Archive for STEROIDS!
A-Rod Roundup: Roberts’ book out Monday
Posted by: | CommentsAs the fallout from yesterday’s less-than-shocking A-Rod revelations continues to die before the end of the 24-hour cycle, Selena Roberts and her publishers are quickly jumping on the bandwagon. With A-Rod’s rehab going better than expected, The Times reports that Roberts’ book will hit newstands on Monday, over a week before its original street date.
At this point, it’s tough to know what to make of this book. First, it was going to be printed in April around Opening Day. Then A-Rod got injured, and Roberts’ publishers announced the book would hit on May 13, two days before A-Rod was due to be activated. Now that Daily News reporters have spilled the beans — the rather unsubstantiated and hearsay-based beans — and now that A-Rod is set to start a rehab assignment soon, the publishers are again pushing the book forward to preempt A-Rod’s return from the DL and any more leaks. That sounds as sincere as A-Rod is.
Anyway, the A-Rod story never stops. After the jump, a round-up of the day’s news and notes.
DN: Roberts’ book ’strongly suggests’ A-Rod used on Yanks
Posted by: | CommentsSo The Daily News got its hands on a copy of Selena Roberts’ tell-all book about A-Rod, and as you can imagine, the book is as bad as we feared. That’s right folks — A-Rod tipped only 15 percent at Hooters. Tsk. Tsk.
We’ll delve into the more serious content after the “read more” tag, but for all of you who either don’t care or don’t want to know, just head on over to Joe’s game recap. Why let this piece of expected but still dismaying news ruin a start in which Joba utterly dominated the Tigers for seven innings.
Now, why would Selena Roberts’ publisher do that?
Posted by: | CommentsI love the Associated Press. While the newswire is trying to wage war against search engines and news aggregators, its reporters are proving to be fairly clueless. To whit is a story that went out over the wires earlier today. Selena Roberts, unauthorized biographer of All Things A-Rod, has delayed the street date of her upcoming tell-all. Ostensibly, the delay is due to the fact that she “need[ed] more time for the book.”
But who is Harper Collins trying to fool? Any reporter worth his or her salt would have noticed that the new release date — May 13 — ensures that A-Rod will either be off the disabled list or on the verge of being activated when this supposedly explosive book arrives. I certainly understand the business rationale behind this one, but talk about a blatant marketing ploy. How could the AP not pick up on that?
Pondering the implications of Saito’s surgery
Posted by: | CommentsWhen the Traveling A-Rod Circus makes its way up to Boston this year for the first time, the Yanks’ third baseman is sure to be greeted with a louder-than-usual chorus of Bronx cheers. Not one to engender much love in the Hub, A-Rod and his off-season steroid revelations simply give the Fenway Faithful more ammunition. I have to wonder though if this isn’t some huge act of hypocrisy perpetrated by baseball fans throughout the nation.
Yesterday, as I was procrastinating work on an appellate brief browsing my usual baseball sites, I came across an article on Takashi Saito from the Oct. 3, 2008 edition of the Los Angeles Times. Saito, now the Red Sox set-up man was with the Dodgers at the time, and the article is about a medically groundbreaking procedure Saito received last July when he suffered what should have been a season-ending tear of his elbow’s ulnar collateral ligament.
Generally such an injury leads to Tommy John surgery, but in Saito’s case, it led to an injection of a medicine designed to greatly enhance his body’s natural healing process. That almost sounds like Human Growth Hormone, but it’s not. Here’s how the LA paper described the process:
Saito credited his unlikely recovery from a partially torn ulnar collateral ligament in his elbow that he suffered in July to a cutting-edge medical procedure, which, to his knowledge, had never been tried on a major league pitcher. To this day, team physician Dr. Neal ElAttrache can’t definitively say that injecting platelet-rich plasma into Saito’s elbow is what allowed him to avoid Tommy John surgery. ElAttrache also won’t guarantee how long the elbow will hold up or that Saito won’t have to have surgery in the future…
Trainer Stan Conte said he estimated that Saito had a 20% chance of pitching again this season and told management not to count on him being back. So when ElAttrache offered using PRP as an option, Conte was open to the idea.
Within a week of hurting his elbow, Saito had blood drawn and spun to isolate the platelets, which clot and promote healing. The platelets, 10 times more concentrated than in normal blood, were injected into the site of the tear in the elbow. ElAttrache said he used PRP in the past to repair tendons, but never ligaments.
So what’s the difference? Medically, Saito’s doctor took something found naturally in his body — platelets — concentrated them into a super-high dosage and then reinjected the platelets into the site of Saito’s injury. When a baseball player injects himself with a steroid, as far as my medical knowledge goes, he is basically doing the same thing. He takes a super-high dosage of testosterone, something found naturally in the body, or a synthetic substance and injecting into his body to promote quick healing and an unnatural edge.
