Steeroids

We've discussed a number of times the ridiculousness of MLB getting put on the spot for steroids (even appearing before Congress) whereas NFL, in which using is almost certainly rampant, basically gets a free pass. But we haven't talked about other sports in which athletes might use steroids. Sports like sledding. Zach Lund, the world's no. 1 ranked skeleton athlete, just got banned from the Winter Olympics because he failed a drug test. It wasn't for performance-enhancing drugs, it was for a masking agent, Finasteride. Unfortuantely, Finasteride is also the active ingredient in the "baldness pill" (Propecia), which he's been open about taking.

I think this gives us a nice glimpse of the mess ahead with dealing with performance enhancers in baseball (and sports in general). Plenty of easily available medicines have side-effects which might be useful for athletes. Not to mention some, like Ritalin, in which the benefit isn't the side-effect, but the stated purpose of the drug. Some athletes will need/want to take the medicine for normal reasons (it's hard to imagine an Olympic sledder really was on 'roids); others will take advantage of the situation. I honestly don't see how organized sports is going to be able to deal with this.

(On a side note, am I the only one who loves that the event is called "skeleton"? We get to hear about "skeleton athletes" failing drug tests and "skeleton coaches" being fired for sexual harassment. I keep imagining they all look like this guy.)