First there was Roger Clemens who was charged with doping. Then there was Barry Bonds who was charged with doping and lying, and was probably taken by surprise when his supposedly destroyed urine sample resurfaced and yielded positive results. And now there is Alex Rodriguez, the baseball superstar who is now under public judgment because the documents that listed supposedly confidential test results in 2003 were found along with his positive steroid test. You think that the rest of the 104 listed positive should be the only ones scared. Apparently, that is not the case. Even those that tested negative back then could be subject to some re-analyzing. Remember Bonds testing negative at first then positive after a few years? The feds might be considering the same in this case.

From Daily News:

Even those who tested negative could be subject to re-testing as a result of the Players’ Association’s failure to destroy the spreadsheet with the names of those who tested positive.

There are believed to be 525 negative urine samples in the hands of the government in addition to the 104 positive samples.

After the testing process was completed in 2003, union officials had the right to destroy the documents that connected names to actual urine samples. Sources close to the union defend its inaction, saying it would have been improper to destroy urine samples and test documents because they were potential evidence in the ongoing BALCO probe.

The laboratory that did the tests should have destroyed the samples whether positive or negative. It didn’t though and now we have 525 urine samples to analyze with more modern tests. That could mean over a hundred more Barry Bonds.

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Tags: 2003, Alex Rodriguez, BALCO, Barry Bonds, drug test, Major League Baseball, steroids, urine samples

Posted in Steroids and Anabolic Steroids, Steroids in Baseball, Steroids in Sports, steroid nation | No Comments/Questions

Kirk Radomski has been bumping into a lot of disputes lately, just after his book, “Bases Loaded”, had been available for preview. First there was this 2-time “correction” by George Mitchell, and now, Major League Baseball officials are not happy with what they’ve read.

Radomski wrote that players were summoned in order to tell them that they had positive results during tests for steroid use. According to the steroid dealer, one player approached him and told him that the commissioner’s office wanted him to drop by for that reason. The main problem with this is that testing during those times were introduced on an anonymous basis and that it would imply that the baseball officials had been trying to limit the number of athletes who would have positive results the next season by warning them early.

Rob Mandred, one of the drug test’s officials, tried to clarify the mistakes on the passage.

From The New York Times:

In a telephone interview Wednesday, Rob Manfred, baseball’s top drug-testing official, said that the passage in Radomski’s book was “categorically incorrect.”

“By no means were we involved in that process; any suggestion that we were involved is untrue,” he said.

What actually occurred in 2004, when anabolic steroids testing began in earnest, is murky. In his report on baseball and performance-enhancing drugs, George J. Mitchell said that at least one player was told in 2004 by the players union that he tested positive in 2003 and that he would be tested again in the coming weeks. Mitchell said other players who tested positive in 2003 might have received similar warnings from the union. He did not cite any attempts by the commissioner’s office to tell players about positive tests or warn them about coming tests.

Interestingly, there is some misinformation written on Radomski’s book. One of these is that he mentioned that Roger Clemens and Jose Canseco even if they had played together several times. Another is an incident with Dwight Gooden testing positive for cocaine use during the wrong year.

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Tags: Bases Loaded, drug test, Kirk Radomski, Major League Baseball, Mitchell Report, Performance enhancing drugs, steroids

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