Report: Evidence Exists Of HGH Shipments To Clemens
The case against Roger Clemens might turn on a busted television.
Convicted steroid distributor Kirk Radomski told ESPN.com that while he was moving a broken television off a dresser in the bedroom of his Long Island home last Sunday night, he found a shipping receipt for human growth hormone that he claims to have sent to Clemens' Houston home in 2002 or 2003. Radomski said he found that receipt, along with "seven or eight others" for shipments to other baseball players, under the TV.
"My TV broke and I said, 'Damn, I got to get it off the dresser,'" Radomski said Wednesday. "And it was right there."
Radomski said he turned the evidence over to federal authorities on Monday.
My TV broke and I said, 'Damn, I got to get it off the dresser.' And it was right there.
--Kirk Radomski
Clemens, the seven-time Cy Young Award winner who is being investigated for perjury, denied under oath before Congress in February that he ever used steroids or human growth hormone. He also denied having knowledge that his wife, Debbie Clemens, was injected with HGH by his former personal trainer, Brian McNamee, prior to a photo shoot for a Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue.
Testifying before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Clemens and McNamee offered dramatically conflicting testimony on the injections given to Clemens' wife in the master bedroom of their home. Clemens said he had no knowledge about it, but was irate after the fact. McNamee told Congress that Clemens watched as he injected the HGH into his wife's abdomen.
Radomski, 38, is a friend of McNamee's who has backed him in his public war of words with Clemens. He said he told federal investigators early on about the shipment to Clemens' house, and was prepared to provide an affidavit in McNamee's defense in the defamation suit Clemens has brought against the trainer.
"The investigators knew from day one that I sent a package to Clemens' house," Radomski told ESPN.com. "They knew before the Mitchell report was released and before Brian went before Congress. So this is nothing new to them.
"I just couldn't find the receipt. And just by [accident] this weekend, I moved my TV and whatnot and I found the package, an envelope, and it had [Clemens'] receipt and about seven or eight other receipts."
Soon after he discovered the envelope, Radomski said he called Jeff Novitzky, the San Francisco-based federal investigator leading the government's probes of drugs in sport, who happened to be in the New York area. The next day, Novitzky and Matthew Parrella, an assistant U.S. Attorney from San Francisco, went to Radomski's auto detailing shop on Long Island and picked up the evidence.
"They were happy that I found it, because they thought they would never find it," Radomski said. "I'd told them, 'I know that it was in my house.' I said, 'You guys sure you didn't take it [in the original raid]?' It just happened to turn up."
Radomski said he also alerted McNamee of the find after meeting with Novitzky and Parrella.
The records and information gathered from Radomski, a former New York Mets clubhouse employee, provided the bulk of the evidence in former Senate majority leader George Mitchell's nearly two-year study on steroid use in Major League Baseball. Radomski received a five-year probation sentence in February after cooperating with federal investigators.
Radomski said he couldn't recall the names of the other players for whom he had receipts for shipments, but he said they had all been previously named in the Mitchell report.
The delivery to Clemens' house, sent via overnight U.S. mail, contained two kits of HGH, Radomski said. He said he believes he made at least one other shipment to Clemens, but doesn't have additional receipts.
"It was addressed to Clemens as a hold for Brian McNamee," Radomski said. "Brian knows what he did with it. They signed for it, because all my packages you always had to sign for. Brian never signed for the package. The package got there before Brian got down there."
Radomski said he was never paid directly by Clemens, Andy Pettitte and Chuck Knoblauch, all of whom were clients of McNamee's at the time and all of whom were named as users in the Mitchell report.
"Brian would always give me the money," he said. "I never dealt directly with Clemens or talked to Pettitte directly about any of the growth or nothing. They always went through Brian. And Brian would always see me and pay me."
Radomski said he isn't sure of the source of the HGH he sent to Clemens' house, though he said he often obtained it from AIDS patients eager to sell a monthly supply of it for upwards of $1,600. He said they sought out bodybuilders such as himself in gyms or on the street to make their sales.
Mike Fish is an investigative reporter for ESPN.com. He can be reached at michaeljfish@gmail.com.
A recent double-blind, placebo-controlled study involving 27 women and 34 men, 68 to 88 years of age, who were given growth hormone or placebo for 6.5 months confirmed the effects of growth hormone on body composition; there was no change in muscle strength or maximal oxygen uptake during exercise in either group. This study corroborated the findings of a study by Papadakis et al. involving 52 healthy men, 70 to 85 years of age, who were given placebo or growth hormone for six months. Not mentioned on the “antiaging” Web sites is a study of 18 healthy men, 65 to 82 years of age, who underwent progressive strength training for 14 weeks, followed by an additional 10 weeks of strength training plus either growth hormone or placebo. In that study, resistance exercise training increased muscle strength significantly; the addition of growth hormone did not result in any further improvement.
Karl E. Friedl, “Performance-Enhancing Substances,” in Baechle and Earle (eds.) Essentials of Strength Training and Conditioning, 2e, p. 219, . (Textbook)
There is no evidence that supplemental growth hormone produces effects of the same magnitude [as growth hormone deficiency] (it may not even produce normal muscle) or enhance athletic performance in a normal man or woman….Apparently, few athletes are actually using this hormone, which suggests that they may well be aware that the substance probably does little to enhance performance, carries risks, and is very expensive.
One of the notorious stars of the Mitchell Report, baseball's investigation of its steroids era, is a chain of 191 amino acids known as the human growth hormone.
If a peptide can be controversial, the growth hormone certainly is that -- sparking a race to find a viable test and a broader medical argument about its effectiveness as an "anti-aging" treatment.
In his 409-page report, former Sen. George Mitchell described the growth hormone -- which is undetectable in urine tests -- as the new horizon for doping cheaters.
"Mandatory random testing, formally started in 2004 after the survey testing results, appears to have reduced the use of detectable steroids," Mitchell wrote, "but players switched to human growth hormone precisely because it is not detectable. Players who use human growth hormone apparently believe that it assists their ability to recover from injuries and fatigue during the long baseball season; this also is a major reason why players used steroids."
Finding a way to detect HGH is the key to solving the biggest performance-enhancing drug problem facing baseball, but it won't be easy.
While there is debate about growth hormone's efficiency as a performance-enhancer, interviews with medical researchers, physicians and Olympic drug testers reveal why players switched to the illegal drug.
Growth hormone multiplies the power of anabolic steroids in the body. A player who intends to cheat can take a small amount of a designer steroid -- some of which can be out of the body in 24 hours -- then stack a heavy dose of human growth hormone over the top. This drug cocktail would provide the muscle-building power of a heavier dose of steroids that would linger in the body and increase the player's chance of being caught.
"Growth hormone is known to synergize with anabolic steroids, so that is another part to this," said Dr. Don H. Catlin, who founded the UCLA Olympic Analytical Laboratory in 1982 to conduct doping tests for the 1984 Summer Games in Los Angeles. Catlin, who this summer joined the Anti-Doping Research Institute, has been at the forefront of drug testing ever since.
Since Major League Baseball's testing program is mostly in-season -- only 60 of 3,000 annual tests are given during the offseason -- it's easy to see why an HGH-steroid combination that is hard to detect might entice cheaters. Agencies must continue to upgrade drug-testing technologies as cheaters become more sophisticated.
"We are in a game of escalation," Catlin said. "And the game is we find more expensive equipment to better find drugs, and the other side comes up with drugs that require more expensive equipment to detect."
Major League Baseball gave Catlin a $500,000 grant to develop a urine test for growth hormone. Scientists have devised a blood test and the International Olympic Committee plans to have it in place before the Beijing Olympics next summer. But the current collective bargaining agreement between baseball and the player's union has no provision for blood testing. So Catlin continues a 10-year quest for a urine test.
"It is the most daunting task I've ever undertaken," he said. "But I think it can be done."
"A big problem"
Growth hormone is difficult to detect because of its chemistry and its role in the body.
The anterior pituitary gland produces growth hormone, which spurs cell growth and is vital for governance of adult height, muscle and organ growth and sexual development. Since 1985, growth hormone has been produced synthetically. The man-made chemical is identical in molecular makeup to the natural hormone. Thus, a urine test has been ineffective because the chemical already is present in the athlete's body.
"It has been a big problem," said Larry Bowers, senior managing director for the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, the tester for Olympic sports in the U.S. "The first people started working on a test in the late '90s and here we are a decade later still trying to solve the problem."
Olympic labs face similar problems in detecting injections of testosterone because the steroid is produced by the body as well. Tests focus on the ratio between testosterone and epitestosterone -- a breakdown product. Among clean athletes, the ratio remains consistent. When it jumps above a 6-to-1 mark, the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency counts the test as a "positive."
As in any endeavor where large sums of money are at stake, cheaters often are several steps ahead of regulators. The Bay Area Laboratory Cooperative, for example, helped clients beat the ratio test by giving them epitestosterone along with the steroid testosterone.
Catlin's lab needs a sample of the steroid to develop a test. And chemists who help millionaire athletes beat the system are not going to file steroid formulas with the U.S. Patent Office. Sometimes, testers need to get lucky as Catlin did with tetrahydrogestrinone, the powerful anabolic steroid BALCO dubbed "the Clear."
"BALCO put THG in play around 1999 at least, maybe earlier," Catlin said. "We did not get onto it until 2003. That's when we got the syringe from USADA, and they got it from a coach."
Trevor Graham, a track coach who worked with sprinters Marion Jones and Justin Gatlin, anonymously mailed a syringe that contained THG to the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency in June 2003. The UCLA lab then mapped the chemical's molecular structure and included those parameters into its scans. They had a viable test in three months.
The breakthrough prompted the BALCO investigation in Northern California that implicated Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi, Jones and others -- and led baseball commissioner Bud Selig to launch Mitchell's investigation. All from a mailed syringe.
Jones later admitted to using THG -- which she said she got from Graham -- while she prepared for the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney. Earlier this month, the International Olympic Committee formally stripped Jones of the five medals she won in Sydney. Graham, who was banned from track and field by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, is awaiting trial on charges he made false statements to federal investigators.
$1.5 billion in sales
Two years ago, S. Jay Olshansky, an epidemiologist, and Drs. Neil Reisman and Thomas Perls published a paper in the Journal of the American Medical Association about the illegal distribution of human growth hormone, which they estimated produced worldwide annual sales of more than $1.5 billion.
"Its use is rampant," said Olshansky of the University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health. "I am guessing the use of growth hormone as an athletic enhancer is minor compared to its use as anti-aging intervention. There it is everywhere."
The trio's research spotlighted a problem for the expanding "anti-aging" industry. Federal laws don't sanction the use of growth hormone as an anti-aging treatment. Olshansky said the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act limits the use of growth hormone to the treatment of growth disorders in children, the wasting syndrome faced by AIDS patients and growth hormone deficiency syndrome.
"I am shocked anyone is administering it," Olshansky said. "I think physicians are acting irresponsibly. These doctors who sign prescriptions for patients they haven't seen, they should be in jail."
Perls is an internist and associate professor of medicine at the Boston University Medical Center. He said most physicians have stopped prescribing growth hormone for AIDS patients because it can cause chronic joint pain. Perls said the drug does help patients with growth hormone deficiency syndrome, a rare disorder.
"When we pointed out anti-aging was not a legal application for growth hormone, the industry seized on adult growth hormone deficiency syndrome and made a disease with an incidence of about 1 per 10,000 as popular as aging itself," he said.
The risks for patients can be significant. Human growth hormone has been linked to cardiomyopathy, glucose intolerance, diabetes, arthritis, carpal tunnel syndrome and the overgrowth of bone that causes protrusion of the jaw and eyebrow bones. For older patients, Perls said the most dangerous side-effect is the drug's effect on latent cancer cells.
He compared growth hormone's impact on cancer -- the unbridled growth of cells -- to "throwing gasoline on a fire."
Despite the weight and scope of the Mitchell Report, baseball's integrity will be threatened by growth hormone until Catlin finds a urine test or the players' association concedes to blood testing.
One other tactic that could curtail abuse would be for manufacturers to install a chemical marker in the drug that would be identifiable in a test.
"It is feasible but not practical," Catlin said. "It would work, but the drug companies would have to repeat all the baseline studies and resubmit them to the FDA. . . . Companies shy away from that because it is so expensive to do that kind of work."
While the game is eager to end the steroids scandal, the facts indicate that baseball must gear up for a long siege. Enormous contracts provide a powerful incentive for cheaters who can afford to hire resources, such as BALCO, to help them defeat even the best testing schemes.
"From what we know about the black market, steroid mixtures are designed uniquely for a particular athlete," said Anthony Butch, director of the UCLA Olympic lab. "BALCO had calendars for athletes; they were giving them testosterone and epitestosterone at the same time. They are very sophisticated. There is lots of money in all of this. It is hard to keep up with."
Brian Meehan, 503-221-4341; brianmeehan@news.oregonian.com
These are players named in The Mitchell Report, which investigated the use of steroids and performance-enhancing drugs in Major League Baseball. The full report can be read in PDF form here Y = Current/former Yankees player. M = Current/former Mets player. Highlighted in yellow-Specifically noted to use growth hormone
Manny Alexander - M Chad Allen Rick Ankiel Mike Bell David Bell Marvin Benard Gary Bennett Jr. - M Larry Bigbie Barry Bonds Ricky Bones - Y Kevin Brown - Y Paul Byrd - M Ken Caminiti Mark Carreon - M Jose Canseco - Y Jason Christiansen Howie Clark Roger Clemens - Y Paxton Crawford Jack Cust Brendan Donnelly Chris Donnels - M Lenny Dykstra - M Bobby Estalella - Y Matt Franco - M Ryan Franklin Eric Gagne Jason Giambi - Y Jeremy Giambi Jay Gibbons
Troy Glaus Juan Gonzalez Jason Grimsley - Y Jose Guillen Jerry Hairston Jr. Matt Herges Phil Hiatt Glenallen Hill - Y Darren Holmes - Y Todd Hundley - M Ryan Jorgensen Wally Joyner Mike Judd David Justice - Y Chuck Knoblauch - Y Tim Laker Mike Lansing Paul Lo Duca - M Nook Logan Josias Manzanillo - M/Y Gary Matthews Jr. Mark McGwire Cody McKay Kent Mercker Bart Miadich Hal Morris - Y Daniel Naulty - Y Denny Neagle - Y Rafael Palmeiro Jim Parque
Andy Pettitte - Y Adam Piatt Todd Pratt - M Stephen Randolph Adam Riggs Armando Rios Brian Roberts John Rocker F.P. Santangelo Benito Santiago Scott Schoeneweis - M David Segui - M Gary Sheffield - Y Mike Stanton - Y/M Ricky Stone Miguel Tejada Derrick Turnbow Ismael Valdez Mo Vaughn - M Randy Velarde - Y Ron Villone - Y Fernando Vina - M Rondell White - Y Todd Williams - Y Jeff Williams Matt Williams Steve Woodard Kevin Young Gregg Zaun
Baseball and Growth Hormones: Big Muscles, Big Bodies, Big Trouble WALLSTREET JOURNAL December 20, 2007; Page A15
While some stories noted the many negative effects of androgenic steroids, we have not seen any explanation as to why taking "natural" human growth hormone is also a really bad idea. While growth hormone is necessary for children in particular, athletes are tempted to take growth hormone without a demonstrated positive result on performance. They should note what happens in the disease called acromegaly, a condition of too much growth hormone. In this disease, excess growth hormone causes growth of hands, lips, tongue, feet, nose, chin, forehead and liver. In short, most tissues and organs in the body will enlarge, including the heart, sometimes to the point of heart failure. Diabetes, decreased interest and ability in sex, fatigue, excessive sweating, and disordered sleep are also part of this syndrome.
The only important FDA-approved indications for giving growth hormone are failure to grow due to lack of growth hormone and the HIV-associated wasting syndrome. Despite the relative rarity of these problems, there are nine formulations of growth hormone on the market today, and all list diabetes, leukemia, muscle aches and pain, headache, weakness, stiffness and swelling of male breasts as potential side effects, as well as insomnia, nausea, hypothyroidism and increased blood fats. Also mentioned are pancreatitis and fatigue. Every manufacturer recommends periodic safety monitoring of blood sugar, thyroid blood tests, skin and heart exams. We could easily name quite a few drugs that have been withdrawn from the market with less potential for harm than growth hormone.
Not a single clinical trial has effectively demonstrated that the metabolic effects of growth hormone, even including a temporary increase in lean body mass, have resulted in improved performance. The view of some athletes that a few injections of the hormone might have beneficial effects on sore arms has never been rigorously tested, but is very unlikely to be effective. The risks clearly outweigh the benefits. Our young athletes need to be warned that large muscles are not good muscles, and that these problems are not rare "side effects" but the natural consequence of excess growth hormone, a hormone that affects almost every tissue, not just muscles -- and usually not for the better. Taking any form of growth hormone in the hope of improved athletic performance is misinformed at best, and any mention of this practice should explain why.
Richard Landau, M.D. Emeritus Professor Louis H. Philipson, M.D., Ph.D. Professor, Department of Medicine The University of Chicago
2nd at-bat in Congress?
Subcommittee might summon players for hearing on steroids
By Jeff Barker |Sun Reporter
BALTIMORE SUN December 31, 2007
WASHINGTON - A congressional subcommittee might summon major league baseball players - who have been reluctant to appear in the past - to testify at its upcoming hearing on the sport's problems with performance-enhancing drugs, the panel's chairman says.
"There is a possibility we would invite some ballplayers," Illinois Rep. Bobby L. Rush, chairman of an Energy and Commerce subcommittee, said in an interview. "Of course, that's a sensitive subject."
In March 2005, another House committee investigating steroids used its subpoena power to compel the testimony of Mark McGwire, Rafael Palmeiro, Sammy Sosa and several other current and former stars - most of whom had resisted appearing.
McGwire declined to answer most questions about steroids and then-Oriole Palmeiro, who tested positive for steroids five months later, famously shook his finger and denied using the drugs.
Subpoenas might be needed if ballplayers are placed on the witness list for the Jan. 23 hearing of Rush's Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection.
Former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell was rebuffed in his requests for cooperation from hundreds of players during his recently completed investigation that concluded the use of steroids in baseball was widespread and the response "slow to develop."
Mitchell lacked subpoena power, unlike Congress.
Asked if his committee might use subpoenas, Rush replied: "I think it's kind of early to have those kinds of discussions. It's certainly within the authority of the committee. There might be some ballplayers who are eager to get the story out."
Rush, a Democrat, had written Mitchell earlier this year, saying he was "fully prepared" to intervene if Mitchell needed help in his investigation.
Rush declined to name any players who might be called.
The subcommittee announced its hearing on Dec. 13, the same day Mitchell released his report naming two current Orioles - Jay Gibbons and Brian Roberts - and 17 former Orioles among dozens of players. It featured a detailed description of steroid use by pitching great Roger Clemens, who has denied using the drugs.
In announcing its hearing, Rush's subcommittee said only that Mitchell and baseball "representatives" would be called, without specifying whether players could be included.
The 2005 hearings were threatened with delay when several of the players challenged the subpoenas and the committee's authority. The potential for such legal maneuvering could dissuade Rush from forcing players to appear.
The Government Reform and Oversight Committee plans to invite Mitchell and baseball commissioner Bud Selig to a Jan. 15 hearing. The committee isn't currently planning to invite players to testify.
Members of both panels are likely to add their own recommendations to the ones in Mitchell's report aimed at cleaning up the sport. Among other recommendations, Mitchell proposed that baseball create a department of investigations and turn drug testing over to an independent agency.
