Barry Larkin, still glowing over his election to the Hall of Fame, was asked about next year’s sure-to-be-controversial vote: the first appearances of Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Sammy Sosa on the Cooperstown ballot.

“All I know is playing and competing against some of these guys, they’re the best — period,” he said.

From Online.wsj.com:

The Steroids Era will be the focal point of next year’s Hall ballot, when 550-plus members of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America try to assess three of the most accomplished players in the sport’s history.

For all the home runs and wins, it’s a trio tainted with accusations that their statistics were boosted by performance-enhancing drugs during a period when there were no agreed-upon penalties in baseball for the use of steroids and human growth hormone.

“It’s going to be agonizing,” BBWAA general secretary Jack O’Connell said after Tuesday’s news conference, repeating the phrase for emphasis.

“I’m not going to vote for any of the people that are linked to steroids. I could change down the road, but that’s the real strong feeling I have now,” said Hal Bodley of MLB.com, the former lead baseball writer for USA Today.

Tags: Barry Bonds, Barry Larkin, baseball, Hall of Fame, human growth hormone, Roger Clemens, Sammy Sosa, steroids, steroids era, use of steroids

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According to a sentencing memo filed in court, federal prosecutors want baseball legend Barry Bonds to serve 15 months in prison for his obstruction of justice conviction.

Defense lawyers argued in their filing that the judge should accept recommendation of the probation office that the ex-baseball player be sentenced to two years probation, fined $4,000, and ordered to perform 250 hours of community service.

From Edition.cnn.com:

Bonds, 47, is set to be sentenced on December 16 in a San Francisco federal courtroom, less than two miles from the ballpark where he broke Hank Aaron‘s major league home run in August 2007.

Jurors who found Bonds guilty in April said he was “evasive” in his testimony to the federal grand jury investigating illegal steroids use by pro athletes.

“Because Bonds’s efforts were a corrupt, intentional effort to interfere with that mission, a sentence of 15 months imprisonment is appropriate,” the prosecution said in its memo to U.S. District Judge Susan Illston.

Tags: Barry Bonds, baseball, Hank Aaron, steroids

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In the past year, the number of drug tests conducted by Major League Baseball rose 3 percent when Colorado Rockies catcher Eliezer Alfonzo was the only big leaguer suspended for use of a performance enhancing substance.

According to the annual report issued Thursday by Dr. Bryan Smith, the independent administrator for baseball‘s drug program, Alfonzo was banned for 100 games and there was just one positive for PEDs among 3,868 tests that resulted in discipline.

From Espn.go.com:

Under its new labor deal reached last week, baseball players will undergo blood testing for human growth hormone during spring training, starting in February. There is no agreement yet for regular-season blood testing.

Alfonzo’s was a second offense because he also tested positive in 2008 and served a 50-game suspension. The previous year, there were two positives for PEDs among 3,747 tests: Cincinnati pitcher Edinson Volquez and Florida catcher Ronny Paulino.

While Manny Ramirez tested positive this year, he retired rather than serve a 100-game suspension. Smith’s report lists only the substances for positive tests that result in discipline.

Roughly 20 to 25 percent of the approximately 4,000 tests in 2010 in the NFL were during the off-season.

Tags: baseball, Edinson Volquez, Eliezer Alfonzo, human growth hormone, Major League Baseball, Manny Ramirez, Ronny Paulino

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The Major League Baseball may have come to an agreement with its players to test their blood for human growth hormone but the game will be expected to come to grips with its present testing before it touts itself as the leader in new drug testing, said BALCO founder Victor Conte.

Conte further remarked that MLB should be using a more sophisticated form of detecting testosterone or its HGH testing would not really make a difference as players often make use of small amounts of testosterone in conjunction with HGH.

From Articles.nydailynews.com:

“HGH is not effective unless it is used in conjunction with testosterone or other anabolic steroids,” Conte says. “It’s important to understand that HGH is not an anabolic agent. It is an anti-catabolic agent. It basically helps to reduce muscle degradation and enables a player to maintain the gains they’ve made using steroids for a longer period of time. By itself, HGH has been shown to have no significant performance-enhancing effects.”

Conte, who is now an advocate for stronger testing, has been saying for years that the 4-to-1 testosterone to epitestosterone ratio used by baseball and other leagues to detect testosterone use is ineffective.

“Testosterone gels, creams and patches will clear an MLB player’s system within a matter of hours and be below the 4 to 1 T/E ratio allowable in urine,” he says. “A player could possibly use a fast-acting form of testosterone at night after a game to help with recovery and their T/E ratio would be within the normal range by the time they would get to the ballpark the next evening.

“If MLB were to implement CIR testing, I believe they would possibly catch a significant number of players using testosterone,” Conte says.

Tags: anabolic steroids, BALCO, baseball, HGH testing, human growth hormone, Major League Baseball, MLB, steroids, testosterone, Testosterone gels, testosterone to epitestosterone ratio, Victor Conte

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Two former NHL heavyweights, Georges Laraque and Andrei Nazarov, recently found the spotlight for different controversies.

Laraque says in his soon-to-be released biography, The Story of the NHL’s Unlikeliest Tough Guy that both tough guys and star players used steroids during his 11-year NHL career.

From Montrealgazette.com:

While Laraque doesn’t name names — in contrast to the storm Jose Canseco set off with his kiss-and-tell book about major-league baseball players using illegal substances — he issues a challenge for professional leagues to clean up their dressing rooms.

“Hockey, as well as any other sport in the world, has to take action against the human growth hormone that players have been using for a couple of years now,” he wrote.

Bill Daly, the NHL’s deputy commissioner, said it would be inappropriate to respond.

“Most of us knew who they were, but not a single player, not even me, would ever think of raising his hand to break the silence and accuse a fellow player,” Laraque wrote. “I don’t like snitches and will never be one.”

Tags: baseball, Georges Laraque, human growth hormone, Jose Canseco, NHL, steroids

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Victor Conte, the former doping guru, has claimed that all eight 100 meter finalists at the Sydney Olympics were cheats.

The finger of suspicion was also raised by Conte at world and Olympic champion Usain Bolt of Jamaica in an interview with Italy’s La Gazetta dello Sport.

From Heraldsun.com.au:

Conte, the former mentor to disgraced track star Marion Jones, was the brains behind the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO) which produced and supplied once-undetectable designer steroids to many top sports stars.

A police raid on BALCO in 2004, and the fallout from the affair, rocked athletics and baseball to its foundations and has ended the career of many promising athletes.

Three-time Olympic champion Jones never tested positive, but her career fell apart after she was jailed for perjury amid a federal investigation into BALCO which uncovered the full scope of Conte’s operation.

“I believe that before the BALCO affair, 80 per cent of athletes were using steroids, today that figure stands at about 65 per cent,” Conte said in the hard-hitting interview.

Tags: BALCO, baseball, doping, steroids, Sydney Olympics, Usain Bolt, Victor Conte

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The perjury trial of former baseball star Roger Clemens ended in a mistrial the judge blamed on prosecutors and said a “first-year law student” would have known to avoid.

The question of a new trial up in the air was left by U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton.

From Sports.yahoo.com:

“Mr. Clemens has to get a fair trial,” Walton said. “In my view, he can’t get it now.”

Defense attorney Rusty Hardin, who had asked for the mistrial declaration, patted an unsmiling Clemens on the back as the judge announced his decision. As he left the courthouse, Clemens did not comment but accepted hugs from a couple of court workers, shook hands with the security guards and autographed baseballs for fans waiting outside.

The quick end on only the second day of testimony was the second mistrial involving a superstar player accused in baseball’s steroids scandal. Home run king Barry Bonds was convicted three months ago of obstruction of justice, but a mistrial was called on three more serious false-statements charges after jurors couldn’t agree on a verdict.

Walton called a halt to the trial under way after prosecutors showed jurors evidence that he had ruled out videotaped revelations that a teammate had said he did told his wife Clemens confessed to using a drug.

Tags: Barry Bonds, baseball, Roger Clemens, steroids

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Jason Stevenson of Redding will get a first crack at ex-major leaguer Jose Canseco and the Yuma Scorpions when the Chico Outlaws independent league baseball team begins a 14-game, three-venue series with the Scorpions at 7 p.m. at Tiger field in Redding.

