Chapter[ Summary & Recommendations ]
Section[ D. The Rise of the “Steroids Era” ]
D. The Rise of the “Steroids Era”
Reports of steroid use in Major League Baseball began soon after the widely
publicized discipline of Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson at the Summer Olympic Games in
September 1988. Jose Canseco of the Oakland Athletics was the subject of the first media
speculation about his use of steroids, and Boston Red Sox fans taunted him for his alleged
steroids use during the 1988 American League Championship Series.
News reports about alleged steroid use in baseball grew more frequent throughout
the 1990s. In 1996, after a dramatic increase in offense throughout Major League Baseball, Ken
Caminiti of the San Diego Padres was voted the National League’s Most Valuable Player. In a
2002 Sports Illustrated article, he admitted that he had been using steroids that season and
credited them for his increased power. In August 1998, coverage of the issue reached what
seemed at the time to be a peak, when an article reported that Mark McGwire was using the then-
legal steroid precursor androstenedione while chasing the single-season home run record.
With the benefit of hindsight, it is clear that baseball missed the early warning
signs of a growing crisis. Then, beginning in the summer of 2000, a number of incidents
involving steroids or drug paraphernalia came to the attention of club and Commissioner’s
Office officials, and the Players Association. They included:
In June 2000, state police in Boston discovered steroids and hypodermic needles
in the glove compartment of a vehicle belonging to a Boston Red Sox infielder;
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Also in June 2000, a clubhouse attendant found a paper bag containing six vials of
steroids and over two dozen syringes in the locker of a pitcher with the Florida
Marlins;
In mid-September 2000, a clubhouse employee discovered a bottle of steroids and
several hundred diet pills in a package that had been mailed to the ballpark for an
Arizona Diamondbacks infielder;
In October 2001, officers with the Canadian Border Service discovered steroids,
syringes, and other drugs in an unmarked bag that came from the entourage of a
Cleveland Indians outfielder;
In September 2002, a bullpen catcher with the Montreal Expos was arrested for
trying to send marijuana back to Florida with the Florida Marlins’ luggage. He
later told Major League Baseball security officials that he had supplied drugs to
nearly two dozen major league players, including eight players for whom he said
he had procured steroids.
Further inquiries were made in the Arizona and Montreal incidents, but in some of
these cases, little investigation was conducted. Almost without exception, before this
investigation began active major league players were not interviewed in investigations into their
alleged use of performance enhancing substances.
Instead, players under suspicion frequently were subjected to “reasonable cause”
testing for steroid use. Prior to the 2002 Basic Agreement those tests were the subject of an
informal arrangement between the Commissioner’s Office and the Players Association that
involved negotiations in each case as to whether testing of a player would be conducted and, if
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so, when. As a result, when they did occur, the tests were administered long after the allegations
were received, and no suspected player ever tested positive for steroids in these tests.
Commissioner Selig and Rob Manfred both recognized the flaws in “reasonable
cause” testing as it was conducted during those years. In 2002, Manfred told a Senate
subcommittee that the process was “ad hoc at best, and dysfunctional at worst.”9 To remedy the
problems, they focused their efforts on negotiating a comprehensive drug program with the
Players Association which, when it was agreed to, included both mandatory random drug testing
and its own formal procedure for reasonable cause testing.
More recently, the Commissioner’s Office has been more aggressive in
responding to allegations of the use of steroids or other performance enhancing substances.
Examples include:
In June 2004, a minor league athletic trainer discovered a vial of steroids in a
package that had been mailed by a player on a major league 40-man roster.
Manfred and his deputy investigated the incident and negotiated a resolution with
the Players Association under which the player was immediately separated from
his team and was required to submit to a drug test if he ever attempted to return to
Major League Baseball;
In June 2006, the Commissioner suspended Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Jason
Grimsley for 50 games based on admissions he reportedly made to federal law
enforcement officers about his illegal use of performance enhancing substances.
The joint drug program did not expressly provide for a suspension under those
9 Steroid Use in Professional Baseball and Anti-Doping Issues in Amateur Sports:
Hearing Before the Subcomm. on Consumer Affairs, Foreign Commerce and Tourism of the
S. Comm. on Commerce, Science and Transp., 107th Cong. 7 (2002).
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circumstances, but as part of a later settlement the Players Association agreed that
the suspension was appropriate and could be a precedent in the future;
During 2007, the Commissioner’s Office interviewed several players, and to date
has suspended two of them, after news articles appeared alleging their past illegal
use of performance enhancing substances.
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