Mark McGwire Admits to Steroid Use

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101

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:

[quote]KBCThird wrote:

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:

[quote]KBCThird wrote:

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:

[quote]KBCThird wrote:

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
His lie in deflecting suspicion of his steroid use by letting reports “find” a bottle of androstenedione in his locker and attributing his results to that was the start of the movement against prohormones.

I don’t feel sorry for him. It was snake-like of him to concoct this lie. I am not saying he was obligated to admit to using anabolic steroids – no one is obligated to confess to an illegal act – but that does not exonerate him from that particular deception.[/quote]

Lie? How is it a lie if he believed that it was helping? And if he didnt think it helped then why would he be taking it? Your fears of deception are overblown, and as you say, it’s not as if he coulda said “yeah, it helps, but not as much as the gh”[/quote]

If you think that, when suspected of anabolic steroid use for several reasons, concocting a scheme to make people believe that instead androstenedione was the cause, this does not constitutes a lie, you are entitled to your own opinion.

My definition of a lie is a willful effort to cause people to believe something that you know is not true. Your definition of course can be different.

And if you think that an anabolic steroid user adds things like androstenedione to his cycle, you really don’t know about that sort of thing (which is fine: it’s not as if everyone should be expected to.) Even if he were so stupid that he in fact did that, having it “discovered” in his locker still constituted a willful effort to cause people to believe a thing that was not true: that androstenedione was the cause of his large muscle mass gain, bloated face, and perhaps performance enhancement as well.

Many people did believe this and this was the start of the public turn against prohormones and remained a prime driving factor right up through the ban. No one could name a single example of prohormones contaminating the purity and sanctity of sports, except EVERYONE could name McGwire. But what they believed was not true, and McGwire had to have known it was not: that anabolic steroids were the explanation for those things.

But if you don’t want to call that lying, that’s your prerogative, of course.[/quote]

So your position is that he planted the andro bottle in his own locker, hoping the press would find it all so that he could say “that’s it, that’s why I got big, it was the andro, but I’ll stop using it now” … is that correct? If so, you’re even more cynical than I am, and I don’t mean that as an insult.

Maybe I underestimate people’s deception, or maybe you underestimate their stupidity, but to me, it just seems more likely that he had the andro bottle there because he was using it, and when it was seen, started mumbling, hemming and hawing and put everything on the andro. Occam’s razor, and all that.

As far as whether an experienced steroid user would add andro to his cycle, I have heard enough now to believe that andro does nothing (although I do have friends who SWORE that it helped), but the bottom line is this: you are absolutely right that I dont know as much about that sort of thing as you do. My only point though, would be that most athletes have a ‘kitchen sink’ mentality of “throw it in and lets see if it helps.” I realize there are gurus, but I’m just not sure that we are always dealing with a brain trust here.[/quote]

Well, counting e-mail correspondence, I have worked with over 1000 guys on their steroid cycles, which generally included discussion of any previous cycles and in most cases started with their outlining what they had in mind.

NOT ONE OF THEM had previously or at the time wanted to “stack” androstenedione in an anabolic steroid cycle.

Not one.

So I consider the chances that McGwire was doing so to be exceedingly low. Vanishing really.

Yes, you are correct in saying that I believe the “discovery” of the bottle of androstenedione in his locker was arranged by him at the time he was being publicly suspected of steroid use for the purpose of defusing that situation, which it largely did. If you want to call that cynical, you can: myself I think it is just being realistic and is not at all contrary to any facts and consistent with the overall situation.[/quote]

I don’t know what type of athletes you’ve worked with, so I can’t really comment on that. My point was just that athletes will do things that don’t make sense, for any of a variety of reasons - a shotgun approach, something that someone told them about, etc. As an example you’ve got the dumbass baseball pitcher taking ephedrine to lose weight, while undereating and not drinking, dying. Not saying there aren’t guy who know their stuff. Just that some guys really get into the science of it, and some just take whatever they can get, or get advice from guys who may not have the knowledge that you do.

