballplayer, add roids - you get an almost superhuman hitter like Bonds. Great w/o the roids, unbelievable with them.
Take a decent ballplayer like Sosa, add the roids, you get a GREAT power hitter.

But there are many average to below average pros juicing up that aren't making big impacts.

So, I honestly believe that with or without drugs, pretty much the same players would rise out of the heap and be separated from the others, by and large. Do we have some steroid inflated numbers? Definitely. But we can't forget to factor in some other things, such as increased knowledge and application of diet and training regimes - aside from drugs.

I've always maintained that drugs don't make extraordinary gains really "easy" - they make them possible when they might not otherwise be.

[tnf]

I also think there's something wrong with not allowing hollow plugged bats, but allowing sterioid monsters to play. Would we let them use bionic implants if they were available?

It's also funny how we take these guys at their word, despite so much circumstantial, or even direct evidence against them. Bonds, for example...everyone around him was drugging and knew of drugs at Balco, and he says he was 'unknowingly' taking steroids that he thought were supplements? Sosa gets caught using a corked bat and says it was an accident - that it was a bat he used for BP to put on shows and it got mixed in with his other ones? McGwire and his "don't want to talk about the past" bullshit. Love or hate Canseco, at least he has the balls to admit to his own usage. It was kind of bullshit for him to name names in his book - he could have implicated many of the same guys without actually mentioning their names - the public already has its suspicions. But Schilling, McGwire..those two guys were just avoiding all the hard questions. Schilling is also a hard core born again Christian, so that probably adds to his 'see no evil' perspective in the clubhouse. He's probably whistling around in their like Ned Fucking Flanders trying NOT to let himself be aware of what goes on in the sport.

[Hannibal]

So, I honestly believe that with or without drugs, pretty much the same players would rise out of the heap and be separated from the others, by and large. Do we have some steroid inflated numbers? Definitely. But we can't forget to factor in some other things, such as increased knowledge and application of diet and training regimes - aside from drugs.

I've always maintained that drugs don't make extraordinary gains really "easy" - they make them possible when they might not otherwise be.

I think that's right. But there are some stats that suggest steroids are a pretty significant independent variable, certainly in terms of the home run explosion that just magically 'appeared' out of nowhere.

[eepberries]

Steroids (minus medical 'roids of course) are retarded and sports should be a competition of natural power rather than how much you can fake your body into being stronger. End of discussion

[Guest]

It's not fake if they actualy DO it retard...

[eepberries]

It's not fake if they actualy DO it retard...

It IS fake because they need the steroids to do it, or else they wouldn't be taking them.

[Guest]

That's not the point, the point is you said they "fake" their body into doing something when it's not fake at all if they are doing it.

I think the word you're looking for is artificial, but it's most definitely real.

[rep]

This will be my only post in this thread.

In 2001 in Rocket Arena 3 there was an influx of people who downloaded bots (OGC). Lots of clans were caught by the means of admission or the bots fucking up (shooting through walls, etc.) During the time after they perfected hiding what they were doing (Not shooting people right when they come around the corner, and spamming blatantly off shots to drop their stats down) it became harder to tell if someone was cheating or not.

I knew several newbs who (now) admit they used bots (they suddenly went from newby 40% rail accuracy to the average ra3 accuracy of 60% overnight.) because they felt it was unfair that so many fags had an advantage because they were botting.

Being the best RA3 player at the time, and no doubtedly the best Q3 player of all time (My duel with Zero4 in 2000 was a classic. I don't think anyone has ever gotten 4 kills on him under my circumstances. I was getting 15fps, and I was a regular Q2 player. I just got Q3 a few days before and whooped John for the first five minutes on his best map, q3tourney4.) I was shocked to later find out in 2003 and 2004 that a lot of the nice guys who weren't regulars in clans or anything were the ones cheating, and the newbs who cried and acted like pricks weren't. Also, there were several clans that were found out to have a completely cheating roster.

This baseball shit reminds me of that. I'm glad ra3 died last year. It was such a mobius... Some dude named UnnamedPlayer with a shitty 52% rail calling me an alias and signing off after I beat him 11-0 was the daily routine back then. :lol: