Isn’t that the same reason cyclists us EPO and other illegal performance enhancing drugs? Just cause you don’t use them to get stronger doesn’t mean they are used legitimately. If you gain an advantage, i.e. recover faster so you can play the next week at closer to 100%, than you are cheating. I have never really cared for Bradshaw, but his attitude on this makes me dislike him even more. As some one still around the game today he should know that there is no difference in what he did and using to get stronger. They are both CHEATING!

As a society, we need to look at this. You wouldn’t say Bradshaw was cheating if he took an antibiotic to recover faster from a bacterial infection. Why then is it cheating to use steroids to heal faster? Why is it cheating to use steroids to become stronger or bigger. Instead of treating steroids like black-tar heroine and insider trading combined, we should really look at the issue. Is LASIK cheating. Every sport requires good eye-sight. The better your eye-sight, the better you can perform. It is medical performance enhancement. Why is that ok but steroids aren’t? I propose that athletes are constantly attempting to enhance performance and declaring the use of steroids as a method that is cheating strikes me as arbitrary. I say let athletes dope up to the hilt. I don’t care if it “taints” the records. Records can only really be measured within their own eras anyway. You can’t compare Jerry Rice to a hall of fame receiver from 1947, so why compare a juiced player to one from an era where there was no steroids?

Fire at will.

T.

I don’t disagree that steroid use in pro sports will trickle down to college, h.s., and younger. But that happens anyway. As to the harmful effects of steroids, those are up for debate. But that’s beside the point, really. Now don’t get me wrong… I’m not saying I think kids should be juicing. Kids should not, as their bodies are still developing and their judgement is suspect.

But to the question “Why is it cheating”? The arguement that potential longterm adverse affects make steroids different than LASIK doesn’t fly. Both improve your physical abilities through medical means. Athletes take cortisone shots all the time for bulging disks and whatnot. The potential adverse effects of those are well documented whereas adverse longterm affects of anabolic steroid use has yet to be shown. Potential harm isn’t why people consider it cheating.

However, I appreciate you humble opinion on the subject and enjoy the civil debate.

T.

society sees it as morally wrong. That is why people, myself included, think it is wrong. And I do believe that some of the long term adverse affects have something to do with that. I do believe that there is some medical research out there to show long term side effects of the drug. The bottom line to me is that the rules in sports are made to reflect societal opinion, and I believe there is enough people out there who think steroids are wrong for professional sports to have banned them, and thus called it cheating.

I like you point on LASIK though, I really do. It just goes back to morals and public opinion to differentiate that and steroids from cheating. Following that logic though, wouldn’t any medical procedure be cheating? If you come back stronger than before after surgery to repair an injury, would that be cheating too?