Rush said his subcommittee might introduce legislation to make certain some of Mitchell's recommendations are implemented. "Vigorous testing by a third party - that would be at the core of any bill that would come out of our subcommittee," he said.
Even if baseball adopts Mitchell's suggestions, some House members fear the climate would still be conducive to players using certain drugs - particularly human growth hormone. According to congressional staff, some members are considering asking baseball to begin saving players' urine specimens so they can be analyzed when a test for the drug becomes available. The idea is to make sure a deterrent exists so players can't use hGH with impunity while a screening procedure is being developed.
Growth hormone has long been used by athletes to enhance their endurance and healing. Mitchell's report indicated many athletes have turned to hGH for injury recovery or as a substitute for anabolic steroids.
Selig wants to convene an expert conference on hGH, and drug researcher Don Catlin of UCLA has received grants from Major League Baseball and the NFL to work on a urine test for the substance.
But some House members worry about the continued use of hGH in the period before a testing program is implemented.
In 2006, Rep. Henry Waxman, a Californian who chairs the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, urged baseball to begin saving urine samples. Waxman, who still hopes baseball will adopt that strategy, argued that saving samples for future testing would close a significant "loophole."
Baseball has balked at saving samples in the past, expressing doubts about whether stored tests would still be reliable, and for how long.
But baseball might be more receptive today because the sport is eager to embrace the reform proposals of Mitchell and members of Congress, according to MLB officials who declined to be named because the sport is reviewing its drug policies.
Any such proposal would require the approval of the Major League Baseball Players Association.
Running a risk Patriots safety Rodney Harrison is serving a four-game suspension after admitting he used inappropriately obtained human growth hormone, a substance banned from professional sports. He is the latest of many athletes accused of, or admitting use of, the hormone in what experts say is a useless attempt to improve their performance.
By Alice Dembner, Globe Staff | September 17, 2007
Human growth hormone has become the fix of the moment.
Patriots safety Rodney Harrison said he injected the drug to help heal his football injuries. Other professional athletes allegedly took it as part of a clandestine cocktail that they hoped would boost their recovery or power. And thousands of older people have flocked to clinics that promote the drug as a fountain of youth.
But there is little or no evidence that human growth hormone provides any of those benefits to healthy individuals, researchers and hormone specialists say, while overuse carries serious risks, including diabetes and heart abnormalities.
In addition, use of the drug is banned in the Olympics and professional sports. And under US law, distribution of the drug to healthy people is a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison.
"People should think twice about using it," said Anne Nelson, scientific project manager for growth hormone studies at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Sydney. "It seems silly to be spending a lot of money on growth hormone if it's not doing anything and there's long-term risks to health. And it's against the spirit of sports."
Nonetheless, sales of human growth hormone, or HGH, worldwide total more than $1 billion, and hundreds of thousands of prescriptions are filled in the United States, far more than the likely number of people with confirmed hormone diseases for which the drug can legally be prescribed.
Some estimate that thousands more get the drug illegally without prescriptions, according to a 2005 article in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
The drug can legitimately be prescribed only for children with growth abnormalities, adults with documented deficiencies of the hormone, and people with wasting from AIDS or other serious conditions.
A law designed to bar growth hormone abuse explicitly limits the leeway doctors usually have to prescribe a FDA-approved drug for any purpose.
But synthetic growth hormone and substances to boost natural growth hormone are widely marketed on the Internet with claims of bodybuilding, rejuvenation, and even increasing sex drive. A Google search for growth hormone sales yields more than 2 million pages, including many ads for pills or sprays, despite the fact that the only effective way to get HGH into the body is by injection. A month's dose can cost up to $1,000.
Many athletes include HGH in cocktails of drugs and supplements, choosing it in part because its use is hard to detect in tests, sports specialists said.
Testing for HGH abuse is difficult because natural levels vary greatly during the day and in response to stress and exercise.
In addition, injected hormone is short lived and does not show up much in urine.
The first blood tests to detect HGH were tried at the 2004 Athens Olympics. These tests will be more widely available by the end of the year, and a second test designed to be more sensitive is being validated, said Dr. Gary Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency, which works to end abuse of drugs in sports.
"Growth hormone is increasingly moving to center stage in our fight against doping," Wadler said.
Harrison, who helped the Patriots win the Super Bowl in 2003 and 2004, admitted last month that he had used human growth hormone and was suspended by the National Football League for the first four games of the season. The NFL banned use of HGH in 1991.
Harrison's use was uncovered by an ongoing New York investigation into HGH mills. That investigation found he had purchased HGH on the Internet from a Florida antiaging center using a prescription from a doctor who never examined him.
Harrison said he used HGH in an attempt to heal faster from shoulder and knee injuries that kept him from playing. He apologized publicly and said his purpose "was never to gain a competitive edge."
This month, two Major League Baseball players - Rick Ankiel of the St. Louis Cardinals and Jay Gibbons of the Baltimore Orioles - were linked to HGH in the same investigation, according to media reports.
Ankiel said he received the drugs from another Florida antiaging center in 2004, under a doctor's orders after elbow surgery. He initially said the drugs included HGH, but then backtracked. A former pitcher who missed most of the 2006 season for knee surgery, Ankiel came back this season as a home-run hitting outfielder.
Gibbons allegedly received shipments of HGH from 2003 to 2005, when he was recovering from injuries, according to a report in Sports Illustrated.
Neither Ankiel nor Gibbons has been accused of any crime. Ankiel denied any wrongdoing; and Gibbons, recovering from shoulder surgery, has not addressed the accusations.
Dr. Lawrence Frohman, a spokesman for the association of doctors who treat hormone imbalances, said HGH confers no advantage in healing. However, one preliminary study, sponsored by an HGH manufacturer, found it speeded healing of certain shin fractures.
Natural growth hormone is generated by the brain's pituitary gland at levels that taper off with age. In children, HGH spurs growth, while in adults it helps to maintain a balance of fat and muscle.
A synthetic form of HGH first became available in the late 1980s. Interest in the drug took off in 1990 after a small study published in the New England Journal of Medicine suggested it could reverse some signs of aging by reducing fat, increasing lean body mass, and thickening skin in men over 60.
Subsequent research showed less dramatic effects, if any.
A review of HGH studies in older people, published in January in the Annals of Internal Medicine, found an average increase of only 4 1/2 pounds in lean body mass and a similar small decrease in fat. It found no evidence of improvements in stamina, bone density, cholesterol or longevity, but it cataloged many problematic side effects.
"There is a very limited benefit. For less money, you could get a personal trainer - and lose the weight more quickly," said the study's lead author, Dr. Hau Liu, a clinical assistant professor at Stanford University Medical Center. "You shouldn't be using growth hormone for antiaging."
One study published after Liu's review did find an increase in thigh muscle and aerobic activity in a healthy older men in the United Kingdom treated with HGH and testosterone.
Studies in young weight lifters and resistance trainers found no improvement in muscle strength, although many athletes continue to believe there's a benefit.
Research presented in June at the Endocrine Society's annual meeting found a small improvement - less than 10 percent - in sprinting capacity in young men who took HGH combined with testosterone, but no benefit for women or in those who took HGH alone.
Neither HGH alone nor with testosterone conveyed an advantage in tests of strength or power, said Anne Nelson, who oversaw the Garvan Institute research. However, most of the men said they felt stronger, even if they received a placebo.
One additional measure of the ineffectiveness of growth hormone supplements in healthy people is the lack of pharmaceutical company interest.
Both Merck and Pfizer recently dropped efforts to develop drugs that stimulated growth hormone production in older people.
A Pfizer spokesman said tests showed its drug wasn't effective. Merck wouldn't comment on why it halted development.
Some sports medicine specialists caution that growth hormone may yet be found to boost function. They cite steroids, which were widely debunked as ineffective until science caught up with what body-builders had already discovered.
"Often the experimentation in the training room is ahead of the scientists," said Dr. Nicholas DiNubile, a spokesman for the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine. "But right now, for a healthy individual, there is no reason to use growth hormone."
Age old problem: as early as the first Olympic Games in 776 BC, athletes have been altering training and dietary regimens to enhance performance. Particularly in today's society where professional athletes can make millions of dollars a year and are treated like celebrities, the temptation to gain a competitive edge is rife. And athletes are trying to gain that critical edge. Anabolic steroids were first used to enhance muscle mass in the 1940s and throughout the 1950s and 1960s their use was rampant in sports. In 1967, the International Olympic Committee was the first sports organization to ban steroids.
Major League Baseball first came under fire in 2002 when a former MVP, Ken Caminiti, told Sports Illustrated that at least half the players were using steroids. This was followed by a tell-all book by Jose Canseco corroborating Caminiti's comments. Recently, baseball's all-time home run leader, Barry Bonds, was indicted in connection with the use of performance enhancing drugs. Former Senate majority leader George Mitchell is leading the investigation of steroid use in baseball.
Anabolic-androgenic steroids are synthetic derivatives of the male hormone, testosterone. Anabolic comes from the Greek meaning "to build," with androgenic meaning "masculinizing." Steroids are occasionally prescribed by doctors to treat certain medical conditions, such as hypogonadism or impotence. They work by increasing protein synthesis in muscle cells, stimulating the body to release endogenous growth hormone, and reversing the effects of the body's naturally occurring cortisol, which is a catabolic hormone. A net effect of these actions is increased muscle mass and strength.
When baseball's steroid scandal hit the news, Jimmy Kimmel joked that "Former baseball star Jose Canseco has a new book out. It's a tell-all biography in which he claims he injected his former teammate -- superstar Mark McGwire -- with steroids....Mark McGwire vehemently denies the accusation -- he got so angry when he heard about it, he picked up his house and threw it onto the freeway." The problem is that the potential side effects of anabolic steroids are not laughing matters.
"High blood pressure, increased cholesterol, acne, clotting disorders, liver damage, depression, and psychosis are but a few of the adverse effects of steroids," says Dr. Joshua Dines, a sports orthopedic surgeon at the Hospital for Special Surgery and the Joe DiMaggio Sports Medicine Center in Manhattan. Men may report impotence, development of breasts and shrinking of their testicles. Females may experience masculinization, including facial hair growth and menstrual cycle abnormalities. In children, anabolic steroids can cause premature growth arrest.
And, while rare, fatal effects have been reported. "Athletes have died of strokes and heart attacks secondary to prolonged steroid use" adds Dr. Dines. There is also one reported case of a bodybuilder who contracted HIV by sharing needles used for steroid injections.
Ironically, athletes that take steroids to improve performance set themselves up for other sports-related injuries. Dr. Dines further comments that "anabolic androgenic steroid use can alter the microscopic structure of tendons, increasing their risk of rupturing." Achilles tendon, quadriceps tendon and distal biceps tendon tears have all been associated with steroid use." Another potential effect of steroid use occurs when athletes stop using them. The muscle strength gained by steroids helps protect ligaments and tendons that are exposed to excessive strains by athletes involved in repetitive motions, such as throwing. When the steroids are discontinued, the muscles lose some of their strength, increasing the stresses seen by the ligaments. According to Dr. Dines, "Though anecdotal, we are seeing an increasing number of elbow ligament injuries in throwers, which may be due to some players no longer using steroids."
The problem is not isolated to professional sports. Some high-school athletes view using steroids as their ticket to a college scholarship; and a number of college athletes take steroids to increase their chances of turning professional. A review by the "American Academy of Pediatrics" found that anabolic steroid use by adolescent athletes was as high as 11 percent for boys. And, in 2005, a study by the Center for Disease Control reported that 6.1 percent of high school students had taken anabolic steroids.
Very soon, the Mitchell Commission will report their findings on such drug abuse, possibly "naming names" of many major league baseball players that are currently revered by millions of Americans. While it is unclear how the report will affect the way we as a society view this generation of baseball players, what is certain is that the illegal use of anabolic steroids is dangerous for both the user and those that view these athletes as role models. And all to the detriment of sports and those who enjoy them. Dr. Dines quips that "using these drugs is a sure way to end up in the loss column."
Gibbons suspended, admits to using hGH
O's outfielder suspended 15 days for violating MLB's drug policy; 'I have no excuses and bear sole responsibility for my decisions'; Royals' Guillen also given ban
Major League Baseball today suspended Orioles outfielder Jay Gibbons 15 days, beginning with the start of the 2008 season, for violating the league's drug policy. Gibbons admitted to The Sun today that he had used hGH. Gibbons and Kansas City Royals outfielder Jose Guillen, who was also given a 15-day ban today, are the first players to be suspended without failing a drug test. (Sun photo by Karl Merton Ferron / December 6, 2007)
By Jeff Zrebiec and Dan Connolly |Sun reporters
6:35 PM EST, December 6, 2007
Major League Baseball today suspended Orioles outfielder Jay Gibbons 15 days, beginning with the start of the 2008 season, for violating the league's drug policy. Gibbons admitted to The Sun today that he had used hGH.
Gibbons had not previously addressed allegations that he received a shipment of steroids and hGH from a raided Florida pharmacy. Gibbons and Kansas City Royals outfielder Jose Guillen, who was also given a 15-day ban today, are the first players to be suspended without failing a drug test.
"I am deeply sorry for the mistakes that I have made," Gibbons said. "I have no excuses and bear sole responsibility for my decisions. Years ago, I relied on the advice of a doctor, filled a prescription, charged the hGH, which is a medication, to my credit card and had only intended to help speed my recovery from my injuries and surgeries. I hope that my family, teammates, fans and [Orioles owner] Peter Angelos and the entire Orioles organization will accept my apologies and that we can all move on."
Share your thoughts about Orioles outfielder Jay Gibbons' admission that he used human growth hormone. Gibbons has been suspended by Major League Baseball for 15 days, starting with the beginning of the 2008 season.
If Gibbons was indeed taking performance enhancing substances, does this not jeopardize the validity of the contract that he signed, which was based on his performance numbers collected while he was cheating?
Submitted by JoeyK
8:16 PM EST, Dec 6, 2007
Get rid of this guy! He's a lousy ballplayer on or off of the juice. 15 game suspension? What a deal! No wonder young people think it's worth trying.
Gibbons will not appeal the decision, according to Michael Weiner, general counsel for the players association, but "at Jose's request the association will grieve the suspension." That grievance will be held before a neutral arbitrator, which likely would occur before the start of the 2008 season.
"We completely support the commissioner's program and his decision with regard to Jay Gibbons' suspension," said Andy MacPhail, Orioles president of baseball operations. "Jay has acknowledged his mistake, and we appreciate his willingness to accept the consequences."
Gibbons, who has spent the offseason in Arizona rehabilitating his surgically repaired shoulder that caused him to miss the last month and a half of the 2007 season, declined further comment and wouldn't take questions.
The 30-year-old outfielder, who has been with the Orioles longer than any current player except third baseman Melvin Mora, met with MLB officials on Sept. 18, about a week after SI.com reported that Gibbons received shipments of steroids and hGH from Signature Pharmacy, which is under investigation for illegally distributing prescription medications.
Citing a source in Florida with knowledge of Signature's client list, SI.com reported that Gibbons received six separate shipments of Genotropin, a brand name for synthetic hGH; two testosterone deliveries; and two shipments of human chorionic gonadotropin, a hormone produced during pregnancy and taken by anabolic steroid users to stimulate testosterone production.
According to the report, the shipments, which were received between October 2003 and July 2005, were written in Gibbons' name and sent to a Gilbert, Ariz., home that traces back to the player.
Synthetic testosterone was banned by Major League Baseball in 2003, and hGH was banned in January 2005. The story reported that Gibbons received a shipment of hGH in July 2005 that was obtained through South Beach (Fla.) Rejuvenation Center/Modern Therapy, and processed by Signature Pharmacy.
Major League Baseball does not believe there is an accurate test for hGH readily available, and doesn't test for the substance.
Several major leaguers have been implicated in receiving shipments of hGH or other performance-enhancing drugs. That list includes former Orioles Gary Matthews Jr. and Jerry Hairston Jr., Toronto Blue Jays third baseman Troy Glaus, St. Louis Cardinals pitcher-turned-slugger Rick Ankiel and New York Mets reliever Scott Schoeneweis.
Commission Bud Selig's office concluded its investigation of Matthews, Glaus, Ankiel and Schoeneweis and ruled there was insufficient evidence of any drug program violations. The investigation of Hairston is continuing and will be completed shortly, according to Major League Baseball.
Guillen and Gibbons are the only two who will be suspended, the league said.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Spiked eggnog, presents under the tree and the Mitchell report. It should make for an interesting holiday season.
"Well, it ain't Merry Christmas or Happy New Year for somebody," new Cincinnati Reds manager Dusty Baker said Wednesday.
It's expected throughout baseball that former Sen. George Mitchell's investigation of the use of performance-enhancing drugs in baseball will be released before Christmas, and that the names of current and former major-leaguers who have used steroids and human growth hormone will be included.
But the specter of a bombshell has barely made a ripple at the winter meetings here, though once the report is released, it's likely to give baseball another black eye.
"I've not heard of a single instance where it's been part of trade discussions or negotiations," said Detroit general manager Dave Dombrowski, one of the architects of the eight-player blockbuster that sent young stars Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis from the Marlins to the Tigers.
A number of agents and general managers said the same thing, even though teams who sign players this week could soon find out that their prized free-agent acquisitions face possible suspension by Major League Baseball for past use of banned substances.
"It hasn't made a bit of difference. The money machine will just keep moving along," said one agent, pointing out that a possible 10- to 15-day suspension of former Seattle outfielder Jose Guillen for his reported involvement in the purchase of steroids and human growth hormone didn't deter Kansas City from signing him to a $36 million, three-year contract Tuesday. The San Francisco Chronicle reported last month that Guillen bought nearly $20,000 worth of steroids and human growth hormone from 2003-05.
Rockies general manager Dan O'Dowd has said teams must be diligent to make sure they aren't investing in players who have a history of using banned substances.
"The only guys we've gone after wouldn't be suspect," he said. "You never know for sure, but we haven't dealt with that issue very much."
It has been reported that Los Angeles Angels outfielder Gary Matthews Jr. was sent human growth hormone in 2004 from a pharmacy being investigated for illegal distribution of performance-enhancing drugs. Matthews, who has denied using human growth hormone, met with Major League Baseball officials last month. Last week, the Angels signed free-agent center fielder Torii Hunter to a five-year, $90 million contract. Tony Reagins, the Angels' first-year general manager, said Hunter's signing was not linked to suspicions about Matthews, adding that he had no knowledge of Matthews possibly being suspended in 2008.
Wednesday, Angels manager Mike Scioscia said he was not sure if Major League Baseball should suspend players named in the Mitchell report.
"I don't know how they are going to find out definitively and without a doubt that somebody was taking steroids, outside of a player admitting it or a positive test," he said.
It's clear, however, that managers want a resolution to the so-called steroid era.
"It think everybody wants to see a finality to it," Minnesota Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "We'll get it out, and maybe we'll get a little bit of that cloud from over our heads and get back to baseball. The goal is to make our game better and clean it up."
The latest fad in the search for youth and super fitness is probably not what it's cut out to be, research shows. Human growth hormone has become the fix of the moment, from athletes who hope it will boost their recovery, to older people who have flocked to clinics that promote the drug as a fountain of youth.
But there is little or no evidence that human growth hormone provides any of those benefits to healthy individuals, researchers and hormone specialists say, while overuse carries serious risks, including diabetes and heart abnormalities.
"People should think twice about using it," says Anne Nelson, the scientific project manager for growth hormone studies at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Sydney.
"It seems silly to be spending a lot of money on growth hormone if it's not doing anything and there's long-term risks to health. And it's against the spirit of sports."
