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21–242 PDF 2005

STEROID USE IN SPORTS, PART II: EXAMINING

THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE’S POLICY

ON ANABOLIC STEROIDS AND RELATED SUBSTANCES

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON

GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

APRIL 27, 2005

Serial No. 109–21

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/congress/house

http://www.house.gov/reform

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM

TOM DAVIS, Virginia, Chairman

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

DAN BURTON, Indiana

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

DARRELL E. ISSA, California

GINNY BROWN-WAITE, Florida

JON C. PORTER, Nevada

KENNY MARCHANT, Texas

LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina

CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania

VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina

——— ———

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California

TOM LANTOS, California

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland

LINDA T. SANCHEZ, California

C.A. DUTCH RUPPERSBERGER, Maryland

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont

(Independent)

MELISSA WOJCIAK, Staff Director

DAVID MARIN, Deputy Staff Director/Communications Director

ROB BORDEN, Parliamentarian

TERESA AUSTIN, Chief Clerk

PHIL BARNETT, Minority Chief of Staff/Chief Counsel

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on April 27, 2005 .............................................................................. 1

Statement of:

Stewart, Willie, head football coach, Anacostia High School; Bobby

Barnes, head football coach, Buckeye Union High School; Steve

Courson, ex-NFL player, Pittsburgh Steelers and Tampa Bay Buccaneers; Linn Goldberg, professor of medicine, Oregon Health Sciences

University; Gary I. Wadler, associate professor of clinical medicine,

New York University School of Medicine; John A. Lombardo, NFL

advisor, anabolic steroids and related substances; and Bryan Finkle,

NFL consulting toxicologist on anabolic steroids and related substances ........................................................................................................... 34

Barnes, Bobby ............................................................................................ 37

Courson, Steve ........................................................................................... 41

Finkle, Bryan S. ........................................................................................ 73

Goldberg, Linn ........................................................................................... 47

Lombardo, John ......................................................................................... 64

Stewart, Willie ........................................................................................... 34

Wadler, Gary I. .......................................................................................... 55

Tagliabue, Paul, commissioner, National Football League; Harold Henderson, executive vice president, labor relations, National Football League;

and Gene Upshaw, executive director, National Football League Players Association .............................................................................................. 112

Henderson, Harold .................................................................................... 132

Tagliabue, Paul .......................................................................................... 112

Upshaw, Gene ............................................................................................ 134

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Barnes, Bobby, head football coach, Buckeye Union High School, prepared

statement of ................................................................................................... 39

Courson, Steve, ex-NFL player, Pittsburgh Steelers and Tampa Bay Buccaneers, prepared statement of .................................................................... 43

Cummings, Hon. Elijah E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Maryland, prepared statement of ............................................................ 23

Davis, Chairman Tom, a Representative in Congress from the State of

Virginia, prepared statement of ................................................................... 5

Finkle, Bryan, NFL consulting toxicologist on anabolic steroids and related substances, prepared statement of ......................................................... 76

Goldberg, Linn, professor of medicine, Oregon Health Sciences University, prepared statement of .......................................................................... 49

Lombardo, John A., NFL advisor, anabolic steroids and related substances, prepared statement of .................................................................... 67

McHenry, Hon. Patrick T., a Representative in Congress from the State

of North Carolina .......................................................................................... 180

Porter, Hon. Jon C., a Representative in Congress from the State of

Nevada, prepared statement of .................................................................... 179

Sanders, Hon. Bernard, a Representative in Congress from the State

of Vermont, prepared statement of .............................................................. 30

Souder, Hon. Mark E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Indiana, prepared statement of ............................................................... 19

Stewart, Willie, head football coach, Anacostia High School, prepared

statement of ................................................................................................... 36

Tagliabue, Paul, commissioner, National Football League, prepared statement of ........................................................................................................... 117

Upshaw, Gene, executive director, National Football League Players Association, prepared statement of .................................................................. 137

Page

IV

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by—Continued

Wadler, Gary I., associate professor of clinical medicine, New York University School of Medicine, prepared statement of .................................... 58

Waxman, Hon. Henry A., a Representative in Congress from the State

of California:

Letters dated April 26, 2005................................................................... 11, 168

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 14

(1)

STEROID USE IN SPORTS, PART II: EXAMINING THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE’S

POLICY ON ANABOLIC STEROIDS AND RELATED SUBSTANCES

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 27, 2005

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m., in room

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Tom Davis (chairman

of the committee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Davis of Virginia, Shays, Gutknecht,

Souder, Duncan, Turner, Issa, Brown-Waite, McHenry, Dent, Waxman, Towns, Sanders, Cummings, Kucinich, Davis of Illinois, Clay,

Watson, Lynch, Sanchez, Ruppersberger, Higgins, and Norton.

