Chapter[ VII. Major League Baseball and the BALCO Investigation ]
Section[ B. 2. f. Benito Santiago ]
f. Benito Santiago
In Game of Shadows, the authors wrote that when drug testers approached
San Francisco Giants catcher Benito Santiago to collect a urine sample in 2003, Santiago
panicked and fled the clubhouse. According to the authors, Santiago “returned 20 minutes later,
relaxed and ready to cooperate. He had discussed the test with Bonds, he explained. Everything
was fine, he was taking the same stuff as Barry.”349 The authors also alleged that Santiago told
the BALCO grand jury that he injected himself with human growth hormone.350
At the end of the 2003 season, Mike Murphy, a Giants clubhouse attendant, was
cleaning out Santiago’s locker when he found a sealed package of syringes. Murphy brought the
syringes to the training room, handed them to Conte, and told Conte that he had found them in
Santiago’s locker. Conte responded that he “would take care of it.” Murphy recalled that the
Giants’ assistant athletic trainer Dave Groeschner also was present in the training room during
this conversation.
At the time, Santiago was the Giants’ starting catcher and had been named as a
BALCO client in a memorandum recounting the interview of Jim Valente during the federal raid
349 Game of Shadows at 144.
350 Id. at 206.
134
of BALCO’s offices on September 3, 2003.351 Greg Anderson also told federal agents that
Santiago was a client, and in his interview during the federal raid on his condominium he
reportedly said he had supplied Santiago with human growth hormone.352
Conte told us that Murphy did not identify Santiago as the source of the syringes
but instead claimed that Murphy had told him they were found in “the catcher’s locker,”
suggesting the syringes had been found in the locker belonging to Santiago, who was then the
Giants’ starting catcher. Murphy failed to disclose this incident at all during his first interview.
When asked about it again during a follow-up interview, Murphy acknowledged that the incident
had occurred and said that he had told Conte specifically that he had found the syringes in
Santiago’s locker.
The Giants’ assistant athletic trainer Dave Groeschner remembered the incident as
well. He recalled that after Murphy left the trainers’ room, he and the trainers talked among
themselves and decided simply to dispose of the syringes. They did not follow up with Santiago
because they knew he was leaving the team at the end of that season. Santiago became a free
agent after the 2003 season and signed with the Kansas City Royals in December 2003.
Conte did not view the incident as a “big deal,” and he did not investigate the
matter further or report the incident to Giants management or to the Commissioner’s Office.
Likewise, Conte did not confront “the catcher” about the incident.
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