Nonetheless, sales of human growth hormone, or HGH, worldwide total more than $US1 billion ($1.19 billion), and hundreds of thousands of prescriptions are filled in the United States, far more than the probable number of people with confirmed hormone diseases for which the drug can legally be prescribed.
The drug can legitimately be prescribed only for children with growth abnormalities, adults with documented deficiencies of the hormone, and people with wasting from AIDS or other serious conditions.
But synthetic growth hormone and substances to boost natural growth hormone are widely marketed on the internet with claims of bodybuilding, rejuvenation and even increased sex drive. A Google search for growth hormone sales yields more than 2 million pages, including many advertisements for pills or sprays, even though the only effective way to get HGH into the body is by injection. A month's dose can cost up to $US1000.
Dr Lawrence Frohman, a spokesman for the association of doctors who treat hormone imbalances, said the growth hormone confers no advantage in healing. However, one study, sponsored by a maker of the hormone, found it speeded healing of certain shin fractures.
A review of human growth hormone studies in older people, published in January in the Annals of Internal Medicine, found an average increase of only 2.1 kilograms in lean body mass and a similar small decrease in fat. It found no evidence of improvements in stamina, bone density, cholesterol or longevity, but it listed problematic side effects.
"There is a very limited benefit. For less money, you could get a personal trainer and lose the weight more quickly," said the study's lead author, Dr Hau Liu, a clinical assistant professor at Stanford University Medical Centre. "You shouldn't be using growth hormone for anti-ageing."
Studies in young weightlifters and resistance trainers found no improvement in muscle strength, although many athletes still believe there is a benefit.
Research presented in June at the Endocrine Society's annual meeting found a small improvement - less than 10 per cent - in sprinting capacity in young men who took the hormone combined with testosterone, but no benefit for women or for those who took the growth hormone alone.
Neither the hormone alone nor with testosterone gave an advantage in tests of strength or power, says Nelson, who oversaw the Garvan Institute research. However, most of the men said they felt stronger, even if they received a placebo.
Pete Kennedy with his sister Jamie at Albany Medical center days before he died from steroid-related damage to his heart and kidneys.
A body to die for
Pete Kennedy just wanted to be buff, but in the end, he paid ultimate price for using steroids [and GH]
BY WAYNE COFFEY DAILY NEWS SPORTS WRITER
Sunday, March 25th 2007, 4:00 AM
EAST BERNE, N.Y. - Long before his muscles got big and his organs shut down, Pete Kennedy was just a country kid who loved to tinker. In the garage next to the little blue house on a hilltop he shared with his mother and sister, he would spend hours taking machines apart, and putting them back together.
His mother still remembers the time he came home with a bushel basket full of dirt bike parts, when he was 12. Two weeks later, Pete was riding the thing up and down Main St.
"He could build anything," Barbara Kennedy says of her son. "You could give him something that didn't work, and he would fix it. He would fix my tractor, my car, fix my aunt's vehicles. Friends would call and say, 'Pete, I have a problem,' and he'd say, 'Bring it over.'"
There will be no more automotive reclamation jobs for Pete Kennedy, no more wizardry with his wrenches. He died in the intensive-care unit of Albany Medical Center in the early hours of Friday morning, three weeks before his 28th birthday, three weeks to the day after he was hospitalized with what his mother thought was a heavy cold. Barb Kennedy was supposed to pick him up the next morning, never imagining the heartache to come; that her only son would have his healthy body ravaged by steroid use, that he would become the nation's latest chemically enhanced tragedy - a young man who just wanted to be big and buff, and wound up in the ground.
Barbara Kennedy found out with a 4 a.m. phone call from the hospital.
"I pray that no other mother ever has to go through this," she says.
Pete Kennedy was born and raised here, in the hill country southwest of Albany, a community (pop. 1,843) where people leave their houses unlocked and their keys in the ignition. Pete never played team sports; he just rode his four-wheeler and snowmobile, and lifted lots of bales of hay. He was a sinewy 6-1, 162-pound farmboy who worked for a glass manufacturer and had a bedroom done completely in John Deere, from clock to sheets.
Could there be a more improbable person to intersect with the burgeoning investigation into Internet steroid trafficking being conducted by David Soares, the Albany County district attorney? A less likely face of an orbit of steroid use that has nothing to do with home-run records or Olympic gold medals - but rather with a simple desire to bulk up?
While there is no evidence linking Kennedy's supply of Nandrolone and testosterone to the alleged steroid distribution ring - a widespread web of doctors, pharmacies and wellness centers that has already implicated several athletes - that Soares is investigating, authorities view the case as a heart-rending reminder of the prevalence, and the perils, of anabolic steroids, particularly those sold on the black market.
"Steroid use has been a drug of denial for many years," says John L. Lestini Jr., director of the National Steroid Research Center. "People say, 'It's an athlete's problem, let them solve it.' Well, it's not an athlete's problem. It's a widespread public health problem that we can no longer ignore."
Gary Wadler, a professor at the NYU School of Medicine and member of the World Anti-Doping Agency, agrees. He says much of the U.S. supply of steroids and human growth hormone comes from Mexico and the Far East, from unknown sources with, quite likely, nonexistent regulatory standards.
"If these drugs are pure, they are dangerous," Wadler says. "If you have no idea what you're swallowing or injecting, it becomes true Russian Roulette. The attitude in America is, 'They wouldn't sell it if weren't safe. They wouldn't sell it if weren't pure. They wouldn't sell it if it didn't work.' The problem is we're not dealing with drugs from the regular marketplace."
* * *
As far as Barb Kennedy can tell, the trouble started last April, after Pete got his second DWI. He was on his way home from Lake George. He'd had some Miller Lites at a bar, and refused the Breathlyzer test. His license was suspended. His probation mandated that he couldn't drink, couldn't join his buddies for Thirsty Thursdays at his favorite bar down the street, the Maple Inn. He felt a void. He opted to fill it by working out. He cleaned out the basement of the garage and set up an impressive array of weights, punching bags and fitness equipment.
By last summer, Pete Kennedy was lifting up to four hours a day, five days a week. He was constantly drinking power shakes and other concoctions. He spent $300 monthly at GNC, according to his sister, Jamie, 22. When he lifted, he had his heavy metal music blaring - "Anger music," he called it - and pushed himself to almost complete exhaustion.
"Aren't you overdoing it?" his mother would ask.
"No, I'm fine," Pete would say, before cranking up the music to drown out her voice.
"The gym became his crutch," Barb says.
For years Pete and Barb wore interchangeable jeans, waist 29, but that changed. His arms began to bulge with slabs of muscle, and his neck and chest thickened and hardened, as his weight increased to 170, 180, 190 - all the way to 215. Jamie noticed his jawline becoming more pronounced - a common side effect of HGH - and Pete's girlfriend said his back had developed severe acne - a condition that often accompanies steroid use.
Seeing him every day, Barb was slow to notice any changes at all, until Pete needed new pairs of size-34 jeans. He was becoming increasingly impatient and sometimes irritable, she realized. She asked him straight out if he was using steroids. Pete said no. She brought it up several other times. He was emphatic, just as he was when Jamie asked him about it.
"I'd never do that. I would never stick a needle inside me," he said.
Barb Kennedy is a dark-haired, 47-year-old woman with the sturdy grip and down-home bearing of a person who has spent a lifetime around the farm. She raises quarter horses and holds down three other jobs - waitress, short-order cook and an aide in a veterinary clinic. She knows when horses have been pharmacologically enhanced.
"I can pick a horse out in the crowd with steroids, but I couldn't pick my son out," she says. Sitting in the hospital cafeteria last week, amid another 10-hour day at her son's bedside, she blamed herself for not going at Pete harder.
"I wish I'd called him a liar and did the thing that parents don't like to do - searched his room," she says.
That search was belatedly conducted three weeks ago, Pete already in St. Peter's Hospital after complaining of a persistent cold, extreme fatigue and shortness of breath. Within hours of his admission, his kidneys shut down, his liver began to fail and his heart was enlarged. His blood was full of toxins. Doctors induced a coma as they figured out how to proceed. They asked Barb Kennedy if her son took steroids. Just before Pete was transferred to Albany Medical Center, Jamie got a call from a friend of Pete's. The friend said that awhile back Pete had asked where he could get hold of steroids. Jamie hung up and went into Pete's room. She looked everywhere. In the bottom of the closet she found a fireproof safe. She went to the desk and got the keys. She opened the safe. Inside it was a plastic bag with eight 30-milliliter bottles, four brown and four clear. "Testosterone," it said on the brown ones, next to a homemade label with a caricature of an overly muscled man.
Jamie began to sob. "My heart just dropped to the floor," she says.
* * *
Nobody knows for sure when Pete Kennedy started taking steroids, or how much he was taking. Linn Goldberg, M.D., a professor of medicine at Oregon Health & Science University and a leading researcher of youth steroid use, says it's not uncommon for "an average steroid user to take up to 100 times the normal level of testosterone."
State drug-enforcement investigators, working with DA Soares' office, are probing the black-market source where Pete Kennedy got his drugs. At 4:30 Friday morning, right after Barb Kennedy got the worst call of her life, she made a call herself.
"Go get the sons of bitches," she told investigators.
The terrible irony is that a day before his death, Pete Kennedy had had his best day in three weeks. He was taken off the respirator, and began to do some breathing on his own. His eyes opened and he seemed a bit more alert. Pete and Jamie are extraordinarily close - he always called her "Kid." Jamie asked him if he could say, "Hey, Kid." Slowly, almost inaudibly, Pete repeated his sister's words. Hours later, his breathing became labored and his heart began to race. The respirator was reinserted, but his heart finally gave out. "He fought hard," Jamie says. "I just don't think he could fight any longer."
Throughout the ordeal, the Kennedy family has been astounded at people's kindness. At the restaurant where Barb waitresses, two couples recently had a $160 dinner, and left $400. Barb ran after them and told them they had made a mistake. "No, we didn't," one of the men said. Food keeps showing up in Barb's refrigerator. People drop by with money here and there, to help pay for the $93 fillups for Barb's truck, and to help her cover the $479 monthly payments on Pete's beloved Ford F-250 pickup. A fellow farmer gave her $400 for a month's feed for her horses, and there is an upcoming benefit spaghetti dinner at the East Berne firehouse, followed by another at the Maple Inn. They are much more pleasant things to think about than the persons who sold the eight bottles of steroids that made their way inside Pete Kennedy's safe. "If a hillbilly on top of a mountain can get a hold of it, then it can get anywhere," Jamie says.
Over the last quarter-century, as steroids have become as much of a sports-world staple as standings and shattered home-run records, some have depicted their distribution and use as a victimless crime - not worthy of prosecutors' time. If some cartoon-character linebacker or slugger wants to take such a risk, what's the big deal? The NSRC's Lestini scoffs at that notion, and so does Wadler, who sees steroid trafficking as "every bit the money-driven enterprise that the cocaine and heroin businesses are." Steroid use routinely comes bundled with financial, familial and psychological wreckage, experts say.
Barbara Kennedy never figured she'd be weighing in on this, but she never imagined living through the hell she's lived through the last three weeks. She has bills to pay. She has a son to bury. She has a life she must try to carry on, without devouring herself with regret about what she might've done differently. Don't waste your time talking to her about victimless crime.
"I have proof it's not true," Barbara Kennedy says. "And the proof is seeing a mother watch her son die and not be able to do anything about it.”
Jose Guillen among three linked to steroids
FOXSports.com November 7, 2007
Veteran outfielder Jose Guillen and two other retired Major League Baseball players have been linked to purchases of performance-enhancing drugs from the Palm Beach Rejuvenation Center, targeted in a law-enforcement investigation of suspected illegal drug sales, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Matt Williams bought $11,600 worth of growth hormone, steroids and other drugs in 2002, when he was playing for the Arizona Diamondbacks, according to the records. In a phone interview Monday, Williams told the newspaper a doctor advised him to try growth hormone to heal a serious ankle injury suffered early in 2002.
Journeyman pitcher Ismael Valdez bought $11,300 worth of performance-enhancing drugs in 2002 after he was traded from the Texas Rangers to the Seattle Mariners, the records show. Guillen, an 11-year veteran who played for the Mariners last season, ordered more than $19,000 worth of drugs from the center between May 2002 and June 2005, according to the records.
On May 1, 2002, while he was playing for the Diamondbacks, Guillen placed his first order with the Florida center, paying $2,180 worth of growth hormone, the steroids testosterone cypionate and nandrolone and syringes, the records show. The drugs were shipped to a Phoenix address. Guillen was with the playoff-bound Oakland A's on Sept. 19, 2003, when he used a credit card to order $2,083 worth of Genotropin, a brand name for human growth hormone, along with the steroids testosterone propionate and stanozolol and syringes and needles, to be shipped to him at the Oakland Coliseum, records show.
Guillen didn't respond to requests for comment left with his agent and business manager. Valdez's former agent didn't return phone calls or an e-mail message.
Last week, the Mariners declined their $9 million option on Guillen's contract for next season. He has until Wednesday to decide if he wants to exercise his part of the mutual option at $5 million. If he does, the club can void the deal and pay him a $500,000 buyout. That would make Guillen a free agent.
Mariners president Chuck Armstrong told the Associated Press the team remains interested in keeping Guillen.
"We thought he was an outstanding teammate. We were happy to have him. We know nothing about what happened in the past," Armstrong said. "I continue to admire and respect him greatly.
"Before I feel anything negative about Jose, I need to see something tangible or real."
Armstrong also said if Guillen exercises his option, the Mariners would need to investigate the allegations.
"I for sure would have to talk to Jose about this," Armstrong said.
Some prescriptions for the three were written by a Florida dentist whose license later was suspended for fraud and incompetence, records show. The same dentist wrote prescriptions for Paul Byrd, the Cleveland Indians pitcher previously identified as buying nearly $25,000 worth of growth hormone through the same anti-aging clinic.
The players' orders were detailed in records provided to the newspaper by a source who said their purchases were consistent with an athlete's personal use of the drugs. The records included payment data and the buyers' birthdates and Social Security numbers.
Guillen, 31, has played for eight teams during 11 seasons in the majors, batting .267 with 166 home runs. In 2007, he hit .290 with 23 home runs and 99 runs batted in for Seattle.
The Palm Beach Rejuvenation Center was targeted by the Albany, N.Y., district attorney for illegal sales of drugs, including steroids and HGH, and was raided by state law enforcement agencies Feb. 27. Authorities have accused doctors associated with several clinics and pharmacies of writing fraudulent prescriptions. Thus far, 10 people have pleaded guilty to felony drug and fraud charges.
Williams was on pace to break Roger Maris' single-season home run record for the Giants in 1994, but a labor dispute ended the season in August and he finished with 43 home runs. During his next-to-last season in Arizona, records show, Williams placed two orders with the Palm Beach Rejuvenation Center. On March 9, 2002, he ordered $5,693 of testosterone cypionate, growth hormone, clomiphene, Novarel and syringes. On May 8, Williams ordered $6,000 of testosterone cypionate, nandrolone, clomiphene, Novarel and syringes, according to the records. The drugs were sent to a Scottsdale business office Williams long has used as a mailing address. Williams' prescriptions were written by the same dentist who prescribed growth hormone for Byrd and Guillen.
Williams is now a broadcaster for the Diamondbacks.
"We obviously just learned of this," team president Derrick Hall said in a statement Tuesday. "Matt informed us that a doctor recommended its use to help heal his ankle injury. It was a substance that he was not familiar with at the time, and according to him, did not like its effects after sampling. He discontinued the use of it and retired the next season.
"Matt is a stand-up guy, who without hesitation, admitted using it and not liking it. There is no doubt in our minds that Matt would decline such a recommendation today, knowing what we all know about enhancing substances."
Injuries limited Williams to just 60 games in 2002, and he hit .260 with 12 home runs and 40 RBIs. He retired the following June after playing in just 43 games.
On Sept. 7, 2002, about a month after he was traded from Texas to Seattle, records indicate Valdez used a credit card to buy nearly $2,500 worth of growth hormone through the Palm Beach Rejuvenation Center. The invoice listed the primary shipping address as 1000 Ball Park Way, Arlington, Texas — the Rangers' stadium.
Ten days later, Valdez spent $2,337.50 on Novarel, Clomid — a brand name for clomiphene — and Arimidex. Arimidex is prescribed for breast cancer, but experts say it is taken by male steroid users to counter side effects such as the growth of breast tissue. The drugs were shipped to the Seattle address.
The Chronicle said Valdez's former agent did not return an e-mail message or phone calls to AP.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
lass=gtv_headline id=GetFullStory1_divSlug>Indians support Byrd among human growth hormone accusations
CLEVELAND -- The Cleveland Indians are standing behind veteran pitcher Paul Byrd among accusations he bought thousands of dollars worth of human growth hormones.
A San Francisco newspaper reports that Byrd bought over $20,000 dollars in human growth hormones between August of 2002 and January of 2005.
In a statement, Indians Vice President and General Mark Shapiro said, "I have spoken with Paul about the situation, however, at this time I don't feel I have enough information to make any further comments on the matter."
He went on to say that Byrd has been an important member of the Cleveland Indians organization, on and off the field over the last two years.
Byrd joined the Indians prior to the 2006 season.
Stay with WKYC.COM and Channel 3 News for further information on this developing story.
BOSTON – Accused of purchasing human growth hormone and syringes for a period of three years through 2005, Cleveland Indians pitcher Paul Byrd contended Sunday that he was being treated for a tumor on his pituitary gland, took the drug under medical supervision and regretted that the story surfaced hours before Game 7 of the American League championship series.
In an email to Yahoo! Sports, Byrd wrote, "I'm not sure there is a story here since I didn't do anything illegal. The tragedy in all of this is the timing. I am in the bullpen tonight and don't want this to be a distraction for our team."
In his email, he continued, "I have not taken any hormone apart from a legitimate doctor's care and supervision. My team, my coaches and MLB have known that I have had a pituitary gland issue for some time and have assisted me in getting blood tests in different states. I recently found out from an MRI that I have a tumor on my pituitary gland. I am currently working with an endocrinologist and will have another MRI on my head after the season to make sure that the tumor hasn't grown."
Byrd was the winning pitcher in Game 4, the victory that gave the Indians a three-games-to-one advantage in the series. The Boston Red Sox have since won two consecutive games, forcing Sunday night's Game 7.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported Byrd bought nearly $25,000 worth of HGH, which was banned by baseball in 2005, from an anti-aging clinic that is the subject of a federal investigation into illegal distribution of performance-enhancing drugs.
Major League baseball issued a statement that read: "We will investigate the allegations concerning Paul Byrd as we have players implicated in previous similar reports. Since Mr. Byrd and his club, the Cleveland Indians, are currently active in post-season play, we will interview Mr. Byrd prior to the start of the World Series should the Cleveland club advance."
Byrd, who claims to have a medical condition that requires hormone treatment, said he would hold a news conference before Sunday's game.
Tim Brown is a national baseball writer for Yahoo! Sports. Send Tim a question or comment for potential use in a future column or webcast.
Title Fight Being Reviewed
October 3, 2007
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — The heavyweight title fight between Samuel Peter and Jameel McCline on Saturday night is under review by boxing authorities following a report that McCline received more than $12,000 worth of steroids, human growth hormone and related drugs within the last two years.
New York State Athletic Commission chairman Ron Scott Stevens told The Associated Press of Friday he would comment on the bout's status later in the day.
Stevens told the Daily News of New York in Friday's editions that he would consult with the state Attorney General's office to determine if the Madison Square Garden bout would proceed.