Also present: Representatives Sweeney and Payne.

Staff present: Melissa Wojciak, staff director; David Marin, deputy staff director/communications director; Keith Ausbrook, chief

counsel; Jennifer Safavian, chief counsel for oversight and investigations; Howie Dennis and Anne Marie Turner, counsels; Rob

White, press secretary; Drew Crockett, deputy director of communications; John Cuaderes, subcommittee staff director; Susie

Schulte, professional staff member; Teresa Austin, chief clerk;

Sarah D’Orsie, deputy clerk; Kristina Sherry, legislative correspondent; Corinne Zaccagnini, chief information officer; Phil

Schiliro, minority chief of staff; Phil Barnett, minority staff director/chief counsel; Kristin Amerling, minority deputy chief counsel;

Karen Lightfoot, minority communications director/senior policy advisor; Brian Cohen, minority senior investigator and policy advisor;

Earley Green, minority chief clerk; Jean Gosa and Teresa Coufal,

minority assistant clerks; and Cecelia Morton, minority office manager.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. The committee will come to order.

Good morning, and welcome to today’s hearing on the National

Football League and the use of performance-enhancing drugs. The

purpose of this hearing is to consider the NFL’s drug policy, how

the testing policy is implemented, how it effectively addresses the

use of prohibited drugs by players, and the larger societal and public health ramifications of steroid use.

Fourteen years ago, anabolic steroids were added to the Controlled Substance Act as a Schedule III drug, making it illegal to

possess or sell them without a valid prescription. Today, however,

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evidence strongly suggests that steroid use among teenagers, especially aspiring athletes, is a large and growing problem.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tells us that

more than 500,000 high school students have tried steroids, nearly

triple the number of just 10 years ago. A second national survey

conducted in 2004 by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and the

University of Michigan found that over 40 percent of 12th-graders

described steroids as fairly easy or very easy to get. And the perception among high school students that steroids are harmful has

dropped from 71 percent in 1992 to 56 percent in 2004.

The reality is parents today are in the unenviable position of

having to add anabolic steroids and performance-enhancing drugs

to their teachings on the dangers of recreational drug use. The Associated Press reported yesterday that an alarming number of

American girls, some as young as 9 years old, are using steroids.

Researchers say 7 percent of middle school girls—7 percent—admit

to trying anabolic steroids at least once. Researchers also say that

while most of these girls were looking to get more competitive on

the playing field, some were just hoping to improve their appearance. Clearly it is time to discuss how we got there.

In light of the societal impact of steroid use, the committee decided to launch an investigation into steroid policies of professional,

amateur, collegiate and high school athletics. Last month we held

our first hearing aimed at evaluating Major League Baseball’s efforts to crack down on steroid use. After that hearing the committee sent letters to the NFL, National Basketball Association, National Hockey League, Major League Soccer, U.S. Soccer Federation, USA Cycling, USA Track and Field, and the Association of

Tennis Professionals requesting information on their respective

steroid policies.

Today’s hearing is based on the information provided by the NFL

to the committee regarding its 2004 policy on anabolic steroids and

other related substances.

The dynamic is somewhat different from what we encountered at

the Major League Baseball hearing. Major League Baseball and the

Players Association greeted word of our inquiry first as a nuisance,

then as a negotiation. In contrast, both the NFL and its players association have worked cooperatively with the committee to educate

us about their policy and the proactive steps the NFL has continued to take with regard to steroid testing. We are appreciative of

their cooperation and their responsiveness.

Drug-testing experts have long hailed football’s testing program

as the top of the heap in professional sports. It’s a policy that the

league and players association review quarterly and improve upon

annually. It’s a policy that has evolved along with advancements

in science and technology. It’s a policy with tough penalties, and

that’s getting tougher all the time. But it’s not perfect, and that’s

one of the reasons we’re here today.