The first five games are at Tiger field, the second quintet is set for Shasta College, while the last four contests between the two teams begin at 7:05 p.m. Aug. 8 at Nettleton Stadium in Chico.

From Paradisepost.com:

Yuma is led by player manager Jose Canseco and his hitting coach and brother Ozzie. Jose Canseco won the American League Rookie of the Year Award in 1986 when he belted 33 home runs and drove in 117 runs. Two years later, Canseco did something nobody before him had done when he hit 40 home runs and stole 40 bases in a single season. He’s also a six-time Major League All-Star, two-time World Series Champion, four-time Silver Slugger Award winner, an American League MVP winner and a Comeback Player of the Year winner.

Canseco specifically identified Mark McGwire, Rafael Palmeiro, Jason Giambi, Ivan Rodriguez, Juan Gonzalez, Jorge Delgado, Damaso Moreno, and Manuel Collado as steroid users.

Tags: baseball, Chico Outlaws, Damaso Moreno, Ivan Rodriguez, Jason Giambi, Jason Stevenson, Jorge Delgado, Jose Canseco, Juan Gonzalez, Manuel Collado, Mark McGwire, Rafael Palmeiro

Posted in buy steroids, Steroid Cycles, steroid nation, Steroids and Anabolic Steroids, Steroids in Baseball, Steroids in Sports

Federal prosecutors still care deeply about steroids, and lying about their use to Congress as the aborted Roger Clemens trial shows.

The shredded reputation of Clemens remains in limbo after last week’s mistrial in the perjury case against one of baseball’s all-time greats.

From Miamiherald.com:

Charged with lying to Congress about performance enhancing drugs, Clemens joined otherwise surefire Hall of Famers Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire as the personification of the sport’s steroid era.

Bonds’ own steroid saga is likewise on hold. Back in April, a jury convicted him of one count of obstruction of justice but deadlocked on three other charges.

So, while it’s clear federal authorities still take matters of steroid use and false statements seriously, do the rest of us?

Steroidmania, which peaked with the demolition of Major League Baseball’s home run records, has ebbed as sluggers have retired and longball totals have dropped.

The fervency is tangibly on the wane in Florida, where a testing program at the high school level was allowed to lapse after one year. There is no current plan to revive it.

“I think there’s certainly some performance-enhancing drug fatigue,” said Charles Yesalis, a professor at Penn State and longtime outspoken critic of PED abuse.

Tags: Barry Bonds, baseball, Mark McGwire, Performance enhancing drugs, Roger Clemens, steroid, steroid era, steroid use, steroids

Posted in buy steroids, Steroid Cycles, steroid nation, Steroids and Anabolic Steroids, Steroids in Baseball, Steroids in Sports

Jose Canseco, the former baseball slugger, has expressed regret over his involvement in the sport’s ongoing steroids controversy in a one-hour documentary titled, “Jose Canseco: The Last Shot.”

Canseco regretted “mentioning players (as steroids users)” in his book “Juiced” that was published in 2005 and ultimately led to a congressional hearing on doping in the sport.

From Espnstar.com:

Canseco, 44, revealed that he wrote the book because he wanted to get even with Major League Baseball, which he believed had him “forced out of the game.”

In his book, Canseco named Sammy Sosa, Mark McGwire and Rafael Palmeiro as steroids users. Those three players, along with Canseco, were present at a March 2005 congressional hearing in which Sosa and McGwire provided questionable testimony while Palmeiro defiantly denied using steroids.

Less than four years later, Sosa and McGwire are widely considered longshots to reach the Hall of Fame despite ranking sixth and eighth, respectively, on baseball’s all-time list for career home runs. Palmeiro tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs during the 2005 season and was suspended.

“If I could meet with Mark McGwire and these players, I definitely would apologize to them,” said Canseco, who developed a friendship with McGwire during their seven-year stint together with the Oakland Athletics. “They were my friends. I admired them, I respected them.”

“I never realized this was going to blow up and hurt so many people,” Canseco said in the interview.

Tags: baseball, Jose Canseco, Major League Baseball, Mark McGwire, Rafael Palmeiro, Sammy Sosa, steroids

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