Off-season thoughts: No one cares about Steroids/PEDs

Imagine one percent of NCAA Div 1 football players are taking them. 128 teams, 85 scholarships = 10,880 players. If one percent were using PEDs, that would be about 108 players.

Imagine, for argument's sake, that a test could identify 5% of users. That would be about 5 or 6 players a year busted. I don't follow this closely, but that seems far higher than what is reported as happening.

This basic math seems to lead to 1 of 2 conclusions: either far less than 1% of college football players use steroids, or testing catches far less than 5% of PED users, to the point of functionally catching no one.

So each school is monitoring this on their own, with very little to no functional oversight from the NCAA. Any way to tell which schools might have less stringent enforcement? Not really, but the chart in the 538 article I linked from a few years ago demonstrates which schools over-performed with respect to their recruiting rankings. (For those interested, of course ND underperformed).

This could be due to excellent coaching, smart scheduling, dumb luck, etc. Maybe even if there were PED use it would not lead to out-performing expectations.

But, given what we know about human nature when it comes to cheating and incentivizing success, it is hard not to suspect that everyone is simply turning a blind eye to what may be a huge issue.

Click here for link at https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/after-signing-day-wisco

Anti-PED is a stupid argument

I met Stan Musial at a signing event in San Diego.

It was the back room of a small card shop in Mission Hills.

Sadly, yet luckily for me, less than a dozen people showed up.
Only 6 of us stayed for the full four hours. It was fascinating.

While everyone was there, one asked what he thought about Steroids, etc.

His comment was, "Hell, in my era, greenies and reds were out on the training table like they were jelly beans. I have no problem with it."

He went on to talk about Greg Maddux (though he called him, "that fella from the Cubs" who was up for induction. "He wears prescription for glasses. Doesn't that mean he has a prescription to enhance his performance? Hell, it was a grind to go out and play 154 games, now it's 162. Let 'em in."

I later shared this with Cal Ripkin. It changed his mind about PEDs.

i read this analysis on another board *

My first thought about Mehki Brown's behavior in the

NC game was "roid rage". While athletes are supposed to be tested during post season bowls, it is random and doesn't include every player. How hard would it be to test every starter from both teams? I honestly don't know.

As with most enforcement of its policies, the NCAA is toothless. While they do conduct random testing throughout the year, it's across all sports so the sample size for football is even smaller.

Deer antler velvet can make you act like that

And it's "legal".

That was a Richard Sherman quality outburst. *

I think Saban put him on a timeout

after he went after a member of the coaching staff.

But he did return in time to one arm slam a Georgia kid to the turf on a kick return.

STARTING DEFENSE!!!! PLACE AT THE TABLE!!

It did have a Lattimer-esque quality to it.

Do they test for anything besides steroids and narcotics?

Would a player get caught if they were taking something like adderall to help understand how to run VanGorder's defense?

Assuming you're serious, one can get a medical clearance

for ADD/ADHD meds.

The NCAA bans the following
classes of drugs:
a. Stimulants
b. Anabolic agents
c. Alcohol and beta blockers (banned for rifle only)
d. Diuretics and other masking agents
e. Illicit drugs
f. Peptide hormones and analogues
g. Anti-estrogens
h. Beta-2 agonists

It's not 1988 anymore. *