The NFL’s testing program has come under heightened scrutiny

in recent weeks in the wake of news reports that three Carolina

Panther’s players filled steroid prescriptions within 2 weeks of

playing in last year’s Super Bowl.

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Today we will ask some serious questions to find out if we can

make a good policy even better. Most questions will focus on the

what, how and the whens of the league’s testing procedures.

I think we will hear from the NFL and the players association

about improvements they’re making in their policy. I also hope

they will address the steps they’re taking to educate young people,

especially young football players, on the dangers of steroid use;

after all, that’s why we have undertaken the investigation. More

than just the reputation of baseball or football is at risk. Our primary focus remains on the message being sent to our kids, children

who play football and baseball and basketball and soccer, children

who idolize and emulate professional athletes.

Too many college athletes believe they have to consider steroids

if they’re going to make it to the pros. High school athletes, in turn,

think steroids might be the key to getting a scholarship. It’s time

to break that cycle, and it needs to happen from the top down.

We will hear about the vicious cycle and the societal pressures

that fuel it firsthand today from Bobby Barnes, head football coach

at Buckeye Union High School in Arizona. Coach Barnes made the

right decision: He suspended 10 of his players for using steroids.

But some in his community criticized the move, and I can only

wonder how we’ve arrived at a place where the drive to win is more

important to some than not cheating or not risking permanent

harm to your health.

These hearings are the beginning, not the end. Today’s hearing

can give us important information about the prevalence of steroids

in professional football, shine light on the sometimes tragic results

of steroid use by young athletes, and offer thoughts on where to

take our investigations next; thoughts from two high school football

coaches with us today on how to steer kids away from steroids and

what to do when young athletes fall victim to their allure; thoughts

from medical experts about how to better educate all Americans

about the very real dangers of steroid use; thoughts from the NFL

and the players association on how one professional sports league

is addressing this problem, and the need to continually revisit testing effectiveness over time.

Our ongoing investigation already has spawned draft legislation

offered by Mr. Waxman and myself that would create uniform testing standards for all major league sports and associations. We

think this is a critical next step, and we hope to introduce the legislation soon. Senator John McCain is also working on legislation

along these lines.

But our job won’t end when the bill becomes law. Public education and awareness will remain paramount. That’s why I’m

pleased that the advisory committee Mr. Waxman and I announced

at the Major League Baseball hearing is beginning to take shape.

The leagues and players associations are still discussing the nuts

and bolts with each other, but with the leadership of Curt Schilling

and Frank Thomas and other high-profile athletes, I think the advisory committee can accomplish some great things, great things

like getting more than 56 percent of teenagers to understand

steroids are harmful, like getting young girls to find healthy ways

to enhance athletic performance or self-esteem. Like getting all

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sports leagues to acknowledge that their testing programs need improvement.

[The prepared statement of Chairman Tom Davis follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. I now recognize the distinguished ranking

member, Mr. Waxman, for his opening statement.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

This is the second hearing in our committee on the issue of

steroids and professional sports, and this hearing is very different

from the first. A little over a month ago we looked at baseball’s

steroid policies, and Major League Baseball fought us every step of

the way. When we finally got the league’s policy, we found that it

was surprisingly weak.

The NFL has been different. They have cooperated with the committee from the start, and they have a very different steroid policy,

too. There is no question that the NFL has a steroid program that

is superior to the baseball program we examined at our last hearing. The NFL policy covers a broad range of steroids, and its testing is more extensive. And the NFL acted quickly to add substances like andro to its list of banned substances.

This morning the NFL and the players’ association will describe

additional changes to their steroid policy. These are significant

changes that will make a good policy better.

But even the NFL policy—as good as it is—does have holes. I

have questions about how the league treats human growth hormone. And the list of stimulants that the NFL tests is much shorter than the Olympic list. I hope we can explore these issues today.

We also need to explore how the NFL steroid policy is working.

The percentage of NFL players who test positive for steroids is very

low. Is this because the policy is working, or is this because players

have figured out how to avoid detection?

Clearly there is evidence that some football players are trying to

cheat the system. Last month 60 Minutes reported that three members of the Carolina Panthers filled prescriptions for testosterone

before playing in the 2004 Super Bowl. The NFL testing program

never caught any of these players. One possible explanation, they

may have been carefully calibrating their dosage to stay below the

detection threshold.