Of course, what Saito did doesn’t run afoul of medical ethics, U.S. law or baseball rules. So the Red Sox fans will cheer him — or ignore him — as he contributes during the season, and A-Rod who went looking down illegal paths for that edge will get booed. It’s quite the conflict in baseball’s PED policy. How and where do you draw the line between acceptable forms of over-medicating?
Breaking: Selig issues A-Rod 50-game suspension
Posted by: | CommentsWhile the Yankees knew they would be without their starting third baseman until mid May, the team received a bombshell just minutes ago when baseball commissioner Bud Selig announced a 50-game suspension for A-Rod this morning.
Citing his power to protect the best interests of baseball, Selig took the unprecedented step of suspending a player for failing a drug test before punishment measures were in place. The MLB Players Association plans to appeal the ruling.
“These players who use performance-enhancing substances offend all of us who care for the game, and I will not tolerate their actions,” Selig said during an early-morning conference call with reporters. “What Alex did was wrong and he will have to live with the damage he has done to his name and reputation. There is no valid excuse for using such substances, and those who use them have shamed the game.”
Selig’s decision came after nearly two months of soul searching and investigation. In February, Sports Illustrated’s Selena Roberts broke the news that A-Rod was one of 104 players on a supposedly anonymous list from 2003 of those who failed a drug test. A-Rod, who a year ago had denied ever taking PEDs, came clean in a series of interviews with Peter Gammons and Michael Kay and in a press conference in Tampa.
Meanwhile, a few weeks later, as the steroid fallout dissipated, another A-Rod story popped up. The Yanks’ clean-up hitter had to go under the knife for a torn labrum and was originally set to miss the first six weeks of the schedule. During A-Rod’s rehab in Colorado, though, Selig decided enough was enough. He didn’t want to hear about the “loosey-goosey” steroid era anymore and determined that a 50-game suspension for A-Rod would send a message to those still trying to evade drug tests.
While Gene Orza and his team at the Players Association are busy trying to figure out how to overturn this suspension, baseball insiders are worried about the labor unrest this move may generate. While popular with a media long critical of steroid uses, the PA believes that Bud Selig has overstepped his bounds as commission and has violated the Collective Bargaining Agreement.
Meanwhile, the Yankees are left with Cody Ransom at third base until seemingly the end of June now. Ransom, 33, has never gotten more than 78 plate appearances in a single big league season and remains untested. While the Yanks were prepared to use him until May to fill a hole, the reality of a half of season without A-Rod may force them to package Melky Cabrera and Ian Kennedy in a deal for a third baseman.
Interviewing the Rocket reporter
Posted by: | CommentsOn Friday, we were completely unsurprised when the news “broke” that Brian Cashman knew about Jason Giambi’s steroid use. This story came out in Jeff Pearlman’s latest book on Roger Clemens, the Yankees and PED, and it constitutes as obvious a “duh” moment as one could imagine. Despite that, Pearlman has done a thorough job putting this sordid tale together, and he recently answered 20 questions from Jason at IIATMS. Pearlman takes about Clemens, Pettitte, the work behind the book and PED use today. Check it out.
Duh: Yanks knew about Giambi’s steroid use
Posted by: | CommentsWhen Barry Bonds broke the single-season home run record in 2001, most baseball fans knew he was on the juice. They had noticed his transformation from slender leadoff man to hulking power hitter. Not only that, but they noticed how he achieved such a mutation at such a relatively late stage of his career. It was pretty obvious, though it took a few years for anyone to do anything about it.
Another guy clearly on steroids at the time was Jason Giambi, then with the Oakland A’s. As we all know, he signed with the Yankees after the 2001 season. Giambi was outed for his grand jury testimony after the 2004 season, at which time the Yankees claimed they had no knowledge of his alleged steroid use. In fact, they knew so little of his steroid use that they thought it perfectly okay to remove any language referring to steroids from the guarantee of the contract. Yeah, that argument really holds up.
According to Jeff Pearlman’s new book, “The Rocket That Fell to Earth,” due in stores later this month, Brian Cashman seemed fully aware of the situation. Pearlman — he who wrote about Barry Bonds’s conversation in which he said he was going to use some hardcore stuff after the 1998 season — talked with a then-Yankee (or maybe a current Yankee?), who related this anecdote:
The book said that when Giambi went through a slump in the 2002 season, his first with the Yankees, Cashman was heard yelling at a television in the Yankees’ clubhouse during a game. Citing “one New York player,” the book said that Cashman screamed, “Jason, whatever you were taking in Oakland,” get back on it.