McCline (38-7-3, 23 KOs) and Peter (28-1, 22 KOs) are to fight for the WBC interim heavyweight title. McCline is a substitute for the fight, following an injury to Oleg Maskaev.
Citing an anonymous source, the newspaper reported that Infinity Longevity of Boca Raton, Fla., a clinic associated with the Signature Pharmacy scandal, supplied drugs to McCline from March 2005 until last December. They included steroids like stanozolol and nandrolone, along with human growth hormone, testosterone and tamoxifen, an estrogen blocker taken by steroid users to keep them from developing feminine physical characteristics.
Signature and several related sales companies face prosecution in Albany County on charges they illegally sold steroids, human growth hormone and other performance-enhancing drugs banned by many sports.
Calls to the attorney general's office and Albany County district attorney's office were not immediately returned Friday.
Stevens told the Daily News that McCline has never tested positive for steroids in New York, including before his Nov. 13, 2004, split decision loss to Chris Byrd.
"We tested him before and after the fight and he came up clean," Stevens said.
Stevens has told the AP that Evander Holyfield, another boxer whose name was linked earlier to the steroid scandal, also tested negative for steroids when he fought in New York.
McCline's manager, Scott Hirsch, told the newspaper he doubted his fighter had used performance-enhancing drugs.
No excuse for HGH use: FedEx receipt exposes Rick Ankiel
BY T.J. QUINN
DAILY NEWS SPORTS WRITER
Sunday, September 23rd 2007, 4:46 PM
Ankiel's amazing 2007 story has been marred by the link to HGH.
THE RESPONSE
Rick Ankiel's agent, Scott Boras, responded to requests for comment on this story with this statement:
"I have not been provided any proof any records exist. The allegations of records do not establish Ankiel received a shipment. There is no statement by a shipping employee or Signature evidencing who received the shipment. Further, there is no evidence of a shipping statement documenting the contents of the alleged shipment. Ankiel has stated he has never ordered or purchased anything from Signature Pharmacy. His medical treatment has complied with state and federal law and baseball rules and you question writers who attempt to cloud players' careers when the only evidence they possess is legal medical practices."
The package with two months' worth of human growth hormone was addressed to Rick Ankiel, 3345 Burns Road, Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. That's the address for The Health and Rejuvenation Center, the "anti-aging" clinic that helped provide his prescriptions for Saizen, Genotropin and vitamin B-12.
Someone named Johnson signed for the FedEx package at 2:37 p.m., Dec. 3, 2003, at the clinic from which Ankiel received HGH. The return address on that package, according to records obtained by the Daily News, was Shipping Department, Signature Pharmacy, 1200 Kuhl Ave., Orlando, Fla.
After the Daily News reported on Sept. 6 that Ankiel had received the HGH shipments for a year, he offered two responses in his defense: First was a very public denial that he ever received anything from Signature, the Orlando pharmacy raided by law enforcement agents in February and at the center of an illegal prescription drug distribution ring. Apparently Ankiel didn't want to be associated with the clinic, but the Signature client records the News obtained two weeks ago and the shipping records, which correspond with the dates the prescriptions were filled, belie that argument.
The other argument, one parroted by his fans in Cardinal Nation and his bosses in Cardinal management, is that Ankiel had done nothing wrong. His defense: He took HGH because a doctor prescribed it as a way to help his recovery from ligament replacement - "Tommy John surgery" - on his elbow.
MLB isn't buying that one, whether it's from Ankiel, the Orioles' Jay Gibbons, Toronto's Troy Glaus or any other player recently called on the carpet to explain why they received the expensive, heavily regulated and banned drug.
"Too much credence is given to that argument," a senior MLB official says. "These guys, whatever they may lay out there publicly, they know that they're doing something they're not supposed to be doing. That's why they never tell team physicians."
MLB rules have been clear since 2005 that players may not take human growth hormone, despite the fact that no test exists to detect it. But as the names of players turn up in investigations like the Albany district attorney's probe into Signature, they are trotting out excuses that predate the ban and are offering an unintentional glimpse into a corner of sport's drug culture.
Numerous players have said that Mark McGwire helped fuel the rise of HGH in baseball in 1998 when he spread the word that it was the perfect companion to steroids, strengthening the connective tissue that sometimes ruptured from illicitly expanded musculature. His advice was incorrect - hormones don't affect ligaments and tendons - but players came to believe HGH wasn't only a good companion to steroids, it was a performance-enhancing alterative.
"It is certainly an effective performance enhancer, and especially when used together with low dose testosterone," BALCO founder Victor Conte says. "I had elite Olympic athletes routinely using HGH in combination with the clear and the cream."
A number of NFL players have said privately that after the league banned steroids, HGH became a popular alternative, especially as doping gurus explained how easily they could enhance HGH use with undetectable levels of testosterone.
NFL personnel recently caught in the Signature investigation went straight for the medical excuse, however.
Patriots safety Rodney Harrison, serving a four-game suspension for receiving HGH, said he never intended to use it as a performance-enhancer, but to recover from injuries. What injuries he was referring to is not clear.
In January 2004, three days after he picked off Peyton Manning in the end zone and led the Patriots with 10 tackles in the AFC Championship Game, Harrison received his first order of HGH from Signature, records show. If he needed it to recover from injuries, he still managed to lead his team with nine tackles in the Super Bowl less than two weeks later as the Patriots defeated the Carolina Panthers.
Cowboys quarterbacks coach Wade Wilson admitted to receiving HGH from Signature and was fined by commissioner Roger Goodell, and he explained himself by saying that he needed it for his diabetes. While some anti-aging advocates say HGH can aid diabetes sufferers, medical literature actually lists diabetes as a potential side-effect of HGH use.
It's possible that an anti-aging physician told Wilson it would help with his diabetes, but his condition was also part of the reason investigators wondered if Wilson might have procured HGH for players, rather than just for his own use. Wilson told team and NFL officials it was for personal use only.
In baseball, HGH found a following among pitchers because it didn't just build lean muscle mass and improve their energy, it helped accelerate recovery time. Nothing could be better for a major league arm, especially for relievers trying to pitch on consecutive days, especially when testing for steroids began in 2003.
"The thought on HGH's ability to aid in healing came around secondary to using it as an alternative or supplement to anabolics," a veteran MLB strength coach says. "And I have to believe that some (physicians outside the teams) helped promote that idea. If they were asked, 'Hey, will this stuff help me recover faster?' with the answer being, 'in all likelihood, yes,' then through the doctor's prescription or not, those guys are and were going to find a way to do it."
To MLB, the reason a player uses a banned drug is irrelevant, even if it seems to make a difference with the public and some members of the media.
"For some reason, the public reacts differently to it if a guy says he had a prescription," an MLB official says. "There's a continuum from taking it because you're coming back from surgery, to taking it because you want to be able to pitch more often, to making yourself bigger so you can hit home runs.
"But they're all cheating."
Cardinals skipper Tony La Russa, a stalwart defender of McGwire, and the slugger's manager in Oakland and in St. Louis, also defended Ankiel by telling reporters, "What we have at this point, he hasn't done anything wrong. He was prescribed this by a doctor when he was recovering from elbow surgery, and doctors have said this helps in the recovery. He was still pitching."
For the most part, the strength coach says, players like Ankiel turned to "anti-aging" specialists who were happy to diagnose them with hormone deficiencies in order to prescribe HGH.
Former major league infielder David Segui was one of the first to use the "recovery" claim to explain his HGH use. Segui, who could not be reached for comment, outed himself last year as one of the players identified in the infamous Jason Grimsley affidavit, the search warrant memo filed after federal agents raided Grimsley's home in 2006 and seized thousands of dollars worth of HGH, steroids and amphetamines.
Segui told ESPN he was referred by another player to a Florida physician working through a "wellness" clinic who analyzed Segui's blood and prescribed HGH. Segui said he suggested that Grimsley do the same.
"I was, you know, deemed human growth hormone deficient through blood work," Segui told ESPN. "The doctor put me on human growth hormone, monitored my levels, monitored blood level, blood work periodically, regularly.
"It was perfectly legal. You know, I was under doctor's prescription."
It wasn't even slightly legal. The system Segui described for acquiring HGH would be revealed as the modus operandi of Signature and a series of anti-aging clinics around Florida when Albany officials led the raid on Signature in February.
Under the scam, clients would fill out forms and occasionally supply blood for examination, and the clinics would pay doctors who did not examine the "patients" in person to provide prescriptions, prosecutors charge. So far 22 have been indicted and nine have pleaded guilty as a result of the ongoing investigation.
Under FDA guidelines, the only approved uses for HGH are for children with growth deficiencies or adults with conditions like pituitary tumors or AIDS "wasting" disease, not professional athletes feeling the effects of their age or injury.
But the word spread among HGH users in all sports that once you got it with a prescription, you could always defend yourself by saying you needed it for medical reasons, especially following an injury or surgery like Tommy John.
(There was a time when a team would steer away from drafting a pitcher whose elbow looked like it was headed for a ligament rupture. That ended years ago when teams discovered that Tommy John surgery could be a legal bit of performance-enhancement itself: some pitchers threw harder after their elbows finally blew and they had the surgery.
"Now you just let the guy throw until it goes. He's going to be out for a year, but he's probably going to be better," one major league GM says. "He might look good now, but after the surgery it could be better."
One agent says he thinks teams were content to turn a blind eye as pitchers returned to form with the aid of an undetectable drug.)
For all the players who have shown up and may yet show up in Signature documents and other investigations, there is little MLB can do to punish them if they stopped using before the ban went into effect in 2005. When Ankiel was getting HGH shipments from Signature, it was banned in the minors, but not in the majors. His shipments stopped just in time in December 2004.
When Ankiel and other players met with MLB officials, they were told that they would "probably" not face any punishment, a baseball source says, and they would not be compelled to meet with Sen. George Mitchell's investigation the way Jason Giambi was.
If anything, individual clubs could seek to invalidate the contracts of HGH users, arguing that they violated the club's right to oversee their medical care. But one MLB lawyer says it is "extremely unlikely" any team would pursue such an action.
Players will be reminded next spring training that HGH is not approved for use as a recovery aid, and that if they're caught using it they will be banned. But the MLB official doesn't believe the warning will be necessary.
"This isn't an education issue," he says. "They know what they're doing."
Patriots safety Rodney Harrison is the latest of many athletes accused of, or admitting use of, human growth hormone in what experts say useless. (Winslow Townson / Associated Press)
Running a risk
Patriots safety Rodney Harrison is serving a four-game suspension after admitting he used inappropriately obtained human growth hormone, a substance banned from professional sports. He is the latest of many athletes accused of, or admitting use of, the hormone in what experts say is a useless attempt to improve their performance.
By Alice Dembner, Globe Staff | September 17, 2007
Human growth hormone has become the fix of the moment.
Patriots safety Rodney Harrison said he injected the drug to help heal his football injuries. Other professional athletes allegedly took it as part of a clandestine cocktail that they hoped would boost their recovery or power. And thousands of older people have flocked to clinics that promote the drug as a fountain of youth.
But there is little or no evidence that human growth hormone provides any of those benefits to healthy individuals, researchers and hormone specialists say, while overuse carries serious risks, including diabetes and heart abnormalities.
In addition, use of the drug is banned in the Olympics and professional sports. And under US law, distribution of the drug to healthy people is a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison.
"People should think twice about using it," said Anne Nelson, scientific project manager for growth hormone studies at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Sydney. "It seems silly to be spending a lot of money on growth hormone if it's not doing anything and there's long-term risks to health. And it's against the spirit of sports."
Nonetheless, sales of human growth hormone, or HGH, worldwide total more than $1 billion, and hundreds of thousands of prescriptions are filled in the United States, far more than the likely number of people with confirmed hormone diseases for which the drug can legally be prescribed.
Some estimate that thousands more get the drug illegally without prescriptions, according to a 2005 article in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
The drug can legitimately be prescribed only for children with growth abnormalities, adults with documented deficiencies of the hormone, and people with wasting from AIDS or other serious conditions.
A law designed to bar growth hormone abuse explicitly limits the leeway doctors usually have to prescribe a FDA-approved drug for any purpose.
But synthetic growth hormone and substances to boost natural growth hormone are widely marketed on the Internet with claims of bodybuilding, rejuvenation, and even increasing sex drive. A Google search for growth hormone sales yields more than 2 million pages, including many ads for pills or sprays, despite the fact that the only effective way to get HGH into the body is by injection. A month's dose can cost up to $1,000.
Many athletes include HGH in cocktails of drugs and supplements, choosing it in part because its use is hard to detect in tests, sports specialists said.
Testing for HGH abuse is difficult because natural levels vary greatly during the day and in response to stress and exercise.
In addition, injected hormone is short lived and does not show up much in urine.
The first blood tests to detect HGH were tried at the 2004 Athens Olympics. These tests will be more widely available by the end of the year, and a second test designed to be more sensitive is being validated, said Dr. Gary Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency, which works to end abuse of drugs in sports.
"Growth hormone is increasingly moving to center stage in our fight against doping," Wadler said.
Harrison, who helped the Patriots win the Super Bowl in 2003 and 2004, admitted last month that he had used human growth hormone and was suspended by the National Football League for the first four games of the season. The NFL banned use of HGH in 1991.
Harrison's use was uncovered by an ongoing New York investigation into HGH mills. That investigation found he had purchased HGH on the Internet from a Florida antiaging center using a prescription from a doctor who never examined him.
Harrison said he used HGH in an attempt to heal faster from shoulder and knee injuries that kept him from playing. He apologized publicly and said his purpose "was never to gain a competitive edge."
This month, two Major League Baseball players - Rick Ankiel of the St. Louis Cardinals and Jay Gibbons of the Baltimore Orioles - were linked to HGH in the same investigation, according to media reports.
Ankiel said he received the drugs from another Florida antiaging center in 2004, under a doctor's orders after elbow surgery. He initially said the drugs included HGH, but then backtracked. A former pitcher who missed most of the 2006 season for knee surgery, Ankiel came back this season as a home-run hitting outfielder.
Gibbons allegedly received shipments of HGH from 2003 to 2005, when he was recovering from injuries, according to a report in Sports Illustrated.
Neither Ankiel nor Gibbons has been accused of any crime. Ankiel denied any wrongdoing; and Gibbons, recovering from shoulder surgery, has not addressed the accusations.
Dr. Lawrence Frohman, a spokesman for the association of doctors who treat hormone imbalances, said HGH confers no advantage in healing. However, one preliminary study, sponsored by an HGH manufacturer, found it speeded healing of certain shin fractures.
Natural growth hormone is generated by the brain's pituitary gland at levels that taper off with age. In children, HGH spurs growth, while in adults it helps to maintain a balance of fat and muscle.
A synthetic form of HGH first became available in the late 1980s. Interest in the drug took off in 1990 after a small study published in the New England Journal of Medicine suggested it could reverse some signs of aging by reducing fat, increasing lean body mass, and thickening skin in men over 60.
Subsequent research showed less dramatic effects, if any.
A review of HGH studies in older people, published in January in the Annals of Internal Medicine, found an average increase of only 4 1/2 pounds in lean body mass and a similar small decrease in fat. It found no evidence of improvements in stamina, bone density, cholesterol or longevity, but it cataloged many problematic side effects.
"There is a very limited benefit. For less money, you could get a personal trainer - and lose the weight more quickly," said the study's lead author, Dr. Hau Liu, a clinical assistant professor at Stanford University Medical Center. "You shouldn't be using growth hormone for antiaging."
One study published after Liu's review did find an increase in thigh muscle and aerobic activity in a healthy older men in the United Kingdom treated with HGH and testosterone.
Studies in young weight lifters and resistance trainers found no improvement in muscle strength, although many athletes continue to believe there's a benefit.
Research presented in June at the Endocrine Society's annual meeting found a small improvement - less than 10 percent - in sprinting capacity in young men who took HGH combined with testosterone, but no benefit for women or in those who took HGH alone.
Neither HGH alone nor with testosterone conveyed an advantage in tests of strength or power, said Anne Nelson, who oversaw the Garvan Institute research. However, most of the men said they felt stronger, even if they received a placebo.
One additional measure of the ineffectiveness of growth hormone supplements in healthy people is the lack of pharmaceutical company interest.
Both Merck and Pfizer recently dropped efforts to develop drugs that stimulated growth hormone production in older people.
A Pfizer spokesman said tests showed its drug wasn't effective. Merck wouldn't comment on why it halted development.
Some sports medicine specialists caution that growth hormone may yet be found to boost function. They cite steroids, which were widely debunked as ineffective until science caught up with what body-builders had already discovered.
"Often the experimentation in the training room is ahead of the scientists," said Dr. Nicholas DiNubile, a spokesman for the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine. "But right now, for a healthy individual, there is no reason to use growth hormone."
Baseball to seek out Matthews
Angels outfielder expected to be summoned by the commissioner's office soon over his link to a shipment of human growth hormone.
By Bill Shaikin, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer September 13, 2007
Baseball officials want to meet with Gary Matthews Jr., seven months after the Angels center fielder was alleged to have been sent a shipment of human growth hormone.
Within the last week, as reports have linked Rick Ankiel, Troy Glaus and Jay Gibbons to orders for steroids and human growth hormone, baseball officials have requested meetings with each player. The reports all follow a national investigation into Internet drug trafficking, led by the Albany County (N.Y.) district attorney.
Matthews, the first major leaguer linked to that investigation, was expected to be summoned by the commissioner's office in the near future, a baseball source said Wednesday. Scott Leventhal, the agent for Matthews, said no meeting has been requested as of Wednesday and would not say how Matthews might respond.
"We'll address that at that time," Leventhal said.
Matthews declined to comment after the Angels' game at Baltimore on Wednesday.
On Feb. 28, SI.com reported that, in 2004, Matthews had been sent a shipment of genotropin, a brand of synthetic human growth hormone since alleged by the New York Daily News to have been sent to Ankiel in 2004. Baseball did not ban HGH until 2005, although its use was -- and is -- illegal without a prescription.
On March 14, Matthews issued a statement in which he denied using HGH and he has refused to address whether he ordered or received it.
In the interim, baseball officials quietly tried to arrange a meeting with Matthews. His lawyer, Harold McGuire, told them Matthews would not talk because he could be "the target of a criminal investigation," MLB spokesman Rich Levin said.
McGuire did not return a call. Leventhal said Matthews' statement reflected McGuire's subsequent conclusion that the player was not a target of any investigation.
Heather Orth, spokeswoman for the Albany County district attorney, said Wednesday the targets of that investigation are pharmacists and distributors.
"No athletes are the target," she said via e-mail. "We are unaware of any criminal investigation targeting Gary Matthews Jr."
Said MLB spokesman Pat Courtney: "If that is indeed the case, we will revisit bringing Mr. Matthews in."
Times staff writer Mike DiGiovanna contributed to this report.
Jay Gibbons missed 65 games because of injuries in 2004, when he allegedly bought testosterone and growth hormone. (Sun photo by Gene Sweeney Jr. / May 8, 2007)
No lab evidence showing substance helps strengthen athletes
By Childs Walker
Sun Reporter
September 11, 2007
Sports fans and commentators speak of human growth hormone as a magical substance that offers the same benefits as anabolic steroids but cannot be detected in urine tests.
So when a player is linked to hGH, as Orioles outfielder Jay Gibbons was by an SI.com report, many presume the player was desperate to bulk up and power baseballs into the stands.
The scientific community doesn't uniformly agree, however, that hGH would help an athlete do so. Several studies of senior patients have found that hGH helps build lean muscle mass but does not increase muscle strength. This conclusion might not transfer perfectly to high-level athletes in their physical primes. But there is no laboratory-based evidence that hGH would help strengthen these elite performers, several researchers said.