In 2003, four members of the Oakland Raiders were found to be

using a new type of steroid, THG, that was designed to avoid detection. We need to assess whether these are isolated exceptions or

part of a broader pattern.

As our committee continues its work, I think we should recognize

some positive developments. We had a rocky start with Major

League Baseball, but I am encouraged by our discussions with the

Commissioner’s office and players union since the hearing. Both

are now working with us as we sort through the next steps.

One issue that I raised with baseball I will raise again today;

whether we should have a single tough standard for all professional sports leagues. To its credit, baseball has recognized the potential value of such an approach. Today we’ll have an opportunity

to learn what football and its players association think about this

issue.

I received a letter yesterday from nearly 100 high school baseball

players in New York who were writing to tell me about a new organization they had formed. These were high school baseball kids,

and they formed an organization called HATS, High Schoolers

Against Taking Steroids. These young athletes signed a pledge not

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to use steroids because as they wrote—‘‘We want to uphold the integrity and honor of the sport as representatives of our generation.’’

I would like to make their letter a part of the hearing record

today.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Without objection, it will be entered into

the record.

[NOTE.—The signatures are on file with the committee.]

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mr. WAXMAN. These young members of HATS have the right

idea, but they need our help. If steroids are condoned in sports,

these aspiring athletes and others like them around the country

will be put in a crushing competitive disadvantage. We in Congress

and the representatives of professional sports testifying today have

a responsibility to ensure that this doesn’t happen.

In closing, let me say that I look forward to the testimony today,

and I want to commend Chairman Davis for his leadership in holding this hearing.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Waxman. And I appreciate your initiating this as well.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Henry A. Waxman follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Souder, the chairman of the subcommittee.

Mr. SOUDER. I thank the chairman and ask unanimous consent

to place my full statement in the record.

I would just like to make a few comments. I want to thank the

chairman and ranking member for holding this hearing.

The first hearing we heard these constant critics about why you

are focusing on baseball. Clearly we’re trying to look at the steroid

problem as a whole, but the NFL is not Major League Baseball.

From his perspective, Ricky Williams would have been a lot better

off playing baseball.

We have huge problems in sports. Clearly we have problems that

have already been alluded here in the NFL. But the problems here

are how can we get a tough enough policy to adjust as the steroids

and other body enhancers change their content; as they adjust, as

we do testing, how can we do better targeting, how can we do this

during the season, how can we do this in a logical way as the market adjusts because the incentives to cheat are overwhelming?

Then as chairman of the Narcotics Subcommittee, and Ranking

Member Elijah Cummings and I have been doing—last hearing I

pointed out 27 hearings in 22 months, I think it was, but we’ve had

multiple ones since then. And yesterday we focused on drug prevention and how we handle drug prevention budgets. And what

we’ve seen is the use of steroids among professional athletes is

alarming, but the trickle-down effect on our youth is huge; that the

steroid use among 12th grade boys has been steadily increasing.

Now, the most alarming thing that we look for in drug abuse is

perception of risk, and one of the reasons we’ve made incredible

gains in the last 12 months in States where methamphetamines

have been used and so-called crystal meth is because we quickly

communicate in those zones the perceived risk. And we’ve had a 38

percent reduction in meth once it hits the media, but then it moves

to another market. And right now we’re chasing meth across the

country.

In steroids, we have close to the lowest point ever in the perceived risk in high-schoolers of steroids. We have to change this

perception. We could do drug-free schools programs, we can do prevention and treatment programs, we can have community action

groups, but, in fact, if our professional athletes aren’t clean, and

the example they set is that if you cheat, you might make the

SuperBowl, if you cheat, you might become most valuable player,

that’s going to trickle down to the guys who don’t know if they

quite have that edge.

And this is very important as we pursue this and as today we

continue along the line of how can we make these policies—even

when our heart is in the right place, how can we make them really

effective so we don’t get this inadvertent communication that undermines our ad campaign, that undermines everything else we’re

trying to do in drug abuse.

I yield back.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Mark E. Souder follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And I

thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding today’s hearing examining

the use of steroids in the National Football League and the effectiveness of the NFL steroid testing policy.