I do agree that your theory is not at all contrary to any of the known facts, but as I said, we will just have to agree to disagree on whether it was planted or not[/quote]

OK, fair enough! :slight_smile:

For the sake of trying to do as good a job of getting across why I believe this to be the case, though, a good analogy would be as to whether an adult cigarette smoker is ALSO going to “smoke” some sort of fake or toy cigarettes, out of a more-is-better philosophy.

Nope, they’re going to smoke more real cigarettes if they want more.

And someone who is using anabolic steroids and wants more effect is going to use more of them rather stack androstenedione with them. Even if dumb as a rock and thick as a brick.

This is not a unique opinion of mine, btw. Back in the day, so far as I could tell the general consensus among steroid users was that McGwire’s androstenedione-prominently-displayed-in-his-locker was a plant.

Btw I saw, as I’m sure many have, a video clip of him talking about this interview. Crying like a pussy. Colbert had it right: he needs to inject steroids into his tearducts to man-up those pussy eyes. The reason I mention this is not the rather pathetic crying, but that he was still lying (now on a different matter) in insisting that he used them only for health reasons, and even when asked if strength increase occurred along with it, to deflect that and repeat that he (supposedly) used them only for health reasons.

You don’t bulk up as much as he did simply from using anabolic steroids to aid recovery.

He’s just not an honest individual, judging from that. I don’t know why he 'fessed up (partially) to this now.[/quote]

That makes sense, that someone who’s using steroids would look to add another steroid to the mix, rather than a PH. Two questions - do any of these guys have supply problems? Ie, in terms of not being able to get stuff when they need it, or being limited in the types of steroids they have access to? also, do any of them use anything over the counter, creatine, etc?

I’m still not 100% convinced that it was pre-planned/conspired, but you’ve certainly given me a lot to think about.

102

I really have no way of knowing how easy it is for MLB players to obtain steroids, but given the way that so many people fall all over themselves for big-name professional athletes, and that it’s not too tough in the first place for the average person, it seems unlikely to me that McGwire would have been able to obtain just a little bit of anabolic steroids but not enough to get the “health benefits” that were his sole concern.

But that is guesswork only.

Really I’m not familiar with their supplement use – I just do know that steroid users at that time were not stacking with androstenedione or if any at all did, it was a truly rare thing to do.

Also, if his interest really were health benefits, I can’t remember anyone at the time, or since, EVER claiming that androstenedione aided recovery or helped heal injury. It had no reputation for that at all.

So hmmm, maybe McGwire used the anabolic steroids for his real concern of recovery and healing, with absolutely no intent to become bigger and stronger with them: for that latter goal he used androstenedione, so that’s why he (supposedly) stacked them? And as he bulked up and got stronger it never occurred to him that that was the anabolic steroids – he was convinced it was the androstenedione?

Um, that would really be reaching, it seems to me. I just can’t imagine a person believing that androstenedione would aid his size and strength but that anabolic steroids taken at the same did not. The scenario does not add up.

103

no one has brought up ken caminiti. or the fact that its very very likely that steroids were popular in the MLB in the 70’s and 80’s, like in the NFL. MM was far from the first to use. I think Brandon Abrayo(sp?), who i think is a pitcher, has admitted to using them to keep himself fresher, and he was middling at best.

what about someone like mike piazza, rickey henderson (whom i love) or the players a generation before the current one that have managed to leave speculation behind. i say this is all speculation, but if we magnify and villify the present, shouldnt we examine the past too?

104

[quote]Kanada wrote:
no one has brought up ken caminiti. or the fact that its very very likely that steroids were popular in the MLB in the 70’s and 80’s, like in the NFL. MM was far from the first to use. I think Brandon Abrayo(sp?), who i think is a pitcher, has admitted to using them to keep himself fresher, and he was middling at best.

what about someone like mike piazza, rickey henderson (whom i love) or the players a generation before the current one that have managed to leave speculation behind. i say this is all speculation, but if we magnify and villify the present, shouldnt we examine the past too?[/quote]

If youre going to claim that steroids were ‘very very likely’ being used in the 70’s how can you not include the 60’s? No major records were falling in the 70’s. There were only a few prodigious power seasons in the 70’s and about the same in the 80’s. Players didn’t even lift weights in the 70’s and only started to in the late 80’s. Steroids were around since the 50’s. So by your logic Mickey Mantle must have hit his 550’ homer with some help.

