Sports need to crack down on drug use

The 1990’s in baseball. For most of us, that is the era we learned about the game of baseball, found our heroes and favorite players and watched with awe as home runs regularly traveled 500 feet.

To any baseball traditionalist, that era has another term. There is no denying it. As 10-year-olds, we watched Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds belt home runs. And we thought it was cool.

Now we know that time by its better moniker: the steroid era. We also see these heroes in a different light.

As Little Leaguers, is there anything the 10-year-old versions of ourselves wanted to be more than the next McGwire or Bonds? Today, there are kids who want to be the next Alex Rodriguez. The influence of drugs in sports and the speculation that surrounds it is striking.

These athletes are role models to children. And they are giving children the misguided thought that performance-enhancers make you a better athlete.

Steroids have major implications on long-term health and also can pose serious side-effects. The last thing that any young athlete should want to do is affect their future health or take such a risk.

Look no further than this past baseball offseason. No new members will join the Hall of Fame because of speculation to steroid use. A Miami clinic is being investigated for possible distribution of performance-enhancing drugs to some of baseball’s top athletes.

And that’s not where it stops. Other sports are now joining the fray. There are top-tier football stars being caught using drugs. There are basketball players who are rumored to have used and even players starting to receive suspensions for it.

Perhaps the greatest athlete any of us have ever seen, Lance Armstrong, even admitted his usage of drugs and doping in cycling. The superhuman are proving to be very human after all.

Sports is turning into something so much more than what happens on the playing surface. Who can we trust anymore? Is anybody making headlines on just God-given ability? And in a field that is so negative, why don’t we focus more on the superstars who are also good role models?

Baseball will always have Derek Jeter, Jim Thome and the other seasoned veterans that are regarded as some of the classiest in the game. But we tend to just look at the negative, the players that take the risk and get caught.

But that is also where sports are starting to make this negative subject a positive one. Drug testing has taken on new life in recent years and now the risk is greater than ever. You can still bulk up on performance-enhancers but you take the risk of suspensions and not being able to play at all.

Testing for drugs has been a blessing to sports, especially for athletes who are still developing at a young age. There is a lot of temptation. But you must pay your dues before becoming a superstar. Nothing, except in rare cases, is instant.

With baseball’s steroid policies leading the way, perhaps all sports are on their way to solving the problem that performance-enhancers and the athletes who made them famous started some two decades ago. And perhaps that means sports are on their way to returning to being solely about the simple things: hard work, dedication and team play to win.