Today’s hearing reflects an understanding that professional

sports, at their best, represent more than a game, but an expression of some of America’s most revered principles. It tells us that

we can achieve more together than we can alone, and that our

drive and talent should be the only limitations to how high we can

soar on the playing field or in life.

Unfortunately, our first hearing on steroids use in sports served

as a stark reminder of what happens when a professional athletic

league, that is, Major League Baseball, fails to embrace the very

values that make it America’s pasttime.

As ranking minority member on the Subcommittee on Criminal

Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources, I work along with

Chairman Souder frequently on issues related to U.S. drug control

policy and public health. Although Schedule I substances are the

primary focus of our oversight in our hearings, the dangers associated with substances on other schedules, such as steroids, are just

as real.

Even though some anabolic steroids have legitimate medical use,

abuse of steroids by recreational users seeking increased muscle

growth and enhanced athletic performance can result in serious

health problems ranging from early cardiovascular disease to serious psychiatric side effects, including severe depression and even

suicide.

To minimize the dangers of illegitimate steroid usage, Congress

added certain anabolic steroids to Schedule III of the Controlled

Substances Act. Individuals possessing such drugs without a valid

prescription are subject to a misdemeanor charge, while persons

convicted of distributing, dispensing or selling these drugs are subject to a 5-year sentence for first offense. In other words, it is a

crime.

Unfortunately, today we find that the illegal use of steroids by

professional athletes encourages the perception that steroid abuse

is acceptable. I am here to tell you it is not. The private actions

and personal choices of even a few elite players can reverberate

into the lives of our young people. Let us not forget the families

who testified before this committee about the suicide of their children after using steroids. They attributed their children’s steroid

use and subsequent deaths to the negative examples set by professional athletes.

Unfortunately, while the world of professional sports is increasingly beset by allegations of steroid use among athletes, more families are confronting the use of performance-enhancing drugs by

their children. In just 10 years the percentage of U.S. high school

students reporting steroid use has tripled, and experts believe that

over 500,000 high school students have used steroids in some form.

According to Centers for Disease Control, 1 in 45 high school students reported steroid use in 1993. By 2003, the figure was 1 in

16.

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Given these startling statistics, I was pleased to learn that the

NFL maintains what is generally considered the most effective

steroid testing policy in American professional sports. The NFL recognizes that steroid use among its players sends a dangerous message to our young people, undermines the credibility of the game,

and violates the sanctity of our laws. This steroids testing policy

includes penalties for steroid use, random year-round testing, and

public disclosure for violations. In the past 5 years, only 0.5 percent

of 15,000 NFL players have tested positive.

However, while the NFL’s drug testing policy is strong, it needs

to be one of zero tolerance, and it needs to be air-tight. NFL’s policy fails to meet the Olympic standard in several key areas, from

insufficiently prohibiting and testing stimulants to inadequately

penalizing players who test positive. Allegations that the NFL steroid testing policy may be underestimating the scope of the problem

must be considered in light of a recent 60 Minutes report that has

already been mentioned where three Carolina Panthers obtained

steroids before the 2004 Super Bowl and evaded detection.

I repeat, the use of steroids is a crime, and the use of steroids

is cheating. While I applaud the NFL for adopting a strict steroid

policy, I will continue to push for zero tolerance. Mr. Chairman, we

should not settle for a field goal. American families deserve a

touchdown when it comes to a robust steroid testing policy in professional sports.

And with that, I yield back.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Well, thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Elijah E. Cummings follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Let me ask, we’ve had the chairman and

subcommittee chairman give long, lengthy statements. If Members

would like to take a minute or two so we can move it along, that

would be great. And everybody will get a chance to say something,

and the entire statements will be in the record.

Mr. Shays.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to first thank the National Football League for being so

cooperative in this hearing. It is very appreciated. And I thank you,

Mr. Chairman.

Young athletes are threatened by a cultural tsunami of explicit

rewards and implicit tolerance for pharmaceutically enhanced performance. No testing policy, however tightly drafted or rigorously

enforced, will turn back the tide that is already rising in our high

schools and college playing fields across this Nation if we don’t

change the culture of drug tolerance.

When an admitted steroid user gets taken in the first round of

the NFL draft, and three players from a team competing in the

Super Bowl allegedly obtain illegally filled steroid prescriptions

from a doctor, it is clear a tougher policy is in order.