The average number of league leading homers in the 70’s was around 40 and only one person hit 52, George Foster in a well above average season for him. In the 80’s the average went up to about 43. No one hit more than 49 in the 80’s. Then 1996 rolls around in the next four years McGwire hits 54, 58, 70 and 65!. There’s more to it than just the numbers also. In the 70’s the guys leading the league in homers were considered some of the best hitters and power hitters ever (not all HOFers though). In the 80’s the numbers weren’t special. In the 90’s you have random career .245 hitters like Sosa breaking 60 homers THREE TIMES. Brady Anderson average 22 homers a season and hit 50 in 96. Sure maybe a few guys experimented with stuff in the late 80’s but its clear that the numbers started to become inflated by the mid 90’s.

Caminiti and Piazza played in the 90’s btw. Caminiti is a known drug user and Piazza’s numbers dont jump off the page, not saying that he wasn’t using, no one can know that.

It’s certainly not likely that steroids were pervasive in the 70’s and 80’s and obviously not very very likely based on the numbers alone.

105

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:

[quote]Big_Boss wrote:
Well…say it ain’t so,Mark.

Mark McGwire finally came clean Monday, admitting he used steroids when he broke Baseball’s Home run record in 1998.

I guess getting snubbed for HOF made him come clean. Sucks for him…[/quote]

His lie in deflecting suspicion of his steroid use by letting reports “find” a bottle of androstenedione in his locker and attributing his results to that was the start of the movement against prohormones.

I don’t feel sorry for him. It was snake-like of him to concoct this lie. I am not saying he was obligated to admit to using anabolic steroids – no one is obligated to confess to an illegal act – but that does not exonerate him from that particular deception.[/quote]

He is a piece of shit for wrecking it for us so we can’t use prohormones. MAG-10 was the shit, so was 4AD-EC. They allowed me to meet my physique goals, while still having a life, without having to blow gobs of money on supplements and I had a greatly enhanced work capacity so I made more money at work.

While I can agree that he shouldn’t have to incriminate himself, what I will never forgive is his lying to cover his own ass which directly caused problems for me.

He got rich off of his dishonorable and unsportsmanlike use of steroids, then screwed over people like me who weren’t rich, who weren’t using them to create and unfair advantage in a sport just so he could protect his image for a few years.

He is a dirtbag who needs to make amends.

106

Biotest can sell MAG-10 here in the UK and I can ship it to all of you.

Vindication!

: D

107

[quote]BONEZ217 wrote:
If youre going to claim that steroids were ‘very very likely’ being used in the 70’s how can you not include the 60’s? No major records were falling in the 70’s. There were only a few prodigious power seasons in the 70’s and about the same in the 80’s. Players didn’t even lift weights in the 70’s and only started to in the late 80’s. Steroids were around since the 50’s. So by your logic Mickey Mantle must have hit his 550’ homer with some help.

The average number of league leading homers in the 70’s was around 40 and only one person hit 52, George Foster in a well above average season for him. In the 80’s the average went up to about 43. No one hit more than 49 in the 80’s. Then 1996 rolls around in the next four years McGwire hits 54, 58, 70 and 65!. There’s more to it than just the numbers also. In the 70’s the guys leading the league in homers were considered some of the best hitters and power hitters ever (not all HOFers though). In the 80’s the numbers weren’t special. In the 90’s you have random career .245 hitters like Sosa breaking 60 homers THREE TIMES. Brady Anderson average 22 homers a season and hit 50 in 96. Sure maybe a few guys experimented with stuff in the late 80’s but its clear that the numbers started to become inflated by the mid 90’s.

