Our professional sports leagues and to a lesser degree the college and amateur leagues don't know what to do anymore regarding the misbehavior, performance enhancing drug use and personal illegal drugs used for a "high" by today's athletes.
A-Rod, of the NY Yankees, is one home run from tying Willie Mays 660 total. A-Rod's contract states he will earn a $6 million dollar bonus. The Yankees don't want to pay since he is a proven PED user. His records and career are forever blemished. But they signed the contract knowing he had cheated before the most recent time so I say pay him the money.
Then we have Jon "Bones" Jones, with a slight Rochester, NY tie. He is, no was, the Ultimate Fighting Champion before running into an issue with crashing his rental car into a pregnant woman's car and breaking her arm. He also then ran off before police arrived, but not before stuffing his pockets with the cash he had left in the car. Oh, and let's not forget the marijuana pipe he left in the car. UFC took his championship title away. This is not Jones only known drug problem. In January he checked into rehab for cocaine use, but unfortunately dropped out after just one day. Maybe he should have stayed?
Then we have professional running. Russian marathoner Shobukhova, the female Chicago 2009-11 champion, among other races and the World Marathon Champion (a series of 4 marathons in a year) 2009-2011 has been banned from racing for two years. But what of the $1 million plus she earned from being the World Champion? That's in addition to prize money for winning the races, sponsor's money, and money for showing up to race. The people who finished behind her and didn't test positive lost large amounts of cash. Is that fair?
Kenyan Rita Jeptoo is the latest casualty, though she is still appealing the process. Jeptoo won Boston and Chicago, was the 2014 World Marathon Champion and walked/maybe ran away with at least $700,000. Again the people finishing behind her in races get shafted.
What's the answer? Each league has it's own fuzzy rules. Is marijuana wrong for athletes to use if it's legal in Colorado and soon other states? It should be if you cause an accident just like alcohol, but otherwise maybe not.
PED's are befuddling. Testing costs so much money, is random, and usage can be hidden for years many times, by which time it's too late to correct any wrongs. Every sport, every sport, even ones like golf and the biathlon, have had problems with athletes abusing drugs. I don't see a future where the problem ends.
1 comment:
another good blog, Mike. The problem won't get any better until prize money and subsequent endorsement money must be returned and wins and titles given back. If I win a million bucks from the lotto by cheating and my penalty is a ban from playing the lotto again for 50 days or a year...so what?
If Derek Jeter and the rest of the Yankes were also punished by A-Rod's cheating I think they would have had stopped him long ago.
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