The book said that Cashman then added, “Please!”
Cashman, of course, denies the story, saying that Pearlman didn’t even bother to call him to confirm the quote. Pearlman owns up to that oversight, but stands by the story.
It’s tough not to believe Pearlman here, at least in that Cashman knew of Giambi’s steroid use prior to signing him (which was under directive from George Steinbrenner). Maybe the scene didn’t unfold exactly as told, but something similar might have happened.
It’s a funny scene, Cashman yelling at a televised Giambi to get back on the juice, because I’m sure many of us had similar sentiments at the time. The public outrage had not quite hit full swing, and there certainly weren’t any penalties at the time for players using. We knew players were using, and Giambi was one of the obvious cases. Which leads to an obvious conclusion: if we fans knew about Bonds, Giambi, and others using steroids, how could front offices not? The answer, of course, is that they did, but aren’t letting on more than they have to.
h/t BBTF
Musings on an A-Rod suspension
Posted by: | CommentsIn the post-game wrap-up today, Peter Abraham has an interesting quote from Joe Girardi. The Yankee skipper, it seems, is worried that A-Rod may still be suspended. “I think you have to be a little bit concerned any time you go in front of Major League Baseball,” Girardi said. “The precedent has been set with how they’ve dealt with players but there’s still always a concern. I’m hoping it’s a fact-finding mission and that he’s set to go on April 6.”
Major League Baseball has never suspended anyone for past PED use, and the Players Association would throw a fit, legitimately, of epic proportions if they did so. The Yanks have every right to be worried about a suspension, but one will not come down for A-Rod on Sunday. I’d bet money on that.
Giambi praises the Cap’n
Posted by: | CommentsPraising Derek Jeter for his leadership has become something of a baseball cliché over the years. There is, after all, a reason why some fans derogatorily call him Captain Intangibles. But in a recent Bob Klapisch piece, Jason Giambi praises Jeter’s leadership and sounds genuinely sincere in doing so. “I’ll thank Derek until the day I die,” Giambi said. “What he did for me, after what I’d been through, made it possible for me to keep playing in New York. The fans forgave me because of Derek. I’ll never forget that for the rest of my life.”
While I generally think that Klapisch painted an accurate picture of Giambi’s complex tenure in New York, I don’t like how he compared the situation to A-Rod’s. In comparing Giambi’s steroid problems to A-Rod’s he praises Jason and says the current Athletic is “unlike A-Rod, who’s had two chances to come clean (and still hasn’t).” This is a point blank attack that serves no purpose and is grounded in nothing more than unhealthy skepticism. It doesn’t help what is otherwise a solid example of a profile piece.
Taking both coffee pots out of the clubhouse
Posted by: | CommentsRemember the revelation a few years ago that talked about clubhouses having two coffee pots: leaded and unleaded? Clearly, this referred to the presence of amphetamines in the brew. Turns out, both pots can enhance your performance. J.C. Bradbury of Sabernomics post a link and summary of a study done on caffeine, titled “The effect of caffeine as an ergogenic aid in anaerobic exercise.” The abstract, with my own emphasis:
The study examined caffeine (5 mg/kg body weight) vs. placebo during anaerobic exercise. Eighteen male athletes (24.1+/-5.8 yr; BMI 26.4+/-2.2 kg/m2) completed a leg press, chest press, and Wingate test. During the caffeine trial, more total weight was lifted with the chest press, and a greater peak power was obtained during the Wingate test. No differences were observed between treatments for the leg press and average power, minimum power, and power drop (Wingate test). There was a significant treatment main effect found for postexercise glucose and insulin concentrations; higher concentrations were found in the caffeine trial. A significant interaction effect (treatment and time) was found for cortisol and glucose concentrations; both increased with caffeine and decreased with placebo. Postexercise systolic blood pressure was significantly higher during the caffeine trial. No differences were found between treatments for serum free-fatty-acid concentrations, plasma lactate concentrations, serum cortisol concentrations, heart rate, and rating of perceived exertion. Thus, a moderate dose of caffeine resulted in more total weight lifted for the chest press and a greater peak power attained during the Wingate test in competitive athletes.
You can read more about Wingate tests here.
Clearly, this is not a cry to add caffeine to the banned substance list. It’s legal in all 50 states (obviously), so everyone is on even ground. Yet it does enhance performance, perhaps even more so than some of the illegal substances baseball players use to get an edge. I’ll refrain from jumping to any conclusions about how much or little it affects performance, especially when compared to other stimulants and psychoactive drugs. I just think it would be amusing if caffeine actually helped athletes more than certain steroids and amphetamines.
