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Alex Sanchez
and Steroids - "Not Guilty"?
by Jonathan
Leshanski
April 8, 2005
And so it begins. MLB has had its first positive
steroid test and the guilty party is...
 Alex
Sanchez???
Yes, you heard right. Alex Sanchez. Some people don’t find
that believable - after all Sanchez is not a home run hitter but
rather a speedster. Then again neither Ben Johnson, who tested positive
for steroids, nor Marion Jones, who has been accused of using steroids
by both her ex-husband and BALCO president Victor Conte, are exactly
home run hitters. They are sprinters. Anabolic steroids build leg
muscle too, not just upper body strength.
So, the real question is: Does that mean that Sanchez really used
steroids? He has denied it and claims that he has never taken anything
that he had not purchased over the counter such as multi-vitamins
and energy shakes. Just this afternoon he announced he was not going
to appeal the charges as per his previous statements. That probably
brought a sigh of relief to the MLBPA (The Player’s Union),
who would have had to represent him - especially since they are
the same people that helped to create the drug policy that Congress
verbally shredded just weeks ago. This is the very same policy that
has been called “a sham” and “full of holes”
over and over again.
Fortunately now the Player’s Union does not have be either
the hero or the villain in this piece. If Sanchez had gone forward
with the challenge of the results then the MLBPA’s job would
have been to protect him, even if he were guilty. That would have
put them into direct opposition with the steroid policy that they
helped craft as well as being a direct conflict of interest, which
really puts them into a no win situation. If they didn’t defend
Sanchez to the best of their abilities by getting him off scot-free
via the loopholes that they created then they would have risked
alienating the players that they represent. Yet if they did get
him off it would have proven to both to the American public and
to Congress that the drug policy was little more than a sham.
The truth remains that MLB is making an example of Alex Sanchez,
probably because they don’t want to come down elsewhere, perhaps
on a big name star and I am sure that several stars are suspect.
Sanchez may not be innocent but he is probably a scapegoat.
What other reasons could they have for waiting almost a full month
before releasing his name and announcing his punishment? He tested
positive March 7 but MLB didn’t announce the positive test
results or his suspension until April 3. In my opinion the only
reason is that MLB and possibly the Player’s Union were figuring
out what to do.
Now baseball didn’t announce exactly which substance that Sanchez
tested positive for. As a matter of fact they have danced around
that, probably because they don’t want the public to know precisely
what is on their testing list. All that Bud Selig has said is, "Alex
Sanchez tested positive. There was no doubt that he tested positive
and he is gone for 10 days." Alex Sanchez is being used to
prove that MLB is being tough on steroids and that the new drug
policy will bring about change.
Unfortunately, this has all the credibility of asking the tobacco
industry to regulate itself. MLB has its own interest at heart;
the interest is public relations while the goal is to avoid having
prying eyes, or independent testing groups interfere with the home
run derbies and offensive records. That means that baseball needs
to retain the rights to set the drug policy and avoid anything that
could force it to obey outside rules.
Then along came Sanchez, a perfect player to make an example out
of. Not a superstar, or even a star, but a nominal player that without
his great speed would probably be a bench player at best. Someone
must have thought that he was a godsend. A name that is big enough
to be known by fans, including the 15+ million people that play
fantasy baseball, a name big enough to take the heat and distract
the audience in order to buy time while MLB and the Union try to
get the big names to clean up their act
Of course this is all predicated on Alex Sanchez being guilty and
it’s possible that he is not guilty of intentionally taking
a banned substance. It’s entirely possible that he was the
victim of a change in the law or that an over the counter product
had steroids, or steroid-like ingredients, either intentionally
or unintentionally added to it, and it’s possible that Sanchez
didn’t know what he was taking Some medications including cold
medications have caused Olympic athletes to test positive for steroids.
Nutritional supplements are poorly regulated at best and while many
are little more than snake oil some unethical companies may very
well add in undocumented ingredients to try to convince people that
the product has magical abilities.
It might be worth noting that the Olympic athletes that tested positive
even due to such medications were disqualified. I think we’d
all feel better if we could trust in baseball’s executives
and owners to be that ethical.
Share your thoughts or comments in our forums,
or e-mail Dr. Leshanski
directly. For articles on baseball and steroids visit our Steroid
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