Caminiti and Piazza played in the 90’s btw. Caminiti is a known drug user and Piazza’s numbers dont jump off the page, not saying that he wasn’t using, no one can know that.

It’s certainly not likely that steroids were pervasive in the 70’s and 80’s and obviously not very very likely based on the numbers alone. [/quote]

This has to count only as second-hand information, and I don’t know how strong a basis he had for saying it, but Dan knew a lot of people.

Duchaine happened to mention to me that there was widespread use of anabolic steroids in MLB and had been for decades. But that the doses were very low (by bb’ing standards.) The purpose was to help endure the physical beating of playing so many games in a season with so little rest time.

If he was correct, which I guess he probably was, then it would be fairer to say that the difference is that previously to McGwire, anabolic steroids weren’t being “abused” in baseball in the sense of being used beyond medical dosages or for the purpose of getting bigger or stronger. As you mention, they didn’t even take weightlifting seriously in the 70s.

108

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
My position on it has long been that it is the business of professional sports organizations as to what rules they should have, with no need for the US Congress to pass laws on account of desires of sports organizations to disallow use of substances by their athletes.[/quote]

I have no problem whatsoever with sports organisations setting the rules of their game. What I do have a major problem with is none of my paycheck comes from MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL etc… I am not one of their millionaire players yet my freedom of choice, quality of life and earning potential is being restricted so that they can have a more marketable, profitable, public image.

[quote]
(This was originally with regard to the proposed and now actual prohormone ban, where a major part of the push to ban them was on account of desire for them to not be used in sports.)[/quote]

You are being diplomatic but lets be honest about this. The prohormone ban has nothing to do with sports. Pro ball players are millionaires who can easily afford to fly down to Mexico for a shot of the real stuff every week.

Prohormones were a cheap alternative to the less desirable compounds that the pharmaceutical industry is selling in the burgeoning hormone replacement market. This is big business using it ownership and control of our government to get laws passed that favor it’s business interests at the expense of the average citizen.

I have no problem with sports organizations choosing to ban the use of substances if they desire, other than that I note that they tend to fail at it in practice, and I have a suspicion that they really don’t want to succeed in ending PED use: they wish only to create the appearance that the use does not exist.

They really don’t want HR’s dropping, Olympic performances falling well behind past years instead of setting new records, etc. This is just opinion: I can’t prove it. [/quote]

Even with drug enhanced players breaking records, baseball was a dying sport. There is a financial incentive for anti doping efforts to not be too successful.

109

[quote]Sifu wrote:

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
My position on it has long been that it is the business of professional sports organizations as to what rules they should have, with no need for the US Congress to pass laws on account of desires of sports organizations to disallow use of substances by their athletes.

(This was originally with regard to the proposed and now actual prohormone ban, where a major part of the push to ban them was on account of desire for them to not be used in sports.)[/quote]

You are being diplomatic but lets be honest about this. The prohormone ban has nothing to do with sports. Pro ball players are millionaires who can easily afford to fly down to Mexico for a shot of the real stuff every week. [/quote]

No, I’m not, but speaking quite literally.

In the USFA meetings with both House and Senate staffers, their concerns were:

#1 Use in sports.
#2 Potential use by teenagers. This really was not expressed as a big concern of theirs, but it was there.
#3 Outrageousness of some advertisements seen in bb’ing magazines

Sports was far and away #1.

As for your theory of the ban being to protect pharmaceutical companies, I’m aware of no evidence of that and don’t at all believe it to be the case.

Now if prohormones really were hurting pharma sales then I surely could see their doing something about it, but there’s no sign that that was happening. Either that they were doing anything about it, or that pharma sales were being hurt.

110

[quote]Alpha F wrote:
Biotest can sell MAG-10 here in the UK and I can ship it to all of you.

Vindication!

: D[/quote]

That’s the new MAG-10 which we can get here too. I was describing the old MAG-10 which I wouldn’t suggest for you to use, because it would put hair on your chest.

