by Dan Salem and Todd Salem (9-20-13)
[Part one - Steroids, PEDs & Sports. Oh my]
TODD:
Professional sports leagues should allow players to take anything they want, but everyone will know about it. That's the notion Malcolm Gladwell presents and its a fascinating idea that I am all for. Obviously there are numerous pitfalls, as with anything. But now the court of public opinion can be set rather effortlessly. It will be up to us if we put more stock in an aided 60 home run season or a clean 42 home run season. And owners/general managers can make the same determination. The same thing is happening now but the public isn't aware of it.
What do you think of his idea? This may have severe consequences, such as every player deciding to take drugs since they are legalized or clean players who perform less than their peers getting pushed out of the league but it is an interesting take nonetheless.
DAN:
I'm against cheating, let me make that clear, but I'd hold the same opinion on PEDs if I competed at a higher level of sports. Like all jobs, you can come to your position and success honestly or not. You are ultimately accountable to yourself and have to live with the choices you make. I'm sure I've lost jobs over the last five years to people who "cheated" their way ahead of me. But it wasn't really cheating, they used whatever advantage they had to beat me out for a job. The same goes for those competing for college and professional sports jobs as athletes. You can pursue a less honest means to the job, taking steroids to boost your performance in the short term while sacrificing your long term health, or you can simply kick your workout into higher gear and be a little less strong in a more natural manor. The best player and person will win out. No hard feelings. Its up to you how bad you want something.
Most professional athletes want to compete at the highest level more than anything in the world. I don't agree with sacrificing the later years of my life to be stronger in my 20s, but I never wanted to be a professional athlete either. I can relate to the passion, however, but the idea that testing for everything but banning nothing will solve some problem is ignoring the bigger picture.
The main issue here is high school athletes taking muscle builders, growth hormones and PEDs during the years of their life when the body is still developing, the mind is impressionable and the child doesn't know any better. Adults can and will make their own decisions, but the kids will emulate their elders. Consequently, we have to punish the adults for actions otherwise okay. We as adults try to shield the youth from the reality of life for as long as possible. We don't want them to know that the CEO gets paid the most for doing the least work. We also don't want them to know how hard that CEO had to work, and who he had to step on, to earn his cushy job in the first place. And we DEFINITELY don't want them to know what the CEO did to step on people. That action in sports is the PED.
PEDs are banned for the sake of the kids. PED usage is punished for the sake of the kids. So testing for them, but then doing nothing is the worst possible solution. Its like telling a kid that we are going to put cameras in the class room so we know if you cheat on an exam. We are watching your eyes from every angle. But if we catch you cheating on the test, that's okay. I realize I brought in the word "cheating", but its still a good analogy. The only way to set a proper example and keep kids off drugs they should not be using until they turn 25 (I picked 25 because you should be finished growing by then) is to ban them for the adults. They are illegal outside of the doctor's office because its the doctor's job to understand the drug and administer it. Not your coach.
TODD:
This is you; this is what you sound like:
I actually agree with the school exam analogy to a point. That is a fair assessment...if the point of the testing was to find the kid who was best at taking tests and then have him or her be that school's test taker in order to show the optimum results on nationwide standards. But that isn't the point of school, at least not in good neighborhoods. Sports are a business run for entertainment and to find the humans who are best at it. Where does being a good role model fit into other lines of work? And why is Alex Rodriguez more important to a child's maturation than parents or guardians, teachers or coaches?
This isn't where I expected this conversation to go, which is not a bad thing, but I do want to steer it back towards the professional ranks if I may. Keeping the children out of it for the time being, since you made it clear that you can understand and are relatively okay with adults trying to get an edge, is there any player, active or retired, that you would be disappointed if you found out took PEDs? Framed another way, if you found out ____ took steroids, your opinion of him would change.
I already gather you would be fine with finding out Peyton Manning or Adrian Peterson did. You already said, and I wholeheartedly agree, that taking something to help you recover from injury sounds rather logical. So then, to piggyback myself, would it change your opinion somehow negatively to find out someone like Derrick Rose 'didn't bother' to take PEDs? In essence, Rose took so long to recover because he 'didn't want it bad enough' to cheat.
DAN:
One final point on your killer jab at me via The Simpsons and the iconic Mrs. Lovejoy. Being a professional athlete is a special kind of job. There is only one other job that is akin to being a professional athlete and that's being an A-list Actor. I excluded politicians because we all know better than to look up them. Same goes for Musicians, who sing about such racy material that most people know better. All other jobs are not in the spotlight, more or less. Only Professional Athletes and A-list Actors and Actresses are both in the spotlight and presented to the world as something other than themselves. Kids and Adults alike look up them. They are role models. You don't get to choose this or not. If you choose to be on that level, then you are by default a role model. And there is one simple reason; you get paid in the multi millions of dollars. The money comes with responsibility. So wanting something so badly that you'd do anything is one thing, but getting it and dealing with the consequences of how it changes your life is another.
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