"What athletes are doing is probably unlike anything we see in a clinical setting, so we don't know what it does," said Dr. Mary Lee Vance, a professor of internal medicine at the University of Virginia who wrote a 2003 study of growth hormone. "But the point is that none of our studies of aging populations have demonstrated measurable benefits other than to body composition.
Vance said it's possible that hGH, used in conjunction with high-intensity workouts, builds strength. But unlike with anabolic steroids, those benefits are perceived, not proven. Steroid use increases muscle mass disproportionately to overall body size. Growth hormone increases overall thickness, from muscle to bone to hair.
"If you take steroids and work out, you will get bigger and stronger," said Will Carroll, who writes about sports medicine issues and studied performance-enhancing drugs for his 2005 book The Juice. "If you take hGH and work out, there's no real clear evidence that you'll get stronger than you would have if you had just worked out."
That also was the conclusion reached by a 2004 survey of research on the subject in the American Journal of Sports Medicine.
Some athletes, including St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Rick Ankiel and New England Patriots safety Rodney Harrison, have said they turned to growth hormone to recover from injuries.
"That's the only reason guys take it," said former Orioles first baseman David Segui, who has said he took hGH on advice from his doctor. "People think guys are living on it, and that's not true. People don't want to hear this, but you don't get bigger and stronger off it. You don't get that big steroid look, that bulky look."
Perception vs. reality
Vance questioned athletes' belief in the substance's healing power.
"I think the key word is perception," Vance said, "because there's no evidence at all that it helps anyone recover from injuries."
Dr. Bill Howard, founder of the sports medicine clinic at Union Memorial Hospital, isn't so sure. He noted research on animals suggesting that growth hormone can help heal micro-injuries to the muscles. Such effects could help an athlete attempting to rehabilitate an injury, he said.
"It's the trendy, untestable drug, so that perception is a big reason why guys are going to take it," he said. "But I don't think their belief in it is unfounded. I think it does help you continue with hard workouts when it might be harder to do so otherwise."
Howard said hGH probably isn't as effective a strength builder as anabolic steroids.
Dr. Gary Wadler, a professor at New York University and member of the committee that determines banned substances for the World Anti-Doping Agency, agreed. But he suspects many athletes use it in tandem with low doses of testosterone, which could strengthen muscles made larger by hGH. SI.com reported that Gibbons received testosterone, as well.
"I think that many dopers are using several substances in combination," Wadler said. "And the science suggests that can be effective."
The negative effects of hGH are better established, researchers agreed.
Heavy users might quickly experience carpal tunnel swelling in the hands, and long-term use can lead to heart disease, diabetes and debilitating joint swelling, Vance said.
Gibbons is the latest athlete alleged to have received prescription performance-enhancing drugs from Orlando, Fla.-based Signature Pharmacy. The names have trickled out since February, when New York investigators raided the pharmacy in connection with an Albany County district attorney's investigation of an Internet steroid ring.
Other athletes linked to the investigation by news sources include Ankiel, Harrison, Toronto Blue Jays third baseman Troy Glaus, former Orioles outfielder Gary Matthews Jr., former Orioles second baseman Jerry Hairston Jr. and at least 11 professional wrestlers.
Investigators allege that athletes and dozens of other clients obtained prescriptions from doctors, some of whom lacked up-to-date licenses, and then ordered performance-enhancing drugs online from pharmacies such as Signature.
As the steroid cloud began to loom over baseball, fans associated possible use with sluggers who had bulked up mid-career. But Gibbons, Ankiel and Glaus are linked more by long histories of injuries.
Gibbons missed 65 games because of injuries during the 2004 season, when he allegedly bought testosterone and growth hormone. Glaus missed large portions of the 2003 and 2004 seasons because of a shoulder injury. His alleged steroid purchases fell between September 2003 and May 2004, according to SI.com. Ankiel, responding to a report in the New York Daily News, said he received a medical prescription for hGH to help him recover from reconstructive elbow surgery in 2004.
"The connection I see between these guys is desperation," Carroll said. "Whether it's desperation to recover from an injury or desperation to earn a contract, the risk becomes worth it."
hGH and injuries
Users of hGH anecdotally report increased energy and ability to perform rehabilitation exercises in the wake of injury.
"It reduces inflammation and gets rid of the pain," Segui said. "But there's a misconception that it's about bulking up like what you see in the muscle magazines."
Some doctors believe hGH helps with recuperation.
"I'm not sure the research is in place," Wadler said, "but the general sense among people who deal with these issues is that it can be a reasonably effective recovery tool."
But not all agree. Vance said she prescribes hGH to patients with malfunctioning pituitary glands and to children whose bodies produce too little growth hormone naturally. Those, along with the treatment of frail AIDS patients, are the only legitimate uses for the substance, Vance said.
Researchers agree on the difficulty of detecting hGH. Growth hormone doesn't show up in the urine tests used by American professional sports leagues. Even in a blood test, synthetic hormone looks similar to the hormone produced naturally by the body. And none of the major sports unions has agreed to blood testing.
If enforcement officials dwell on hGH, however, they're missing the point, said Carroll, who said he believes athletes have moved on to a new generation of performance-enhancing drugs, such as insulin.
"It was the wonder drug a few years ago, and guys were flocking to it," he said of hGH. "But now it's almost beside the point. We don't learn what the state of the art is from the scientists. We learn from the users."
Sun reporter Roch Kubatko contributed to this article.
Report: Gibbons received shipments of steroids and human growth hormone
Posted: Sunday Sep 9, 2007 9:41 PM
NEW YORK (AP) -Baltimore Orioles outfielder Jay Gibbons received performance-enhancing steroids and human growth hormone after both substances were banned by baseball, SI.com reported Sunday.
Gibbons is the latest athlete to be linked to the Florida pharmacy under investigation for illegally distributing prescription medications.
Major League Baseball asked Friday to meet with St. Louis' Rick Ankiel and Toronto's Troy Glaus after two reports said they received performance-enhancing drugs from Signature Pharmacy several years ago.
Between October 2003 and July 2005, Gibbons got six shipments of Genotropin (a brand name for synthetic human growth hormone), two shipments of testosterone and two shipments of human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG), SI.com said, citing a source in Florida with knowledge of a Signature Pharmacy client list.
SI.com said its information dealt only with receipt of the drugs, not use.
Gibbons didn't immediately return a message left on his cell phone by The Associated Press. Messages left with his agent, Sam Levinson, also weren't immediately returned. Orioles spokesman Bill Stetka declined to comment.
Major League Baseball banned testosterone in 2003, the same year the sport began testing for steroids. HGH was barred in January 2005, but Gibbons allegedly received a shipment that July. HCG is not on the list of banned substances, SI.com reported.
Prescriptions that were written in Gibbons' name were sent to a Gilbert, Ariz., address that traces to the Baltimore outfielder, SI.com said.
The substances were obtained through South Beach Rejuvenation Center/Modern Therapy, a Miami Beach clinic, and sent through Signature, SI.com said.
The 30-year-old Gibbons underwent season-ending shoulder surgery last month to repair a torn labrum. The procedure ended his worst year in the majors - he batted .230 with only six homers and 28 RBIs in 84 games.
He broke into the majors in 2001 with the Orioles after being selected from the Toronto Blue Jays in the winter meeting draft. His best season was in 2003, when he batted .277 with 23 homers and 100 RBIs in 160 games.
But Gibbons has been plagued by injuries ever since. He played in 97 games in 2004, 139 in 2005 and last year he had two stints on the disabled list and played in only 90 games.
The Los Angeles Times reported last October that Gibbons was one of the players a federal agent said was implicated in drug use by former major league pitcher Jason Grimsley.
Bonds supposedly with a hat size of 7.5 (yet to be confirmed)
Barry Bonds, approximately current photo, with a hat size supposedly of 9.75 inches
NOTE FROM DR. PERLS: We are trying to obtain accurate/valid head sizes on all MLB players. The ones noted here on this website page have not yet been confirmed.
People were a bit confused when the story broke that Cowboys' assistant coach Wade Wilson was suspended five games for using HGH. Wilson stated that he was using the drugs to help with his diabetes ... when he actually was using them for something else: impotence.
"That was my way of trying to cover that subject without coming right out and saying that," Wilson said Thursday when asked if he suffered from impotence, a common complication of diabetes. "There's a quality of life that I don't really want to say a great deal about."
He technically wasn't lying. Studies have shown that male diabetics around the age of 50 can become impotent ... so using HGH to improve his "quality of life" with diabetes was true, from a certain point of view. Viagra or other common impotence medicines don't usually work on diabetics. {NOTE FROM DR. PERLS: There is no documented evidence to show that HGH can help either diabetes or erectile deficiency. In fact, diabetes is a known complication of HGH administration,and would therefore possibly markedly make his condition worse}
Wilson's name surfaced in an investigation by the Albany County, N.Y., district attorney into anti-aging clinics, pharmacies and doctors who signed prescriptions for patients they never examined. Wilson said he chose that alternative because he knew his regular doctors probably wouldn't approve the treatment.
If Wilson had obtained a properly prescribed medication for a legitimate medical reason, he would not have run afoul of NFL rules, league spokesman Greg Aiello said. Wilson will continue to be paid while suspended. Wilson said he earns a little over $300,000 a year from the Cowboys.
Anyways, this had to be an embarrassing admission from Wilson who now must deal with the fact that everyone knows about his problem as well as serving a suspension from the NFL.
FOOTBALL NOTES
HGH isn't put to the test
WADA official takes issue with NFL stance
By Mike Reiss | September 9, 2007
In a league that features big hits, big players, and a growing financial windfall for all involved, there is also one rather large loophole. It came to light in the wake of Patriots safety Rodney Harrison's four-game suspension.
When the NFL added human growth hormone to its list of banned substances in 1991, the league seemingly had good intentions - to protect the integrity of the game by ensuring that players couldn't gain an illegal advantage.
The issue, as Major League Baseball has also discovered, is in enforcement.
Because the NFL does not test for HGH, players are left to their own consciences. The temptation, especially for older players attempting to hang on, is great.
One player who requested anonymity explained the situation: "If you could rob a bank and take care of your family for the rest of your life - and knew you could get away with it - would you do it?"
The NFL has no shortage of hot-topic issues on its plate, but following the suspensions of Harrison and Cowboys assistant Wade Wilson, more attention is being focused on HGH.
So, what are people saying?
League officials boast that they are aggressively contributing toward research on a test for HGH. The NFL has funded a $500,000 grant to Don Catlin's newly formed Anti-Doping Research Institute in Los Angeles, and has funded other studies addressing testing and detection issues. The NFL's Youth Football Fund, in partnership with the NFL Players Association, also recently provided a $1 million grant for a high school education program on performance-enhancing drugs.
Commissioner Roger Goodell has stated repeatedly that the issue comes down to testing.
"There is no test for HGH. We are investing to develop a test," Goodell told ESPN. "There is no such thing in the world right now. In the meantime, we will educate our players and we will work with law enforcement."
Yet critics believe the NFL isn't necessarily being forthright.
"They have twisted and distorted the facts," said Dr. Gary I. Wadler, a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency's Prohibited List and Methods Committee.
"They have reiterated their assertion that there is no test. That is just not the case. There is a test and it will be on line at the end of this year. Others have stated they will allow blood testing when the test is fully implemented. We don't hear from them. Instead, we hear that there is no test."
While Goodell says players want HGH out of the game, they don't feel strongly enough about it to allow blood testing to detect it. Gene Upshaw, executive director of the NFL Players Association, has made reference to not wanting players to become pincushions.
Yet Wadler believes that is the only way the NFL can ensure that its players are not using HGH. While the league is funding research toward a urine test, Wadler is skeptical.
"The only way to catch HGH abusers by testing is to utilize the blood test," he said. "There are people who have spent as much as the last 10 years devoting their lives to HGH, and it is not in the cards in the foreseeable future. A urine test likely will never happen and there are a variety of reasons, one of which is that less than two-tenths of 1 percent of HGH ever shows up in urine. The vast majority remains in the blood and other body fluids."
Wadler said the final obstacle - the antibody necessary to perform the test - has almost been cleared. He added that all 34 world anti-doping agencies will be using the antibody to detect HGH abuse by the end of the year.
"So the assertion by the NFL and Major League Baseball that there is no blood test for HGH is without merit, and despite best efforts to inform them of the facts, they have steadfastly refused to accept the concept of blood testing for HGH," he said. "While awaiting adequate supplies of antibody, we suggested to the NFL that they freeze blood specimens and they have declined to do that as well."
So for now, the only way players can be caught is through stings and investigations. It ultimately comes down to players doing the right thing without the threat of a test.
"If there is no test, there is no disincentive," Wadler said. "If you don't test, it's an invitation to abuse."
First Shawne Merriman. Then Rodney Harrision and Wade Wilson.
Now this.
According to the Daily News, the NFL has suspended veteran official Ed Hochuli five games for using HGH, a sustance the league has banned but cannot test for.
"If you watched Ed's game this weekend, it was pretty obvious that he's even bigger this year than he was a year ago," Commisioner Roger Goodell said in a statement. "There's no way he could have naturally added that much muscle mass at his age."
Records obtained from a pharmacy located in Florida indicate several orders for HGH were placed by an individual identified as "Ad Hoc." The mailing address on those shipments belongs to Hochuli's law firm in Phoenix.
Hochuli, 55, was not immediately available for comment. However, a spokesman for league officials said that Hochuli has been warned repeatedly that his biceps look bigger than T.O.'s in high definition.
Players representative Gene Upshaw added, "I've been receiving complaints from players for years. When a referee makes them feel inadequate by flexing in front of a national audience, the players have no choice but to use performance enhancing drugs to level the playing field."
Glaus tight-lipped about steroid investigation [he got his drugs through an anti-aging clinic, the New Hope Medical Center, in California] Jeremy Sandler, CanWest News Service
Published: Saturday, September 08, 2007
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — Looking near tears and in a voice fraught with emotion, Troy Glaus on Saturday commented for the first time concerning his name being connected to multiple shipments of steroids by an Orlando-based pharmacy that is the subject of a criminal investigation.
Unlike St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Rick Ankiel, who after being linked to shipments of human growth hormone in a New York Daily News story immediately announced he had received all his treatment under a doctor’s care, Glaus offered what amounted to an extended ‘no comment.’
“I respect the fact that you guys have a job to do and I respect that you certainly have some questions,” said Glaus, at Tropicana Field. “I am not going to comment on the story and I hope you respect that at this time.”
The 31-year-old did not specify if he would address the subject in more detail at a later date.
Sources within the Blue Jays organization say Glaus is very shaken up by the affair.
SI.com revealed that between September of 2003 and May of 2004, he received multiple shipments of nandrolone and testosterone at a California address.
“I’m not going to comment on the story,” he reiterated. “At this point, I’m just trying to get ready for a game and help our team get into the playoff run. That’s it.”
Blue Jays manager John Gibbons admitted to being shocked by the news of Glaus’ being connected to steroids.
“It surprised me, it really did,” said Gibbons.
The manager would not speculate what the impact of the news would have on Glaus and the team.
“Who knows how it’s going to affect him?” asked Gibbons. “Hopefully it doesn’t.”
Gibbons also did not seem to think it inevitable that such a story would one day involve his clubhouse.
“I can’t say it’s happened a lot in baseball, but it’s not uncommon now,” said Gibbons. “Who was it, Gary Matthews Jr. earlier in the year? That died down quick.”
How quickly the Glaus story goes away remains a question.
Already baseball’s commissioner’s office has requested to speak with both Glaus and Ankiel to “look into” the allegations, according to Rob Manfred, baseball’s executive vice president for labour relations.
According to the SI.com report, prescriptions written in Glaus’ name were obtained through a California-based anti-aging clinic called The New Hope Health Center.
The SI.com article named a Dr. Ramon Scruggs as the prescribing physician who the article said was on probation with the Medical Board of California as of March, 2007. The magazine story said Scruggs is also prohibited from prescribing drugs over the Internet.
Scruggs’ name also surfaces on the web site elitefitness.com as the reviewer of a book called “Chemical Muscle Enhancement” by Author L. Rea.
"Author L. Rea has done the community of forward thinking physicians and health consumers a great service in publishing this; his latest tome dedicated to the arcane science of "Building the Perfect Beast,’” reads the review credited to a Dr. Ramon Scruggs identified as “noted hormone replacement physician and director of The New Hope Medical Center.”
“Not only is the information accurate, but Rea’s insights into steroid use, nutrition, training cycles and supplements are not simple pearls of wisdom. This man is brilliant.
"The light of that brilliance explodes cherished body building myths and provides many totally unique perspectives on the art of getting big without putting one’s life in danger,” the review goes on to say. “This is a must have addition to the library of the serious athlete or anyone who wants to live long and strong."
Cardinals' Rick Ankiel says everything he took in 2004 was prescribed by licensed physician
Posted: Friday Sep 7, 2007 9:44 PM
PHOENIX (AP) -Rick Ankiel says any drugs he received in 2004 were prescribed by a licensed physician to help him recover from reconstructive elbow surgery. {NOTE BY DR. PERLS: THERE IS NO REPORTED CLINICAL EVIDENCE THAT HGH HELPS WITH INJURY RECOVERY OR POST-OPERATIVE CARE. FURTHERMORE, IT WOULD BE ILLEGAL FOR A LICENSED PHYSICIAN TO PRESCRIBE HGH FOR SUCH AN INDICATION. FINALLY, SIGNATURE PHARMACY IS BEING INVESTIGATED FOR PROVIDING GH TO PEOPLE WITHOUT SUBSEQUENT PHYSICIAN SUPERVISION}
Ankiel, whose comeback is one of the great stories of this season, initially acknowledged human growth hormone was among those medications during a brief session with reporters Friday, then refused to list his various prescriptions.
"I'm not going to go into the list of what my doctors have prescribed for me,'' the St. Louis Cardinals outfielder said when asked specifically whether he had taken HGH as part of his recovery. "I've been through a lot emotionally and physically. There are doctor and patient privileges, and I hope you guys respect those privileges.''
The New York Daily News reported in Friday's editions that Ankiel received eight shipments of HGH from January to December 2004 from Signature Pharmacy, under investigation for illegally distributing prescription medications. The performance-enhancing drug was banned by Major League Baseball in 2005, but the league still does not test for it.
Friday afternoon, Ankiel sat beside Cardinals general manager Walt Jocketty in the visitors' dugout at Chase Field to answer questions about the newspaper's findings before the series opener against the Arizona Diamondbacks.
"I respect the integrity of the game,'' Ankiel said, "and I'm on the same playing level that everybody else is on.''
After talking to Ankiel, Jocketty said he was satisfied that nothing improper had occurred.
"Everything was legal,'' he said. "There was no violation of major league rules. There was no violation of any laws. At this point, if there's anything more to decide, major league baseball will look at it and let us know.''
Citing records the newspaper obtained, the Daily News said Ankiel got HGH shipments that included Saizen and Genotropin, two injectable drugs. Florida physician Dr. William Gogan signed Ankiel's prescriptions, providing them through a Palm Beach Gardens clinic called The Health and Rejuvenation Center (THARC), the newspaper reported.
The drugs were shipped to Ankiel at the clinic's address, the paper said.
Ankiel said he was aware of the clinic but not Signature Pharmacy.
"I don't know anything about the pharmacy,'' Ankiel said, "and I don't know anyone there. I've never purchased or ordered anything from that pharmacy.''
MLB officials already have said they would like to talk with Ankiel, and he said he would cooperate with any investigation.