111

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:

[quote]Sifu wrote:

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
My position on it has long been that it is the business of professional sports organizations as to what rules they should have, with no need for the US Congress to pass laws on account of desires of sports organizations to disallow use of substances by their athletes.

(This was originally with regard to the proposed and now actual prohormone ban, where a major part of the push to ban them was on account of desire for them to not be used in sports.)[/quote]

You are being diplomatic but lets be honest about this. The prohormone ban has nothing to do with sports. Pro ball players are millionaires who can easily afford to fly down to Mexico for a shot of the real stuff every week. [/quote]

No, I’m not, but speaking quite literally.

In the USFA meetings with both House and Senate staffers, their concerns were:

#1 Use in sports.
#2 Potential use by teenagers. This really was not expressed as a big concern of theirs, but it was there.
#3 Outrageousness of some advertisements seen in bb’ing magazines

Sports was far and away #1.

As for your theory of the ban being to protect pharmaceutical companies, I’m aware of no evidence of that and don’t at all believe it to be the case.

Now if prohormones really were hurting pharma sales then I surely could see their doing something about it, but there’s no sign that that was happening. Either that they were doing anything about it, or that pharma sales were being hurt.[/quote]

I remember how much of a fuss they made about how they had to save the integrity of sports blah blah blah. But that does not disprove the notion that there were business interests driving the ban. The solution that was imposed affected far more people than a hnadful of rich baseball players who can afford to get around the ban and they had to know that going into it.

The ad’s in bodybuilding mags have been outrageous for decades. Remember Biogenics or Joe Weider’s anabolic mega pac’s. There wasn’t any problem when the products being sold couldn’t even remotely live up to their hype.

Whether or not pro hormone sales were hurting the pharmaceutical companies is irrelevant. The law has guaranteed them 100 percent of the legal market. There are now no legal competitors in a market that is rapidly growing as the baby boomers age. Even if pro hormones weren’t taking a share of the market back then who is to say that they wouldn’t be taking a big share today or in the future?

Face it Bill, our government is run by whores. Whores who if they express passion about an issue there is probably money or power in it for somebody.

112

[quote]Sifu wrote:

[quote]Alpha F wrote:
Biotest can sell MAG-10 here in the UK and I can ship it to all of you.

Vindication!

: D[/quote]

That’s the new MAG-10 which we can get here too. I was describing the old MAG-10 which I wouldn’t suggest for you to use, because it would put hair on your chest.[/quote]

No. I was referring to the elusive MAG-10 which, when I joined T-Nation, the men were constantly crying over it and I was always curious wondering what this MAG-10 was ( What were the ingredients? ) and wanting to try it.

You can buy pro hormones in the UK. If you are really really desperate for one, google UK sites, buy and ship to my address and I will mail it to you and you do the same for me: I buy Carbolin 19 and ship it to you and you mail it to me.

We talk and talk about the government - I’d rather unite and beat the politics by mutual civilian cooperation.

113

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:

[quote]BONEZ217 wrote:
If youre going to claim that steroids were ‘very very likely’ being used in the 70’s how can you not include the 60’s? No major records were falling in the 70’s. There were only a few prodigious power seasons in the 70’s and about the same in the 80’s. Players didn’t even lift weights in the 70’s and only started to in the late 80’s. Steroids were around since the 50’s. So by your logic Mickey Mantle must have hit his 550’ homer with some help.

The average number of league leading homers in the 70’s was around 40 and only one person hit 52, George Foster in a well above average season for him. In the 80’s the average went up to about 43. No one hit more than 49 in the 80’s. Then 1996 rolls around in the next four years McGwire hits 54, 58, 70 and 65!. There’s more to it than just the numbers also. In the 70’s the guys leading the league in homers were considered some of the best hitters and power hitters ever (not all HOFers though). In the 80’s the numbers weren’t special. In the 90’s you have random career .245 hitters like Sosa breaking 60 homers THREE TIMES. Brady Anderson average 22 homers a season and hit 50 in 96. Sure maybe a few guys experimented with stuff in the late 80’s but its clear that the numbers started to become inflated by the mid 90’s.

