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Steroid use in professional sports thesis
Steroid use in professional sports thesis
Anabolic steroid use among athletes essay
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Drug Abuse in the NFL
It's nothing new for the National Football League's players to be abusing anabolic steroids and other performance enhancing drugs. Drug abuse in the league has recently focused around recreational drugs such as marijuana, cocaine, and alcohol. The newest drug being abused is painkillers. The commissioner and his personal need to change their policies. Will they wait until many more players start to die before they tighten up their drug policies? The National Football League (NFL) can stop most of these drug problems by having more random drug tests given, enforcing stricter punishments when players are caught using drugs, and requiring every team to educate its players annually on the effects and consequences of all drugs.
The number of players abusing drugs in the NFL is increasing every year (www.cbs.sportsline.com). This is concerning because it seems like more and more players each year get caught either using drugs, or being involved in some kind of drug activity. The only drug being used that is on the decline is anabolic steroids. This decline is due to several players in the 1970's and 80's dying before they could see their kids make it to high school. The first player to publicly come clean about being addicted to drugs was Thomas "Hollywood" Henderson. He was a Dallas Cowboys linebacker who played in three Super Bowls. He told the world about his addiction in 1981. He claims that a player using cocaine and marijuana was very uncommon at his rookie season. The more he played, the more drugs he began to take. He claims that since he came clean, the problems have been getting worse. More and more players keep doing drugs even after they hear of players having drug problems. If these...
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NFL should be responsible for the long term illnesses associated with playing the sport. The
The past fifteen years of baseball have contained dirty play by some of the best players to ever play the sport. Kids all over America look at these athletes as role models. The money hungry players proceed to send a terrible message to fans of the game by taking drugs to succeed. After commissioner Bud Selig cracked down on steroid use in 2005, several baseball player’s legacies have been ruined due to steroid allegations. Players are even being charged with perjury by lying to Congress over steroid use to protect their reputation.
Performance enhancing drugs have been a longstanding problem in sports. It not only deteriorates the honesty of the game, but also can have broader social affects that one may not even realize. The use of performance enhancing drugs is especially apparent in Major League Baseball. This problem can be traced back to the 1980’s when baseball was facing one of its first “dark periods”. During the 1980’s Major League Baseball was experiencing a home run drought. Home run totals were down as far as they had been since Babe Ruth, and fans were seemingly becoming bored with the sport. The lack of home runs was a growing concern for players whose salary relied on home run totals. Players needed to find a quick way to boost their power and performance in order to keep the sport alive and to keep bringing in their paychecks. This desire for fame and fortune introduced steroids into Major League Baseball in the 1990’s and 2000’s. Home run totals jumped tremendously during these decades and players were willing to risk being caught using illegal substances in order to shine above the rest. New idols and role models started to sprout up from these outstanding home run statistics and young children started to take notice. This all came tumbling down when these new idols and role models who were making the big bucks and hitting the ball out of the park tested positive for performance enhancing drugs. Here lie the affects of a growing social problem in sports. These famed athletes become walking advertisements and promotions for the use of performance enhancing drugs in sports. The influence professional athletes have over aspiring young athletes is very powerful and these roles models make it seem acceptable to use performance ...
Drug use is happening in the NFL and one of the most heavily used drugs is alcohol. This paper will analyze the effects of alcohol on players and discuss what the NFL can do to better combat the problems of alcohol usage and abuse. The NFL Substance Abuse Policy can be tweaked and modified so it more focused on helping the players, rather than disciplining them. In addition, the paper will discuss the sociological issues associated with NFL players abusing alcohol and the negative impacts this deviant behavior has on society.
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Marcovitz, Hal. How Serious a Problem Is Drug Use in Sports? San Diego: Reference Point Press, 2013. Print.
The era in sports from the late 90s and into the 2000s has often been nicknamed “The Steroid Age” due to the raging use of anabolic steroids and other PEDs (performance enhancing drugs) by professional athletes. The usage of drugs in sports has never been more prevalent during this time, and many people are making it their goal to put an end to the abuse. Influential athletes such as Lance Armstrong, Alex Rodriguez, and Roger Clemens, who were once held as the highest role models to the American people, now watch as their legacies are tarnished by accusations of drug use. The American population, and lovers of sports everywhere, have followed in astonishment through recent years as many beloved athletes reveal their dark secrets. As organizations such as the USADA (United States Anti-Doping Agency) and BALCO (Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative) attempt to halt the use of PEDs, both the drug users and their high-end suppliers work diligently to avoid detection. The use of performance enhancing drugs in recent years has proven to be cancerous to the honesty and competition of modern sports. Although some strides have been made over the past few decades, the use of steroids is in full swing in Major League Baseball, The dangerous side effects of the drugs are often overlooked and many do not realize the message this sends to the youth. The support for halting the usage of PEDs is in need of attention or professional sports will face the loss of all progress made through the past two decades in its war on steroids.
Abstract: Since the beginning of sports competition, athletes have always looked for some kind of edge over their competitors. They will do whatever it takes to be one of the elite, and that includes injecting supplements into their bodies to make them bigger, stronger, and faster. Steroid use is probably one of the most common drug misuses in sports competition. Athletes found that with anabolic steroids, one could become a better athlete twice as fast. Not until 1975 was the drug first banned from Olympic competition because of the health risks it produced.
After thoroughly evaluating the positives and negatives impacting the sport entity, The NFL is really in a tough position by far. More and more players continually are being diagnosed and the worst part about it is, to fix the issue of retired players being exposed to this disease the league must fix its current game. Roger Goodell is in a tough position because like Bernard stated if you are going to practice the “safety rule” in today’s day and age, defensive players are going to be more concerned about getting fined then making the plays for its respective team. The game will lose integrity. The NFL must find a way were it can coup with everything because yes older players are suffering, current players are displeased, but what’s going to happen when parents turn away from football? The NFL may see it’s last snap.
The intent of this essay is to show that steroids have many negative effects and that steroids, and other natural supplements, should be closely studied by the FDA. This essay will also support the claim that the professional sports industry needs to eliminate steroid use and set a good example for younger athletes.
...enon in sports. Some resolutions to this issue include not supporting teams and players that have previously taken steroids by not purchasing their teams or player merchandise. Another solution to this issue in sports is mixing up the times of drug testing throughout the course of a season, making sure the athletes do not know when the tests are coming. Steroids should not be permitted at all in sports and they should incorporate a zero tolerance policy so that if athletes are caught the first time they become banned completely. The game is played fairer and more even when there is a fair playing field and everyone abides by the same rules and guidelines set by the sport. This unleveled playing field has made sports much less interesting for the audience and has a negative impact on sports as a whole. The issue of steroids should be evaluated in sports immediately.
Scott, Michael. “The Use of Performance-Enhancing Drugs in Sports.” The Use of performance-Enhancing Drugs in Sports. San Joaquin Delta College, 2008. Web. 19 June 2013.
Overall, 1,463 young athletes died between 1980 and 2005”(NY Daily News). This is a terrifying statistic and will only continue to rise. On the other hand, Radley Balko, senior writer and investigative journalist at The Huffington Post, participated in a debate about steroids in 2008, he said “As we've seen with government bans on consensual activity -- from alcohol to gambling to cocaine to prostitution -- prohibitions not only don't work, they make the activity in question more dangerous by pushing it underground” (The Huffington Post).... ...
Smith, Chris. "Why It's Time To Legalize Steroids In Professional Sports." Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 24 Aug. 2012. Web. 05 Jan. 2014. .