"I'll be happy to help and conduct anything that Major League Baseball wants to talk about it,'' Ankiel said.
The outfielder has been the talk of the league after hitting nine home runs and 29 RBIs since being called up from the minors Aug. 9. He returned to the majors in style, just two seasons after his promising pitching career was in ruins after he inexplicably lost all control on the mound.
"I'm just disappointed,'' said Ankiel, who homered twice and drove in seven runs in the Cardinals' 16-4 home victory over Pittsburgh on Thursday. "I just don't want it to become a bigger distraction that it already has become. We're in the middle of a pennant race. I just want to be able to go out there and compete at the highest level I can.''
Washington Post Staff Writer Sunday, September 2, 2007; Page D11
After the league announced its second suspension in two days for use of a performance-enhancing substance, NFL Players Association chief Gene Upshaw said that he and other leaders were hopeful there would be no further fallout from an investigation by the Albany, N.Y., district attorney's office into a drug distribution ring.
"You don't know for sure, but I'm hoping this is the end of it," Upshaw said yesterday, adding that he hadn't been made aware of any other NFL players or coaches being investigated because of the probe.
Wade Wilson, a former NFL quarterback who is now the Dallas Cowboys' quarterbacks coach, was suspended for the first five games of the season and fined $100,000 for purchasing and using performance-enhancing substances, reportedly including human growth hormone, while he was the quarterbacks coach of the Chicago Bears between 2004 and 2006. Wilson said in a written statement that he did not distribute performance-enhancing substances to others.
Wilson said his actions "were the result of trying to improve the quality of my life based upon my 20-plus years of living with diabetes," and he had "very limited exposure to a substance" that he discarded after finding that it failed to improve his quality of life. Owner Jerry Jones said in a written statement that he supported NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell's decision regarding Wilson but would welcome back Wilson after the suspension ends.
Wilson's suspension came a day after Goodell suspended New England Patriots safety Rodney Harrison for the first four games of the season for using a banned substance, said by sources familiar with the case to be human growth hormone. Harrison said in a conference call with reporters Friday night that he'd acknowledged to Goodell using a banned substance.
Upshaw and other league officials said the league became aware of the involvement of Wilson and Harrison with performance-enhancing drugs through the Albany district attorney's office's investigation of a drug distribution ring in which professional athletes from several sports are alleged to have been involved. State and federal law enforcement officials from New York and Florida raided two Florida pharmacies in February as part of the nationwide investigation.
A league source said that NFL officials were given specific information on which they could act in the Harrison and Wilson cases within the past 10 days. Upshaw said he was told the names of those in the league involved within the past week or so.
"We're not closing our eyes to any of this," Upshaw said in a telephone interview. "You hope this is the end of it. There's no test for HGH. If and when there is a test, we'll add that."
Growth hormone is on the NFL's list of banned substances but players are not tested for it. There is no urine test that league officials consider reliable, and the union opposes blood-testing. The league and union are funding research aimed at developing a urine test for HGH the two parties deem reliable.
"When we talk to the experts, there's no proof that HGH works effectively alone as a performance enhancer," Upshaw said.
Former Bears coach faces 5-game suspension, $100,000 for HGH
Tribune staff report
2:04 PM CDT, September 1, 2007
Former Bears assistant coach Wade Wilson is facing a five-game suspension and a $100,000 fine for his admitted dealings with an Internet drug operation that distributed anabolic steroids and human growth hormone and other substances banned under the NFL's drug policy.
Wilson, now a Dallas Cowboys assistant, was the Bears' quarterbacks coach from 2004-06. According to NFL sources, the league was expected to announce the suspension on Saturday, after the New York Daily News reported that Wilson and New England Patriots safety Rodney Harrison admitted obtaining the banned performance-enhancing supplements.
"This situation is the result of an uninformed decision that I made, and I accept responsibility for my mistake," Wilson said in a statement issued Saturday. "My actions were the result of trying to improve the quality of my life, based upon my 20-plus years of living with diabetes. I did, however, make an error."
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said he supported the commissioner's decision.
Harrison, a Western Illinois University product from Chicago Heights, said he has been suspended for four games. He admitted obtaining and using human growth hormone, not to gain a competitive edge, he said, but to speed his recovery from the numerous injuries he has sustained over a 13-year career as one of the most aggressive and hardest-hitting safeties in football.
Harrison apologized to fans, especially those in "high school and college."
"I want to make it clear that not once did I ever use steroids," Harrison said. "I did admit to the commissioner that I did use a banned substance. My purpose was never to gain a competitive edge. Rather, my use was solely for the purpose of accelerating the healing process from injuries I sustained."
Wilson, a quarterback with several teams who last played in 1998, admitted receiving human growth hormone and anabolic steroids while a coach with the Bears, according to the Daily News report. Though his statement indicated he obtained the substances for health reasons, league officials were interested in knowing whether he used the drugs himself or he supplied them to players.
The Bears had not be reached for comment, though coach Lovie Smith was expected to address the matter in a conference call with reporters Saturday afternoon. Smith hired Wilson to tutor Bears quarterbacks before the 2004 season, his first as Bears head coach.
Although the NFL does not test for human growth hormone, a player can be suspended under the NFL doping policy if he admits or it can be proved that he took or possessed anything on the banned substances list.
Harrison and Wilson are the first of what is expected to be many connected to the NFL to be named in the investigation. NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said the suspensions stemmed from the investigation by the Albany, N.Y., district attorney's office. Prosecutors alerted NFL officials about Harrison and Wilson, saying both had received drugs from Signature Pharmacy in Orlando. Aiello said a third NFL person involved in the investigation was Dr. Richard Ryzde, fomerly a team doctor for the Pittsburgh Steelers. He had earlier been fired by the team.
Under the scam, in which nine have pleaded guilty, doctors, hired by "anti-aging" clinics, signed prescriptions for patients they never saw, and those prescriptions were filled at Signature and other pharmacies. Albany and Florida law enforcement agents raided the pharmacy and several clinics in February.
Tribune news services contributed to this report.
Fourteen wrestlers tied to pipeline
'Crush,' 'Edge' among those who received 'roids, HGH
Posted: Thursday August 30, 2007 7:47PM; Updated: Thursday August 30, 2007 7:55PM
Since last summer, Sports Illustrated reporters Luis Fernando Llosa and L. Jon Wertheim have been investigating an illegal steroid distribution network that has implicated pro athletes. On Feb. 27, the reporters accompanied federal and state drug enforcement agents on a coordinated raid of an Orlando compound pharmacy and a Jupiter, Fla., "anti-aging" clinic that investigators allege conspired to fraudulently prescribe steroids, human growth hormone and other performance enhancing drugs over the Internet.
With its rare confluence of hot button topics -- sports, kids, death, and drugs -- the double-murder, suicide case involving pro wrestler Chris Benoit and his family made for a cause celebre last summer. When the news cycle passed and the media turned its attention to a corrupt NBA referee and an NFL quarterback financing a dogfighting ring, investigators continued to explore the pipeline that enabled professional athletes to obtain steroids and human growth hormone through a chain of compound pharmacies, "anti-aging" clinics and venal doctors who often rubber-stamped prescriptions, sometimes without treating their "patients."
As the WWE is embattled by charges that its wrestlers die early and unexpectedly with alarming frequency, it must now counter evidence that the culture is awash in illicit drug use. That cause wasn't helped on Thursday, when, based on information provided to the WWE by the Albany District Attorney's office, the organization suspended 10 wrestlers for violating the company's drug policy.
While the WWE declined to release the names of the suspended athletes, SI has learned that a dozen professional wrestlers have received steroids and/or human growth hormone through the drug network. The WWE would not confirm which, if any, of the following wrestlers are among those suspended:
• Benoit, who died June 24, 2007, received nandrolone and anastrozole in February 2006. (Anastrozole is used by athletes to counter side effects of steroid use, such as water retention and breast enlargement.)
• Two weeks prior to Eddie Guerrero's death on Nov. 13, 2005, hewas sent nandrolone, testosterone, and anastrozole. Guerrero died in a Minneapolis hotel room due to what a coroner later ruled as heart disease, complicated by an enlarged heart resulting from a history of anabolic steroid use.
• Chavo Guerrero, who found his uncle Eddie dead in the Minneapolis hotel room, received, among other drugs, somatropin (HGH), nandrolone and anastrozole between April 2005 and May 2006.
• Between November 2003 and February 2007, Shane Helms, a/k/a The Hurricane, received, among other drugs, testosterone, genotropin (HGH) and nandrolone. (As previously reported by SI, he allegedly received HGH from an Arizona doctor in 2005.)
• Starting in September 2004 through February 2007, Randy Orton received somatropin, nandrolone, stanozolol.
• John Hennigan, a/k/a Johnny Nitro, a.k.a. Johnny Morrison, is the current WWE Extreme Championship Wrestling's heavyweight champion. Between June 2006 and February 2007 he was prescribed somatropin, anastrozole, testosterone, stanozolol and chorionic gonadotropin, a hormone produced naturally during pregnancy. (HCG is taken by anabolic steroid users to stimulate the production of testosterone, which is suppressed as a result of steroid use.)
• Ken Anderson, a/k/a Mr. Kennedy, lost to Eddie Guerrero in Guerrero's final match on Nov. 11, 2005. Kennedy received shipments of anastrozole, somatropin and testosterone between October 2006 and February 2007.
• Shoichi Funaki received somatropin in March 2006.
• Brian Adams, a/k/a Crush, who retired from the pro circuit in 2001, was found dead of unknown causes on Aug. 13. He received nandrolone, testosterone and Somatropin or HGH in December 2006.
• Charles Haas was prescribed anastrozole, somatropin, stanozolol, nandrolone and chorionic gonadotropin between August 2006 and January 2007.
• Edward Fatu received somatropin between July and December 2006.
• Between November 2004 and November 2006, Darren Matthews received stanozolol, somatropin, genotropin, and anastrozole.
• Adam Copeland, a/k/a Edge, received somatropin, genotropin (both HGH), and stanozolol between September 2004 and February 2007.
• Sylvain Grenier received somatropin, nandrolone, genotropin and stanozolol, starting in February 2005 through July 2006.
Through WWE spokesman Gary Davis, the applicable WWE wrestlers listed above declined comment.
In the wake of Eddie Guerrero's steroid-related death, the WWE instituted a "Talent Wellness Program" in February 2006. The policy "prohibits the use of performance-enhancing drugs, as well as other prescription drugs which can be abused, if taken for other than a legitimate medical purpose pursuant to a valid prescription from a licensed and treating physician. For purposes of WWE's policy, prescriptions obtained over the Internet and/or from suppliers of prescription drugs from the Internet are not considered to have been given for a legitimate medical purpose."
Under the Talent Wellness Program, an initial positive test triggers to a 30-day suspension and a second positive leads to a 60-day suspension. A third positive yields a termination.
After Benoit's death, Representative Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) contacted the WWE requesting more information on the Talent Wellness Program. In addition to the rash of recent wrestler deaths, Congress has expressed concerned that the WWE counts more than more 500,000 kids among its weekly viewership.
Text: Does HGH Really Enhance The Body?
Last Edited: Saturday, 08 Sep 2007, 9:52 PM CDT
Created: Saturday, 08 Sep 2007, 9:52 PM CDT
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By Betsey Bruce
(KTVI - myFOXstl.com) --
If Cardinal sensation Rick Ankiel took human growth hormone three years ago, did it do him any good?That question is behind the latest twist in the story that has swept the sports world.
A medical expert from St. LouisUniversity says there is no scientific proof that HGH (human growth hormone) produces enhanced athletic performance or even stronger muscles.Dr. George Griffing, an endocrinologist, speaking on The Jaco Report Saturday on Fox 2, said extra doses of the hormone can help children who are small in stature grow to a normal height and adults with growth hormone deficiency.Griffing said, “there have been off label uses and abuses to enhance performance and anti-aging, but there is no data, in fact there are a lot of data against any of those benefits."If Ankiel bought the hormone, Dr. Griffing believes he wasted his money.
Week-end athletes enjoying the batting cages at Tower Tee complex in Shrewsbury Saturday were unaware of the medical data Dr. Griffing cited.Some expressed disappointment that Ankiel would use a substance like the growth hormone.Others said they believed a majority of professional athletes take HGH so they still had great admiration for Ankiel.One young man said he considered human growth hormone identical to steroids.
Speaking to the media Friday night, the Cardinal outfielder refused to identify any of the medicines doctors have prescribed for him.But he said, “I respect the integrity of the game and I'm on the same playing level everybody else is on."A New York Daily News report linked Ankiel to shipments in 2004 of human growth hormone from a Florida pharmacy that is under investigation for illegal sales of prescription drugs on the internet.Ankiel has promised to cooperate with Major League Baseball as it investigates this.Ankiel has not been charged with any wrong doing. The league banned HGH in 2005.
This story is from our news.com.au network Source: AAP
Growth hormone no aid for prowess
June 04, 2007
An illicit hormone infamous for bulking muscles in elite athletes does nothing to boost sports performance after all, new Australian research suggests.
Human growth hormone must be taken alongside testosterone if it is to have any impact on muscle mass, strength or speed, according to surprising new findings released by the Garvan Institute in Sydney.
Scientists said their study, partly funded by the World Anti-Doping Agency, helps develop new drug tests and brings the international sporting community closer to stamping out cheats.
The world-first project evaluated the effects of genetically-modified growth hormone used either alone or with testosterone, a combination Sylvester Stallone recently admitted taking for an undisclosed medical condition.
Both drugs are illegal for sports purposes but are widely abused by both recreational and professional athletes, most famously Chinese swimmers at the 1998 World Swimming Championships.
"We were surprised to find that human growth hormone has no effect on muscle mass or sports performance," said lead investigator Professor Ken Ho, who will release his results at a world endocrinology meeting in Canada today.
It did boost overall body mass, due largely to fluid retention, but did not affect muscle mass or overall sports performance.
"If it had a dramatic affect, we would have found it," Prof Ho said.
They did find, however, that the hormone does have an effect when taken with testosterone, boosting muscle mass and one particular aspect of performance - sprint power.
But this finding in itself has allowed scientists to develop new doping tests to more easily catch cheats who use both drugs.
"The combined drug regime enhances the sensitivity of our tests and means we can detect sports dopers for weeks after they stop taking the banned substances," Prof Ho said.
"This has major implications for random drug testing."
Researchers recruited 100 young recreational athletes, randomly assigning the men high doses of growth hormone, testosterone, both or a placebo. Women got either growth hormone or the dummy substance.
Effectiveness was judged on key aspects of sports performance like strength, power, and endurance.
Many participants assigned the placebo wrongly believed they were on growth hormone and vice-versa. This proved, said the researchers, that the benefits of the drug were not real but imagined.
Student Emma Norval was convinced the hormone was behind her improvements as an endurance runner before discovering she was on the dummy drug.
"It really makes you think about all the other supplements like protein powders and whether they really do have an effect on you," said Ms Norval, a psychology student.
Experts hope the paper, presented to the Endocrine Society in Toronto, will deter the newly-emerging generation of athletes from taking hormones.
People injecting their own kids with illegally distributed HGH. What more needs to happen for the pharmaceutical companies and the government to clamp down on the HGH madness?
Tiny son got illegal boosts?
Wrestler was juicing boy with growth-hormone drug - official
BY ANGELA MOSCONI in Fayetteville, Ga. and T.J. QUINN and ADAM NICHOLS in New York DAILY NEWS WRITERS
Wednesday, June 27th 2007, 4:58 PM Pro wrestler Chris Benoit apparently was pumping human-growth hormone into his 7-year-old son in the weeks before he killed his wife, the boy and himself at their suburban Atlanta home while consumed by "roid rage," a prosecutor said yesterday.
Fayette County, Ga., District Attorney Scott Ballard said Daniel Benoit had needle marks on his arm. Ballard said he believed the boy had been given growth hormone because his parents considered the boy undersized.
"The boy was very small, even dwarfed," Ballard said.
The disturbing developments came as law enforcement officials were investigating whether Benoit suffered from "roid rage" when he strangled his wife and suffocated their son before hanging himself on a weight-machine pulley over the weekend.
Law enforcement sources told the Daily News that Benoit was a client of two businesses at the heart of a massive national steroid and HGH trafficking scam being probed by New York State prosecutors and narcotics agents.
The sources said a Florida company called MedXLife wrote prescriptions for Benoit that were filled at Signature Pharmacy in Orlando and shipped to his home in the Atlanta suburbs. The sources could not confirm what substances Benoit had received.
The musclebound Benoit - a former heavyweight champion known as "The Canadian Crippler" - killed his wife, Nancy, on Friday and smothered their sleeping son, Daniel, late Saturday or early Sunday, leaving Bibles by their bodies, authorities said.
Investigators who forced their way into Benoit's home after the weekend killing spree found anabolic steroids. Authorities said they want to know whether Benoit was unhinged by the drugs - which can cause paranoia, depression and explosive outbursts known as "roid rage."
World Wrestling Entertainment officials alerted cops after Benoit, 40, texted "curious" messages to pals over the weekend.
Sources told The News he was sending the wrestlers biblical passages and sections of his will.
The WWE posted text messages that Benoit allegedly sent on its Web site. One, sent four times, gave his address, and the other, sent once, said where to find his dogs.
Police said Benoit's 43-year-old wife was killed Friday in an upstairs family room, her feet and wrists were bound and there was blood under her head, indicating a possible struggle. Daniel was found dead in his bed.
Benoit's 220-pound body was discovered in the basement. The Montreal-born athlete committed suicide as much as a day after killing his son, cops said.
While police found anabolic steroids and "a lot of prescription medication," there was no suicide note and cops had no motive. Cops said blood tests were being conducted to determine whether Benoit had been using steroids or other drugs.
WWE warned against jumping to conclusions before toxicology reports were complete, which could take weeks.
Benoit had canceled scheduled appearances Saturday and Sunday. The absences were blamed on a "family emergency."
Prosecutors confirmed that Benoit's wife, a wrestling manager known as "Woman," had filed for divorce in 2003 and asked for a restraining order. In court papers, Nancy Benoit said she was "in reasonable fear for [her] own safety and that of the minor child."
But she asked for the case to be dismissed three months after filing.
Florence Griffith-Joyner: Died at 38 surrounded by controversy (Gettyimages.com)
The fact that Human Growth Hormone does not work poses new dilemmas for cheats and dope testers alike.
Human Growth Hormone (GH) does not work! Shock, horror the myth has been exposed. The gym junkies and the dopers have been seduced by all the hype and the odd celebrity (Rocky), not to mention being ripped off big time. Were they ever getting what they paid for, anyway?
The scam of the last 20 years has fooled almost everyone. For those who thought it would help build muscle, strength and power, many of them got nothing more than diabetes, dicky hearts and suspicious bone growth, especially around the jaw and skull. For Flo Jo (Florence Griffith-Joyner), any side effects seemed incidental and she died at the ripe old age of 38 surrounded by GH and steroid doping controversy.
In what shapes as a landmark study, researchers from the Garvan Institute in Sydney have concluded that GH does not build muscle or improve performance - confirming many previous studies (and probably what the cheats already knew). Rather, it helps to maintain water, giving muscles a smooth buffed appearance and the illusion that there is more muscle.
This ‘perception’ that muscles are bigger has had a physical and psychological reinforcing effect while black marketing and ‘wellness’ clinics have commercially reinforced the myth. What also has not helped is the fact that many millions of dollars have been consumed trying to come up with a GH doping test, further confirmation in the minds of cheats that GH must work - otherwise, why would there be a test? The vicious cycle of GH abuse appears to have had many willing and unwilling proponents.