Caminiti and Piazza played in the 90’s btw. Caminiti is a known drug user and Piazza’s numbers dont jump off the page, not saying that he wasn’t using, no one can know that.

It’s certainly not likely that steroids were pervasive in the 70’s and 80’s and obviously not very very likely based on the numbers alone. [/quote]

This has to count only as second-hand information, and I don’t know how strong a basis he had for saying it, but Dan knew a lot of people.

Duchaine happened to mention to me that there was widespread use of anabolic steroids in MLB and had been for decades. But that the doses were very low (by bb’ing standards.) The purpose was to help endure the physical beating of playing so many games in a season with so little rest time.

If he was correct, which I guess he probably was, then it would be fairer to say that the difference is that previously to McGwire, anabolic steroids weren’t being “abused” in baseball in the sense of being used beyond medical dosages or for the purpose of getting bigger or stronger. As you mention, they didn’t even take weightlifting seriously in the 70s.[/quote]

I can easily believe that.

114

[quote]ron-e wrote:

[quote]WestCoast7 wrote:
Steroids cannot help you with pitch selection or bat speed,[/quote]

I tell people this and they think am crazy. The people that never played the game always think that steriods is what helped Barry hit all of thoughs HR’s. It’s years of experience at the plate that helped him.

IMO
[/quote]

I played the game and strength (and hence steroids) would definitely help. They’re not going to make some average guy a pro but they may be the difference between .280 and 25 HRs and .300 and 40 HRs.

As to pitch selection and bat speed, strength helps the latter which indirectly helps the former since the batter has slightly more time before he has to commit to his swing.

115

[quote]Sifu wrote:

Whether or not pro hormone sales were hurting the pharmaceutical companies is irrelevant. The law has guaranteed them 100 percent of the legal market. There are now no legal competitors in a market that is rapidly growing as the baby boomers age. Even if pro hormones weren’t taking a share of the market back then who is to say that they wouldn’t be taking a big share today or in the future?

Face it Bill, our government is run by whores. Whores who if they express passion about an issue there is probably money or power in it for somebody.

[/quote]

Yes, but the financial and power interest was a different one. What you say makes sense in theory, but in practice there was absolutely no evidence of it.

The big lobbying effort was from the USADA (an outfit calling itself the US Anti-Doping Agency) which makes huge dollars out their crusade to stamp out drugs in sports and of course provide testing at huge fees.

Secondly, Congressmen know that Joe Sixpack, for by far the greater majority, will applaud his Congressman working to keep his precious sports pure. So it’s a surefire pleaser for the lowest-common-denominator voter as well.

I appreciate that it may sound ridiculous that “sanctity of sports” was the driving factor, but it was. I was there.

116

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:

[quote]Sifu wrote:

Whether or not pro hormone sales were hurting the pharmaceutical companies is irrelevant. The law has guaranteed them 100 percent of the legal market. There are now no legal competitors in a market that is rapidly growing as the baby boomers age. Even if pro hormones weren’t taking a share of the market back then who is to say that they wouldn’t be taking a big share today or in the future?

Face it Bill, our government is run by whores. Whores who if they express passion about an issue there is probably money or power in it for somebody.

[/quote]

Yes, but the financial and power interest was a different one. What you say makes sense in theory, but in practice there was absolutely no evidence of it.

The big lobbying effort was from the USADA (an outfit calling itself the US Anti-Doping Agency) which makes huge dollars out their crusade to stamp out drugs in sports and of course provide testing at huge fees.

Secondly, Congressmen know that Joe Sixpack, for by far the greater majority, will applaud his Congressman working to keep his precious sports pure. So it’s a surefire pleaser for the lowest-common-denominator voter as well.

I appreciate that it may sound ridiculous that “sanctity of sports” was the driving factor, but it was. I was there.
[/quote]

Perhaps I have underestimated the sheer ignorance of our elected rulers and the average voter. The USADA angle makes sense, somebody stood to profit from it.