Thursday, February 19, 2009

A Rod and drugs in baseball.


The sport of baseball is facing its toughest test in recent history. The admission by Alex rodriguez of him taking drugs from the 2001-2003 Major League baseball season has struck sports fans across America. The emotions were running high as you can see on the video i posted with A rod, as fans like to call him came out about this awful wrong doing. It is not just him being hounded in the press. Barry bonds another baseball player has been subject to a number of court hearings to discus his dealings with performance enhancing drugs.
From my experinces as a young boy growing up in England, i had never heard of athletes taking drugs but since i have moved to the states i have recognised a number of athletes that are taking performance enhances and i cannot think why this is? Obviously it makes them a better player but why not work yiour bum off in the gym and on the training field and get better that way. It frustrates me to look at these amazing athletes have a doubt at the back of my mind where i fear they may be on drugs. Thoughts please...

6 comments:

  1. Very, very good post. In this country anytime you post something starting a conversation on performance enhancing drugs it's gonna spawn some responses.
    I don't know why they have to take any performance enhancers. Bonds was already a damn good player when he allegedly started taking them. He may be the poster boy in favor of roids. Although he was a good player I would say, without a doubt, that he would not have broken the home run record if not for allegedly taking steroids. This is pretty troubling because younger kids and athletes could see this and automatically believe that they're going to break records if they use PE's. A-Rod right now is on the top of my A-Hole list, his apology was totally bogus, he had not a shred of remorse on his face.

    I think the reason you see so much talk about PE's in America is because there is such an emphasis on strength in our sports. In soccer you still need strength, but it seems there is much more of an emphasis on agility, endurance and technique. In football, the emphasis is much more on strength and technique than anything else, and using PE's like steroids and HGH can make you stronger and give you the edge to be the best. At least that's my quick, condensed, take! Good post!

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  2. Did you consider that steroids were just not as common anywhere when you were in your boyhood days? Just a thought.

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  3. When I was on the swim team, I admired all the athletes that worked their butts off to be the best that they can be. However, when I hear atheles taking drugs to perfect their game, it really frustrates me. I hate the idea that these atheltes are getting paid millions of dollars to play this sport and they use drugs to perfect their performance. If this is the case, an ordinary citizen should take drugs and improve his performance, so he could make the millions of dollars. We watch these sports to admire their natural athletic ability. Not to see drug performance that anybody can do if they take these drugs. What are going to be the consequence to these actions? Is he going to be suspended or given a fine. Keep us informed of what is going to happen to A Rod.

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  4. Loved your 80's video clip. Little confused about how they relate. oh well:)

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  5. What's interesting about the apology is where the offender puts the blame. I didn't finish watching (will later) but at the onset he's laying blame on "innocence" (a quality shared with his cousin). However, what I've heard is that coaches are the ones who pressure athletes to use performance enhancing drugs, and coaches are uniquely positioned to influence: They're career builders and emotional confidants. Have you seen the Marion Jones apology? (And how about Kobe Bryant's infamous double-speak apology for rape?) I've not looked at Jones's apology recently--but the admission of wrong doing and her apparent retirement from competition did make me very sad. What's the history of athlete drug abuse over there on the other side of the Pond?

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  6. Joe,

    Like we talked about on Tuesday, the readers wanted to see how the public interacts with sports in both countries, and to give perspective on sports moments that you may feel your readers may not be familiar with. The direction of your blog is good. I like how you stated in your ARod post that you were not familiar with the problem of performance enhancing drugs, being that you were not from here. This gave the reader a chance to see the difference of whats on the typical sports fan's conscience in each country.

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