The same researchers, however, found that when GH is used in combination with steroids, it does build muscle mass and sprint power - that is, GH works by proxy. But how much is due to steroids and how much is due to GH is not immediately apparent from reports. Presumably the group just taking steroids had less improvement than the group taking both. Further confounding the influence of GH is that some subjects in the study who were given placebo also improved their performance, perhaps suggesting that the ‘mind’ is as capable of improving performance as the ‘body’ is. This does say much for all the other supplements out there as well.
The GH industry, which had rudimentary beginnings involving the extraction of GH from corpses, was transformed in the 1980s when GH was first synthesised. In this day and age of excess, there is little justification for prescribing GH apart from the few legitimate GH deficient cases. Growth deficient children of the third world certainly do not need GH, they just need food. But this limited need has not stopped the proliferation in the manufacturing of GH.
Excess and/or counterfeit GH has been targeting other markets like doping and was quantified in a report to the WADA in March this year by Sandro Donati. He estimated that the global sales of GH exceeded some $2 billion of which about $600 million (or 30%) was consumed for doping purposes. Donati suggested that world counterfeiting of GH to meet the needs of around a million users was worth about $1 billion. So between $1 and $2 billion dollars has been ‘pi****d up against the wall’ each year, although in reality many users have probably been using steroids as well, again reinforcing the myth that GH works.
While the latest research corroborates with past studies, that on its own GH does not build muscle or improve performance, it justifies the existence of a GH test after all because of the synergistic effect of GH when used in tandem with steroids. But this raises an interesting dilemma. If GH on its own does not improve performance, then is there a case perhaps that it should be removed from the banned list? Or does it mean that a positive GH test must be accompanied by a positive steroid test to be prosecuted successfully because it works when only both substances are used?
Now, with a test for human GH available, it's predictable that cheats will be scamming to get their hands on the animal versions of GH to avoid detection (watch this market explode now). The problem with using animal versions of GH, though, is that apart from presumably not working (because you are stacking a human and animal hormone rather than human/human) the body may recognise it as ‘foreign’ and run the real risk that the body could not only destroy the animal GH but eventually turn on its very own GH and destroy it as well.
Whether the test could detect animal versions of GH is unknown, so it’s seems dilemmas confront both abusers and testers.
While a test is welcomed and will discourage GH abuse, it will embolden those with inherent risky behaviour to seek ever-more dangerous ways to get the same effect. Animal derived GH may be used to circumvent a human GH test but undoubtedly it will also produce some nasty and unforeseen side-effects.
Robin Parisotto is the author of Blood Sports – the inside dope on drugs in sport
Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit during a match in 1995. Though the wrestlers played rivals, they were fast friends outside the ring, reading Scripture together in hotel rooms when they were on the road. After Guerrero died, Benoit sobbed on camera: "I just want to tell you I love you and [will] never forget you, and we'll see each other again." (By George Napolitano -- Wireimage)
Death Grip Pro Wrestlers' Grim Cycle: Pain, Drugs And Doom
By Paul Farhi Washington Post Staff Writer Thursday, August 16, 2007; C01
Eddie Guerrero and Chris Benoit, best friends through thin times and thickening bodies, strutted in shared triumph around the ring in Madison Square Garden. Guerrero had just successfully defended his World Wrestling Entertainment title; Benoit had defeated two opponents to wear the belt as world heavyweight champion.
The wrestling was scripted, but the mutual sense of achievement on March 14, 2004, was real. After all the travel on back roads, the spiritual and pharmacological comfort, the dreams and near-death, the two pals had reached the professional pinnacle together.
Both were relatively small men in a business of behemoths, and both had built stupendous physiques by pumping their muscles with steroids and human growth hormones. After years of wandering through wrestling's grimy lower levels, the men -- now in their mid-30s -- had grown into well-paid star attractions in WWE, the richest and most glamorous wrestling enterprise.
Side by side at the Garden, their boyhood dreams finally realized, the easygoing, Mexican-born Guerrero and the intense, Canadian-born Benoit stood on the mountaintop, seemingly in peak physical form.
Within a little more than three years, both would be dead.
Benoit and Guerrero lived in a culture that breeds addicts, that encourages comic-book-hero bodies -- and that in recent years has seen dozens of its members die at conspicuously young ages, at a startling rate.
Dave Meltzer, founder and editor of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, recently compiled a list of current and former wrestlers who have died since 1997, before turning 50. He said his list ran to about 60 names -- and that was before former wrestler Brian "Crush" Adams died Monday of indeterminate causes.
About half those wrestlers died of various causes, he said, including car accidents, suicides and drug overdoses; the rest of the deaths, he said, are linked to heart ailments, including the type that killed Guerrero: arteriosclerotic heart disease, a narrowing of the blood vessels that can lead to a heart attack.
To put that mortality rate into context, Meltzer compares pro wrestling -- which has had roughly 1,500 male competitors in the past quarter-century, he estimates -- with pro football. If the same ratio of NFL players in the same time frame died before reaching age 50, more than 430 current or former players would have died prematurely, he said.
"And someone would be asking some serious questions," Meltzer said. "Something would be done."
Soul-Searching Trips
When Guerrero, 38, died alone of heart-related complications in a Minneapolis hotel room on Nov. 13, 2005, the man who found his body was his nephew and also a wrestler, Chavo Guerrero Jr. Overcome, Chavo Guerrero immediately called the one man he thought could understand the shock and grief: Chris Benoit.
Benoit's own demise would come 19 months later. Over the course of three days in late June, police say, the 40-year-old Benoit (pronounced ben-WAH) drugged and killed his 7-year-old son, Daniel, then strangled his wife, Nancy, 43, in the family's home outside Atlanta. Although Guerrero and Benoit died under different circumstances, their lives had several parallels.
The two men had a long friendship, traveling together in a circuit that weaved through Mexico, Japan, Europe and the United States. As wrestlers, both lived in near-constant pain, coping with the bruising, often lonely lifestyle with such drugs as sedatives and narcotic painkillers.
For Guerrero, an admitted alcoholic and drug abuser, prayer became a tool to help tame his torments. He encouraged Benoit to try Christianity, and in the later years of their friendship, they sometimes read Scripture together -- in locker rooms and hotel rooms, on soul-searching road trips.
Over more than 10 years of friendship, Guerrero and Benoit lived a professional existence ringed with sudden death. Eight wrestlers or former wrestlers who had been close associates of Benoit and Guerrero died during this decade -- five from the kind of heart-related ailment that felled Guerrero. The oldest of these men was 51; the youngest was 27.
People looking for clues into Benoit's alleged homicide and suicide have wondered whether despair over his friends' deaths led him to a sense of fatalism. What role did drugs and the long-term effects of his violent line of work play in Benoit's tragic end?
Benoit "took Eddie's death the hardest," said Carlos Ashenoff, a longtime friend of Guerrero, who wrestled with him and Benoit under the ring name Konnan over some 15 years. "And then another close friend dies. And the friend of a friend. Everyone around him dies. And no one seemed to give a damn."
Said Ashenoff: "It's just one tragedy after another."
On July 27, prompted by the Benoit tragedy, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee asked WWE to provide information about steroids and drug abuse in pro wrestling. The committee's chairman, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), said he wants the company to respond by Aug. 24.
After Guerrero's death, WWE vowed to clean house. After Benoit's death, many question how much was actually done.
No Clear Answers
Why do so many wrestlers die young?
There has never been a definitive medical study of the issue, but there are expert guesses. Drug abuse might play a role, some insiders say, as well as the long-term effect of repeated collisions such as concussive blows to the head. The number of heart-related deaths, coming after a long period of heavy steroid use among wrestlers, also has been cited as suspicious.
Others within wrestling think the lifestyle is probably a contributing factor. Even in the major league WWE, life outside the ring can be tougher than life within it.
A publicly traded corporation with more than $400 million in revenues in its most recent fiscal year, ending in April, WWE pays its main-event performers handsomely; retired stars such as Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Steve Williams, better known as Stone Cold Steve Austin, became millionaires.
But lesser lights don't fare quite so well. The WWE's rank and file -- there are about 200 wrestlers under contract, according to the company -- make about $100,000 annually at the low end (Benoit and Guerrero were making about $500,000 before their deaths, according to WWE sources).
That's far more than wrestlers can hope to earn in regional, independent promotions across the country or by wrestling abroad. But WWE's wrestlers are considered independent contractors with limited rights. WWE, for example, doesn't offer paid vacations, pension benefits or 401(k) plans.
There's also no off-season. Wrestlers perform in arenas across America, Asia and Europe as many as 150 times a year.
"The number one change that has to happen, and I've been saying it for years, is mandatory time off on a regular basis," said Wade Keller, the founder and editor of PWTorch.com, a wrestling newsletter. "Working 50 weeks a year is unsustainable. If they had a few months off a year, their bodies would have time to recover and they could have real relationships with their [families]. It's one thing to wreck your body and abuse pills when you're 22. It's a lot harder when you're 40."
There's another job obligation as well: the pressure to maintain a chiseled superhero physique.
Wrestling hasn't always been the province of such muscled men. "Gorgeous George" Wagner, the 1950s TV wrestling star, was 5-foot-9 and a rather lumpy 210 pounds in his heyday. Top performers of the 1960s and 1970s, such as Freddie Blassie and Bruno Sammartino, look flabby compared with today's performers.
The body image of pro wrestlers began to change in the mid-'80s when Hulk Hogan became wrestling's best-known figure. Hogan (real name: Terry Bollea) was so large -- about 6-5 and 300 pounds -- and "ripped" that promoters demanded similarly proportioned men to maintain the illusion of a fairly matched contest.
Among those promoting this change, says Keller, was Vince McMahon, chairman of the WWE (and its forerunner, the World Wrestling Federation). McMahon, a former bodybuilder, wanted "not just guys who performed well, but guys who looked like they just walked in from a video game," says Keller.
WWE executives, however, deny any suggestion that drug use is tolerated among their wrestlers. "We've made a lot of changes over the years," spokesman Gary Davis says. "We don't need steroids. We don't need drugs."
But Marc Mero, a former wrestler, believes steroids are commonplace in wrestling. "If you're not jacked and ready to go, you're not on," said Mero, who added that he took the muscle-building drugs for seven years.
Destined for the Ring
In interviews over the years, Guerrero and Benoit would tell much the same story: They always wanted to be wrestlers.
The youngest of four sons, Eduardo Gory Guerrero seemed destined for the ring. His father, Gory Guerrero, was a legendary Mexican wrestler, promoter and trainer. The family maintained its own makeshift ring in the back yard of its South El Paso home. Eddie Guerrero's elder brothers -- Mando, Hector and Chavo -- all preceded him into the professional ranks, and Chavo Jr. followed close behind. Even the name fit: Guerrero is Spanish for "warrior."
"Out of my whole life, there were maybe four months that I thought, I don't want to be a wrestler," he told the El Paso Times in 2003. "But I know what I wanted to do all my life. I grew up watching my dad and older brothers do it. This is a dream for me."
Benoit followed a similar path. Born in Montreal, he grew up in a suburb of Edmonton, Alberta. When he was 12, he saw a British wrestler called the Dynamite Kid (Tom Billington) perform in his home town. Benoit was hooked. "I just idolized him," he told a Canadian newspaper years later. "We had back-yard wrestling matches or I would be in my room, kicking my bed, trying to [imitate] him."
The teenage Benoit drove 180 miles every week to Calgary to work out at "the Dungeon," a famed training gym run by promoter Stu Hart in the basement of Hart's mansion. In tribute to Billington, Benoit made his debut at 18 as "Dynamite" Chris Benoit in Hart's Stampede Wrestling promotion.
While still a teenager, Guerrero was wrestling professionally, too. His first appearances were in Mexico, where "lucha libre" ("free fighting") has a long and colorful history. He would tour Japan, where he met Benoit.
Those who saw Guerrero perform remarked on his athleticism within the ring and his charisma out of it. But those near him say he was already troubled. Ashenoff said it was apparent when he met him in 1988 that Guerrero had a drinking problem. Later, Ashenoff said: "He had a cocaine habit. Next, it was pain medication. Then it was a muscle-relaxer habit."
Drugs and alcohol seemed to treat Guerrero's wrestling pains, Ashenoff says, but the pain also seemed to justify the drugs.
Current and former wrestlers say Guerrero's problems were extreme, but not unusual. In addition to casual use of alcohol, marijuana and cocaine, wrestlers "play hurt" with the help of pain medications like Vicodin, Percocet and Soma, a particular favorite.
"You self-medicate," says Mero, a veteran of the WWE and the defunct World Championship Wrestling. "You suck it up and perform. If it leads to an addiction, that's part of [the job]. Because, if you can't [perform], there are a hundred guys willing to take your place."
Glenn Gilberti, who wrestled in the WCW as Disco Inferno, said he knew of a fellow wrestler who took "30 to 50" Soma tablets day, and another who took as many Vicodin pills for relief. "Wrestling has changed in the past 10 to 15 years," Gilberti says. "It's more physical and realistic. It looks like it hurts because it does."
Says Ashenoff: "You get into a cycle where you need something to get you to bed at night, then something to get you up in the morning, then something to pick you up during the day, then something to bring you down at night. And you're not getting any real time to recover because you're working all the time."
At some point, Guerrero and Benoit became acquainted with another class of drugs: anabolic steroids.
Insiders say both men used the drugs to pack on muscle. Guerrero was 5-foot-8, Benoit was 5-9, and both weighed about 220 pounds when they died.
The toxicology report on Benoit's body indicated that he was taking synthetic testosterone, a steroid. He also had the anti-anxiety drug Xanax and a prescription painkiller similar to Percocet in his system.
In a subsequent indictment of Chris and Nancy Benoit's doctor, Phil C. Astin, on July 2, federal prosecutors alleged that Astin provided a 10-month supply of steroids to Benoit every three to four weeks from May 4, 2006, through May 9, 2007, as well as prescriptions for Percocet, Xanax and other drugs. According to the indictment, Astin wrote multiple prescriptions for the Benoits on the same date, leaving some of the prescriptions undated -- a violation of federal law. Astin has pleaded not guilty.
The medical examiner who conducted Guerrero's autopsy noted that the wrestler died of heart disease, complicated by an enlarged heart and other enlarged organs that were "consistent" with a history of steroid use.
'Weaker and Weaker'
In the ring, Benoit (nicknamed "the Canadian Crippler") and Guerrero (known as "Latino Heat") sometimes performed as allies, sometimes as feuding rivals. When both men jumped from World Championship Wrestling to WWF in 2000, they formed a "heel" (or villain) alliance called "the Radicalz." At various points, one or the other would become a "face," or good guy.
In real life, they were often inseparable. For several years, they lived near each other in the Tampa area. Benoit was a vigilant friend after an intoxicated Guerrero nearly died in a car accident in early 1999; Guerrero returned the attention when Benoit underwent spinal fusion surgery on his neck in 2001.
Guerrero's accident helped strengthen his religious convictions, and he sought to bolster Benoit's faith, too, says Ashenoff. Both men had rocky marriages punctuated by separations (Nancy Benoit filed for divorce in 2003, alleging that her husband had threatened her, but she eventually withdrew the petition).
When Guerrero finally was anointed WWE champion in early 2004 (he "lost" his title four months later), the organization marketed his triumph as a redemption story. The company released a DVD recounting his life story, and later a WWE-authorized autobiography (both called "Cheating Death, Stealing Life"). In both, Guerrero claimed that he had been sober for four years.
It was a hopeful, inspiring story. But like much about wrestling, it wasn't true.
Ashenoff, Guerrero's old friend and tag-team partner, visited him regularly during his championship years and remembers being shocked by his physical and emotional decline. "I could see him getting weaker and weaker. You'd see him in the dressing room looking like a mummy in ice packs. He could barely move after a show. . . . He was taking all these painkillers and he was very paranoid. He was just an emotional basket case."
"Without a doubt," Ashenoff says, "he wasn't clean [in the months before his death]. I know that for a fact. All those years [of abuse] finally caught up to him."
WWE aired a week of "tribute" shows to Guerrero. Benoit was interviewed on one of them, and is shown sobbing uncontrollably. "I just want to tell you I love you and [will] never forget you," he said through his tears before adding, "and we'll see each other again."
Within days, WWE turned Guerrero's death into a running story line. Two weeks after Guerrero's funeral, wrestler Randy Orton was portrayed on WWE's "Smackdown" show as destroying an "Eddie Guerrero Memorial Lowrider" to initiate a feud with another wrestler. Guerrero's name was later invoked to sell a pay-per-view special called "Hell in a Cell." The angle continued for much of last year.
Publicly, Benoit played along. But he was clearly bitter about it, says Meltzer. "I've got to get out of here, but there's nowhere to go," Benoit wrote in an e-mail to Meltzer late last year.
On June 24, Benoit was supposed to perform at a WWE event in Texas. He never showed up.
In recent interviews, WWE officials say they cannot shed any light on what led to Benoit's behavior during his tragic last weekend. "We just don't know what demons seized him," says David Black, the physician who runs the WWE drug-testing program that was implemented after Guerrero's death.
Evidence at the crime scene and the official police time line of events, however, suggest deliberation, not a sudden burst of drug-fueled activity, says Jerry McDevitt, the company's general counsel.
The Georgia state medical examiner, Kris Sperry, said it is "unanswerable" whether drugs played a role in Benoit's alleged crimes.
Black and McDevitt say they do not know of a link or any pattern to the deaths of professional wrestlers over the years.
"People see things that are a coincidence that leads them to reach grand conclusions that are not supported by scientific analysis," says WWE's Black, a forensic scientist. "You have to be very cautious about this kind of information," he says.
Black and McDevitt point out that only five men -- including Guerrero and Benoit -- have died while under WWE contract during the organization's 44-year history.
Further, they dispute suggestions that drug use is widespread among the WWE's wrestlers.
When the company instituted drug tests early last year, "less than half" of its performers came back with positive results, Black says. Since then, he estimates that there have been "sporadic" cases of positive tests, involving about 15 percent of performers. Suspensions have followed for some WWE stars.
Wrestlers say that contention ignores the obvious. The WWE's testing regime "is a joke," Gilberti says. "Just look at the guys on TV. There's steroid testing?" He and others doubt that WWE, given the economic incentive to keep its stars wrestling, can be trusted to administer and enforce a rigorous drug testing program. Gilberti likens it to "putting Keith Richards in charge of doing drug tests for rock stars."
WWE says its program is comparable to other sports-related drug-detection programs (Black was involved in setting up the NFL's testing program). But WWE acknowledges that its wrestlers are given a "therapeutic exemption," enabling them to escape sanction if they produce a doctor's prescription and justification for taking a drug, such as for treating an injury.
"This is not a competitive sport," Black says. "If a worker tested positive at Nissan Motor Corporation, they would not be dismissed" for a medically justifiable reason, either.
Keller, though, points out that some wrestlers "doctor-shop" until they find a physician who will write prescriptions for the drugs they seek.
Keller is among several critics who say WWE needs a more comprehensive policy, addressing both its working conditions and the use of drugs. Until then, he thinks, wrestling might experience more problems.
This past Monday, it did. Brian Adams, the former WCW and WWE wrestler, was found dead in his Tampa-area home by his wife. While police are still investigating, the circumstances of Adams's death had many of the hallmarks of Guerrero's demise. Adams's wife reported that he stopped breathing, and police said there were no visible signs of injury or foul play.
Adams was 43.
It's time for reform, Ashenoff says. "It's almost like there's an omerta," a Mafia-like code of silence among wrestlers, he says. "You don't snitch on each other. But it's just gotten to the point where enough is enough."
