by Dan Salem and Todd Salem (9-16-13)
TODD:
Has any phrase had a bigger decline in emotional response than "HGH?" Saying those three letters now, in the company of a common sports fan, will elicit disgust and dismay almost immediately. But didn't human growth hormone used to be pretty benign? In fact, wasn't it kind of innocuous? It used to be something doctors gave the elderly to help sooth their many ailments. If you weren't a doctor or old, I don't think you were even aware of what HGH was. And now...?
HGH implies conniving, cheating and lying. It makes us angry. I guess these responses are warranted. Professional athletes who take performance enhancers are blatantly trying to increase their talents beyond what is natural. If you consider human growth hormone not natural. You know, unlike tendon replacement and cortisone shots. Those are cool.
With this very leading preamble, my question to you is as follows: do you have a problem with professional athletes taking PEDs? If those enhancers have no known downside or physical side effects, does that change your answer? Or if the athlete is taking said substance to simply recover from an injury and not to increase his day-to-day performance, does it change your answer? And seriously, what phrase has taken a bigger dip in popularity than HGH? That has to top the list.
DAN:
First of all, I don't have a negative connotation associated with HGH. I guess I'm in the minority here, but HGH is something found naturally in the body and has been used for years by doctors to help cure the sick, elderly, you name it. It is exactly what it sounds like. Human Growth Hormone aids the body in a multitude of ways and I think its foolish to ignore its applications in medicine. Its not illegal for doctors to utilize HGH, but doctors get to utilize traditional steroids as well. I understand there's a difference here when it comes to sports.
My perspective on this issue is one of a former high school athlete, a former varsity football player. I played some rugby in college, but my football career ended with high school. Let me tell you, more than half my high school football team was taking some kind of supplement. Only a few people took actual steroids, but Creatine was super popular and everyone loved protein powder etc. I'm proud to say I took none of it and was by far the biggest and strongest player on the team. But taking stuff was a part of football in high school, so its only a larger part in college and an even bigger part in the pros. What does any of this have to do with PEDs? I'm not going to single out HGH here. Performance enhancing substances is a huge umbrella term, but for me it includes protein powder and that ilk as well. It all helps to beef up your body.
It comes down to this. Athletes at all levels of all sports are going to take things. Attempting to label some fair and others illegal is a fools errand and will never, ever result in anything less than confusion. I could care less if the guy next to me, or the player on the other team, was taking steroids. I never once felt inferior and took pride in being "clean." I have two main feelings on the whole PED issue.
When it comes to injury and recovery from injury, players should be able to get whatever treatment they can get. I don't care if Adrian Peterson took HGH to heel his knee. I'd rather him come back at 100% in six months than at 90% in twelve months. Let's not ignore modern medicine for the sake of old statistics and records.
As for players taking drugs to make them stronger, this is a tricky subject. I don't see it as cheating. They are not breaking the rules of the game itself, just the rules of the governing league. Cheating is doctoring your bat or baseball, or putting metal plating on your shoulder pads. Cheating is what every running back does when he tosses the football five yards up field after getting tackled. He's hoping the referee is unclear where he landed and gives him a more favorable spot. He's trying to steal a yard. Cheating is not making yourself stronger. You have the option of doing that regardless of whether you are taking drugs, protein, or raw eggs to help things out (Disclaimer - I don't think raw eggs do a damn thing). My assumption is that many players in the NFL and NBA are taking things you'd rather not hear about. We get to find out when it comes to MLB, which kind of stinks. If you allow players to take a regulated dosage of a drug, or PED, then at least it would be safe. Some players would get extra on the side, but it would level the playing field. And its still the individuals choice to make, to take it or not.
TODD:
It is actually quite refreshing to hear your take on this. However, your point of view may have changed had you played a sport at the division one, college level or professionally. What if some guy taking a PED was also trying to take your job? Would that change your opinion, or is it all in the game?
Letting players take a regulated dosage of things is interesting but would obviously be corrupted rather quickly. It does bring up an out-of-the-box point though, kind of piggy backing on your point of taking stuff to recover from injuries. Acclaimed author Malcolm Gladwell is a pretty big sports fan with some great theories. Everyone knows his famous 10,000 hours theory about practicing. He also has a radical take on steroids in sports. I'm paraphrasing but Gladwell thinks we should test for everything and ban nothing.
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