"I'm one of the success stories," Mero, 47, says with an ironic laugh. "I'm not dead."
Growth Hormone To Boost Athletic Performance Risks Diabetes
Use of growth hormone to boost athletic performance can lead to diabetes, reports a study published ahead of print in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.
The study reports the case of a 36 year old professional body-builder who required emergency care for chest pain.
He had lost 40 kg in 12 months, during which he had also experienced excessive urination, thirst, and appetite.
He admitted to using anabolic steroids for 15 years and artificial growth hormone for the past three. He had also taken insulin, a year after starting on the growth hormone.
This was done to counter the effects of high blood sugar, but he had stopped taking it after a couple of episodes of acute low blood sugar (hypoglycaemia) while at the gym.
Tests revealed that his liver was inflamed, his kidneys were enlarged and that he had very high blood sugar. He was also dehydrated, and diagnosed with diabetes.
He was given intravenous fluids and gradually increasing amounts of insulin over five days, after which he was discharged. His symptoms completely cleared up, and he was no longer diabetic.
The use of growth hormone has steadily risen among amateur athletes and bodybuilders all round the world, say the authors, because it is easy to buy online and difficult to detect in screening tests unlike anabolic steroids.
The authors believe that this is the first reported case of diabetes associated with the use of high dose growth hormone, and urge anyone taking high doses to regularly check their blood sugar levels.
British Medical Journal BMA House, Tavistock Sq London WC1H 9JP United Kingdom http://www.bmj.com
BRANDON — While law enforcement silently pursued him in Palm Beach County, a heart doctor now charged with peddling steroids and growth hormones on the Internet tried to pump up business in this Tampa suburb by teaming with a former professional wrestler called Cyborg.
Dr. Robert G. Carlson and partner Kevin Donofrio of Brandon formed Florida Rejuvenation Institute in September, state corporation records show. Six months later, Carlson was arrested for his role at Palm Beach Rejuvenation Center, an alleged prescription mill in Jupiter that prosecutors say made millions prescribing steroids, testosterone and other potentially dangerous hormones through its Internet site without face-to-face examinations of patients.
Donofrio said Florida Rejuvenation Institute was founded in hopes of repeating the Jupiter company's success. He said he had no idea Carlson was being investigated. But six or eight weeks after the company was formed, Donofrio said he backed away from their enterprise.
"I realized he didn't really want to see patients face to face," Donofrio said. "They were into this Internet medicine business."
Carlson was arrested in February after a three-year national investigation of prescription drug sales on the Internet. Fourteen Floridians have been charged, plus seven more in Texas and New York.
Carlson, a 50-year-old former Eagle Scout, has pleaded not guilty to seven counts of selling controlled substances. He has refused comment. His attorney, Thomas J. O'Hern of Albany, N.Y., would not answer written questions faxed to his Albany office. Carlson's former attorney has said more prescriptions were written with Carlson's name that the doctor had signed.
A professional wrestler for seven years, 44-year-old Donofrio now operates Partners in Wellness, a string of health clubs and clinics providing primary care, physical rehabilitation and pain management. He touts himself as a five-time All-American in Greco-Roman and freestyle wrestling and a Coastal USA Body Building Champion. He also has coached high school wrestlers.
It was through wrestling that Donofrio met Carlson's brother-in-law, Joseph Raich, a longtime booster of amateur wrestling, as well as the wrestling team at Jupiter Christian School, and vice president of Palm Beach Rejuvenation. When investigators raided the company's headquarters in February, Chris Ruh, son of the high school's wrestling coach, was working there, court records show.
Ruh has not been charged, nor have authorities publicly stated that he is under investigation. Raich has not been charged, but prosecutors call him an unindicted co-conspirator. He has hired a criminal defense lawyer.
Their connections to the company and the wrestling team prompted the Florida High School Athletic Association to open an inquiry into the wrestling program. A year ago, Jupiter Christian became the smallest school ever to win a state wrestling title in Florida.
"My main reason was I heard they were the number one company in the world," Donofrio said of his interest in Palm Beach Rejuvenation. "I'd always known success leaves clues. I figured if they're the No. 1 company in the world, in terms of producing volume, they must do it right, you would think. Like the number one football team, they must have the best players, right?"
Because Donofrio already had medical facilities in Brandon, he said he started the company with about $20,000, some of it spent on advertising. They launched Florida Rejuvenation with a couple of public seminars featuring Carlson, a trim-and-fit heart surgeon who hails the benefits of hormones in combating the common effects of aging: weight gain and the loss of sexual libido and energy.
The two seminars drew 230 prospects, Donofrio said, with 40 later meeting face to face with Carlson. But after that, Donofrio said, Carlson told him he didn't want to see patients. He said the doctor, whose practice and home are an hour's drive away in Sarasota, wanted patients' laboratory test results faxed or e-mailed to him rather than having him personally examine patients seeking prescriptions. Carlson insisted it was legal, Donofrio claims.
"That was kind of when a red light went off and I said, 'Nah, I'm not doing that. I'm not getting into that kind of business,'''' Donofrio said.
The law in New York, where Carlson was charged, prohibits doctors from writing prescriptions without face-to-face visits. Florida law has a similar prohibition, with a few exceptions for emergencies and other circumstances.
Doctors at Donofrio's other medical clinics, he said, spend 11/2 hours with each patient, followed by a nutritionist spending an hour with the patient. Only then, he said, are prescriptions written.
"Carlson is a brilliant doctor," Donofrio said. "He's no dummy. The guy is well-educated, but I can't feel good about having my customers, whom I've worked 20 years for, faxing their labs to Sarasota or to Palm Beach for review and not having face-to-face contact with the physician."
A lack of face-to-face contact is central to the charges brought in New York against Carlson and Palm Beach Rejuvenation employees Glenn and George Stephanos, brothers who also have pleaded not guilty to drug charges.
"It's sad," Donofio said. "These guys, they're out there making millions, but I don't know what'll happen to them. But I can sleep at night."
While awaiting trial, Carlson continues his cardiac practice from a third-floor suite in Sarasota. Tacked on the door along with his name is a sign for Palm Beach Rejuvenation of Sarasota, a business he formed six weeks before opening Florida Rejuvenation Institute with Donofrio. Carlson's pitch on his Sarasota company's Web site: "You need hormone replacement for a better quality of life."Donofrio said that, to his knowledge, Carlson never wrote prescriptions for Florida Rejuvenation Institute patients without a face-to-face examination. He said the company was dissolved in late 2006, right after his falling out with Carlson. Told that state records show the company remained in active status, Donofrio produced the copy of a check to the state as well as a state form he signed to dissolve the company. The check was dated March 29, the same day he was interviewed about the company by The Palm Beach Post.
"It was an oversight," he said, when asked why the form and fee weren't filed earlier.
Sitting in his second-floor office at The Athletic Club, his newly renovated health club in Brandon, Donofrio was surrounded by reminders of his days as Cyborg: dozens of photos, from Hulk Hogan to an autographed picture of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, a former University of Miami football player who became a wrestler and now stars in action films.
There's also a picture of Eddie Guerrero, a wrestling star who died young. The death certificate for Guerrero, who was 38 when he died in 2005, listed an enlarged heart caused by steroid use as a contributing factor.
The picture is a reminder of why Donofrio says he won't help anyone seeking steroids or human growth hormone to boost athletic performance. Donofrio recalled the parents of an athlete who had shoulder surgery asking for human growth hormone to speed up the healing.
"I said, 'Absolutely not. The guy's 16 years old. He's got plenty of hormones,'''' Donofrio said. "I make it very clear to people: We're not in business for athletic performance. We're in business to give people therapy that need it."
Donofrio has remained involved in youth athletics by volunteering as an assistant coach and fund-raiser for the Brandon High School wrestling team, whose winning dynasty is among the greatest in the nation. The Eagles have a 34-year winning streak of 439 dual matches and have won 18 state championships, including the past seven. Because of its size, the school doesn't compete in the same classification as Jupiter Christian.
"I needed somebody to work with my heavyweights, and so I took him on," Brandon coach Russ Cozart said of Donofrio. "He worked with my heavyweights for three years and did a great job. He was always there for the kids."
Demands of his businesses caused him to miss this past season at Brandon High, but Donofrio said he hopes to return soon.Donofrio added to his business interests in November, forming Infinite Vitality of Brandon, part of a chain of hormone replacement clinics with offices in Tampa and Beverly Hills, Calif. Carlson is not involved, he said.
"We have been led to believe that the changes that occur to our bodies with age are inevitable," Infinite Vitality says on its Web site. "In fact, many of these changes can be minimized or prevented by recent advances in the field of Age Management Medicine."
Infinite Vitality is a "very reputable" hormone-replacement firm, Donofrio said, that requires face-to-face examinations with its physicians. "We're not going to get rich, but we're going to help people and I'm going to continue to help people in the health and fitness industry," Donofrio said. "That's what I got in it for."
Staff researcher Sammy Alzofon contributed to this story.
Updated: April 27, 2007, 7:19 PM ET
Ex-Mets employee pleads guilty, agrees to help MLB
ESPN.com news services
SAN FRANCISCO -- A former employee of the New York Mets has pleaded guilty to distributing performance-enhancing drugs to dozens of major league players between 1995 and 2005, and is cooperating with baseball's steroids investigation.
Buster Olney's take
Kirk Radomski's plea bargain, and his cooperation with both federal investigators and Major League Baseball's George Mitchell-led investigation, could be the biggest break in uncovering some of baseball's steroid use. He could turn out to be to baseball what Sammy "The Bull" Gravano was to the Mob. Consider:
• As a clubhouse employee for the Mets for 11 years, and then in his later work as a personal trainer, Radomski would have had contact with literally hundreds and hundreds of players. A source said Friday evening that the federal case involved "dozens" of players, and someone who has seen an investigation affidavit indicated that Radomski told investigators -- to paraphrase -- that if they thought the allegations in Jose Canseco's book were explosive, they would be blown away by what Radomski could report.
• Since agreeing to cooperate with federal investigators, Radomski has apparently been working in concert with them for months. The sealed affidavit in Radomski's initial bust was dated December 2005. That means he could have been cooperating with federal investigators for as long as the last 17 months, perhaps distributing performance-enhancing drugs to players under the guise of the investigators, perhaps wearing a wire, having his phone conversations recorded. And while Radomski could speak to his own alleged distribution, he also could tell all that he knows about performance-enhancing drug use that he saw while he was with the Mets. It's conceivable that it was Radomski who helped lead investigators to the implication of Jason Grimsley one year ago.
• This has presumably given the Mitchell investigation its biggest break so far. As one source said, with this, federal investigators have effectively handed over a "Tiffany box" full of steroid information to Mitchell's team -- leads to be followed up with requests to speak to current and former players.
-- Buster Olney is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine
• Buster Olney has more on baseball's steroids investigation on The SportsBash. Listen
Kirk Radomski, 37, admitted providing anabolic steroids, human growth hormone, Clenbuterol, amphetamines and other drugs to "dozens of current and former Major League Baseball players, and associates, on teams throughout Major League Baseball," San Francisco U.S. Attorney Scott Schools said in a statement.
"The distribution of anabolic steroids to professional athletes cheats both the paying public and the clean athletes and is a serious crime," Schools said. "This investigation shows that distribution of performance-enhancing drugs continues to be an issue for sport in America. This office is dedicated to pursuing those who benefit from such crimes."
Friday's guilty plea is the latest development in the steroids scandal that has plagued sport in recent years. And it put baseball back in the doping spotlight and surely will get fans wondering what names will follow.
"We support the efforts of the U.S. Attorney's office in combating the illegal use of performance-enhancing substances, and we are encouraged that the U.S. Attorney has insisted Mr. Radomski cooperate with Senator George Mitchell's investigation as a condition of the plea agreement," MLB president Bob DuPuy said in a statement. "We urge all personnel connected with Major League Baseball to come forward with whatever information they may have that will assist Senator Mitchell in his investigation."
The story was first reported by the New York Daily News. SI.com, the San Jose Mercury News and Washington Post all were reporting details from a search warrant affidavit that's under seal.
Radomski, a former Mets batboy who also worked as an equipment manager and clubhouse assistant while with the team from 1985-95, surrendered Friday in U.S. District Court, scene of the BALCO steroid proceedings and prosecutions, and pleaded guilty to one count of distribution of a controlled substance -- anabolic steroids -- and one count of money laundering.
Radomski, who faces up to 25 years in prison and $500,000 in fines, was considered by authorities to be the chief supplier of drugs for baseball players after the feds shut down BALCO in 2003.
"This individual was a major dealer of anabolic steroids and performance-enhancing drugs whose clientele was focused almost exclusively on Major League Baseball players," assistant U.S. Attorney Matt Parrella said. "He operated for approximately a decade."
The case is being handled by the same federal investigators who netted guilty pleas from BALCO founder Victor Conte and Barry Bonds' personal trainer, Greg Anderson, among others.
The affadavit contained blacked-out information, including what appeared to be players' names, the newspapers said. Parrella declined to name Radomski's clients. Sports Illustrated, which also has reviewed the warrant, reported on its Web site that at least one player associated with BALCO also has been implicated in the Radomski investigation.
"This individual was a major dealer of anabolic steroids and performance-enhancing drugs whose clientele was focused almost exclusively on Major League Baseball players."
-- Assistant U.S. Attorney Matt Parrella
Sports Illustrated, quoting from the warrant, reported "numerous significant deposits from current and former [Major League Baseball] players and some affiliated individuals" were made to Radomski. He received more than $23,000, pulled from more than 20 different payments between 2003-05 that are alleged to have been made in conjunction with steroids purchases, according to the documents viewed by SI.
Howard Johnson, a Mets infielder in the 1980s and currently the team's first-base coach, told The Associated Press he remembered Radomski.
"He was a clubhouse kid, one of several, one of the kids that were there," Johnson said before the Mets played at Washington on Friday night.
Former Mets pitcher Ron Darling, now a team broadcaster, said he didn't remember Radomski.
Mets spokesman Jay Horwitz said equipment manager Charlie Samuels would not be available for comment.
"We were surprised and disappointed to learn of the guilty plea today," the Mets said in a statement. "The conduct in question is diametrically opposed to the values and standards of the Mets organization and our owners.
"We are and always have been adamantly opposed to the use of performance-enhancing drugs and continue to support Major League Baseball's efforts to eradicate any such use in our game," the team said.
Since federal agents raided BALCO in Burlingame, Calif., in September 2003, Major League Baseball has been trying to come to grips with the specter of steroids on the sport. One-third of the more than 30 athletes subpoenaed to testify in front of a grand jury investigating BALCO were some of baseball's most prominent stars -- Bonds, Jason Giambi and Gary Sheffield.
Bonds, who holds baseball's single-season home run record and is within 14 home runs of tying Hank Aaron's career record of 755, was a focal point of the BALCO investigation. Bonds has repeatedly said that he has never knowingly used steroids.
Earlier this year, another drug investigation exploded on the East Coast as federal agents targeted steroid distribution networks in Florida and Alabama that was responsible for Internet sales of performance-enhancing drugs nationwide. Los Angeles Angels center fielder Gary Matthews Jr. has been alleged to be among several athletes listed as customers.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
Conte tells how Marion Jones injected growth hormone in hotel rooms
Marion Jones
By Alan Abrahamson in Los Angeles December 6, 2004
BALCO founder Victor Conte, in a magazine report that adds extensive detail to allegations he made last Friday on a television show, has revealed how US athletics star Marion Jones left drug paraphernalia in hotel rooms when he was supplying her with illegal performance-enhancing substances. Conte says he provided Jones with an array of banned drugs before the 2000 Sydney Games, where she won five medals, three of them gold.
Beginning in August 2000, six weeks before the Olympics, Conte said he arranged for Jones to receive the designer steroid THG as well as human growth hormone, the blood-booster EPO and insulin, according to a report in ESPN magazine.
"She was on all of it at the 2000 Games in Sydney, when she won three gold medals and two bronzes," he wrote. "I tell you this knowing Marion passed a lie-detector test saying it's not true. All that shows me is lie detectors don't work."
Jones issued a statement saying Conte's allegations "are not true, and the truth will come out in the appropriate forum". It also said: "I have instructed my lawyers to vigorously explore a defamation lawsuit against Victor Conte."
Conte's allegations immediately drew the attention of International Olympic Committee and World Anti-Doping Agency officials.
WADA president Dick Pound said Jones's medals ought to be taken away from her if Conte was telling the truth.
IOC president Jacques Rogge said: "I hope the truth will emerge. We want the truth. We want to know what happened and the more we know the better."
Conte and three others, including Greg Anderson, the personal trainer for San Francisco Giants' hitter Barry Bonds, stand accused by federal prosecutors in San Francisco of multiple felony counts. Each has pleaded not guilty.
Conte's first-person account in ESPN is rich with detail.
On April 21, 2001, in an Embassy Suites hotel room in Covina, California, he said, he was sitting about "a foot away" as Jones used a $US1000 NovoPen injector - a device that "looked like a Sharpie [a large felt tip pen]" and that can be used to inject human growth hormone. After pulling the spandex of her bicycle shorts above her right thigh, he said, Jones "dialled up a dose of 4 units of growth hormone and injected it into her quadriceps." Jones's former husband, CJ Hunter, "was hugely responsible for making sure she did what she was supposed to", he said, adding that after they split up: "I had to reprimand her for getting careless."
She left a growth-hormone cartridge injector "on a refrigerator in a hotel room in Edmonton . . . and had to go back and get it," Conte said. "[She] left it again at a hotel in Eugene, Oregon, a few days later. After the first time she forgot it, she said she'd put it in a sneaker and lean the sneaker against the refrigerator so she wouldn't forget it. Then she forgot the shoe. That injector had a thousand dollars worth of growth hormone in it! "I couldn't afford the risk," Conte said. At the same time, he said, he was having "financial problems" with Tim Montgomery, so he ended his relationship with them, and "soon I was working with their rivals".
Montgomery and Jones are now partners and parents of a year-old son. The magazine story confirms previously published accounts of what was called "Project World Record" on Montgomery's behalf, Conte acting as Montgomery's "pharmacology and nutrition" guru. Montgomery set the 100-metre world record, 9.78 seconds, in 2002. The magazine story draws careful distinctions in Conte's descriptions of what he knew - and did not know - about the issue of whether Bonds used performance-enhancing drugs.
According to a report in the San Francisco Chronicle last Friday, Bonds, testifying before a federal grand jury, said he used a clear substance and a cream supplied by BALCO but never thought the substances were steroids.
In ESPN, Conte said, "I've talked to Barry Bonds about nutrition. [New York Yankee slugger] Gary Sheffield, too, who Greg Anderson brought in to see me. But not only have I never given either of them a performance-enhancing drug, I've never even discussed the topic with them.
"Now, did Barry's trainer, Greg Anderson, ever get 'the clear' and 'the cream' from me?" Conte said, using code names for THG and for a testosterone-based skin cream. "Yes, he did. On about half-a-dozen occasions, I gave him some. There were never any questions. We never discussed who it was for. I assumed it was for Greg, OK?"
United States Attorney Carol C. Lam announced that David Palumbo, bodybuilder and editor-in-chief of Rx Muscle magazine, was sentenced today to five months in federal custody, followed by five months of home detention, based on his October 5, 2004 plea of guilty before the Honorable Thomas J. Whelan, to the charge of conspiring to unlawfully distribute human growth hormone. In connection with his guilty plea, Palumbo had admitted that he obtained counterfeit Serostim from Bill Young in San Diego, California, which he would sell to bodybuilders who did not possess a lawful prescription.
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