Professional sports have to lead the way toward a societal policy

of zero tolerance for chemical cheating. Professional athletes are

role models for our student athletes, and until there is zero tolerance for the use of steroids in the professional ranks, there will

continue to be steroids used in our schools.

They can’t hide behind internal work rules and penalties and ignore the broader impact of the win-at-all-costs culture they glamorize. Bottom line, baseball has five strikes and you’re out; it appears

that football has four strikes and you’re out. I think it needs to be

much less than that. Thank you.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

Any statements? Mr. Lynch.

Mr. LYNCH. Mr. Chairman, at the outset I just want to thank

you, as well as Ranking Member Waxman, for your leadership on

this issue.

I think this series of hearings has assisted greatly in bringing

the issue of steroid abuse from the shadows of society to the attention of the media and general public. As is often the case, any potential legislative response to this problem must also include an

educational component regarding the nature and the scope of steroid abuse for society, as well as for professional sports.

Mr. Chairman, I read recently that there is evidence now that

even young girls and young women have turned to steroid use for

weight control and physique enhancement. In light of this and

other reports indicating that steroid use among our young people,

including those who are not athletes, has risen dramatically during

the last decade, part of our role here must be to inform the public

in the process in which we are, ourselves, informed.

In addition, I’d like to thank the witnesses for their assistance

in this effort, and I wish to express my appreciation for Commissioner Tagliabue, and particularly Gene Upshaw from the players

union. As a former president of the Iron Workers Union in Boston,

I have negotiated a number of collective bargaining agreements,

and with respect to the issue of drug abuse, I have always felt that

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the establishment of a clear and no-nonsense, reliable drug-testing

protocol not only served the best interests of the workplace, but

was also essential in terms of setting the bounds of acceptable behavior beyond work. And I compliment Mr. Upshaw on a job that

cannot be easy.

And from what I have seen, Mr. Upshaw’s tenure as head of the

NFL Players Association has been marked by a proactive and cooperative approach, unlike baseball, to protecting his players from

harmful consequences associated with the use of performance-enhancing substances. However, in turning to the specifics of the

NFL’s 2004 policy on anabolic steroids and related substances,

while I agree with the chairman’s assessment that the NFL has

done a better job than Major League Baseball on policing the steroid abuse, I must admit that the bar was set exceedingly low.

While I would like to believe that the problem of steroid abuse

in football has been eliminated—limited to a small number of players, I am not yet convinced. I believe there is evidence that chemists and so-called steroid designers have become more creative. We

also know that testing for the abuse of human growth hormone has

not been addressed by the league, and that no firm timetable has

been set for the implementation of blood testing that would be required.

In addition, in contrast to the World Anti-Doping Agency’s inclusion of about 40 stimulants in its Olympic Code, the NFL steroid

policy bans only eight.

Now furthermore, I’m also concerned by the statements of some

former players indicating that today’s NFL athletes can and are

gaming the system of testing protocols that are currently in place.

And we cannot ignore the fact that, according to recent statistics

provided by the media, while only five players in the NFL were

over 300 pounds in 1985, by 2003 there were 327 players in the

league over 300 pounds. That is an increase of over 6,000 percent

in the span of 18 years. And it’s my understanding that currently

the average NFL offensive tackle now weighs over 300 pounds,

that’s the average.

It is not only that the average player is bigger, but that a very

cursory review of the data also suggests that unlike the rest of the

population, including players of an earlier era, a phenomenon is developing among a certain segment of players in the NFL suggesting

that the time of which these players have experienced this growth

spurt has actually shifted, and while the evidence is largely, at this

point, anecdotal, it is troublesome, and I would recommend that we

as a committee take a closer look.

And last, but important, I believe that if this committee is serious about investigating steroid use among football players today,

well, we should probably start by talking to some of today’s football

players. And regrettably, today’s witness list affords this panel an

extremely limited opportunity in that respect. It would appear that

the investigation today will receive testimony from a player’s perspective that begins in 1967—if you count Mr. Upshaw’s arrival on

the scene—and it ends in 1985 with Mr. Courson’s retirement. Now

that’s it, from 1967 to 1985; that’s what we’re going to hear player

testimony, actual player testimony. And I for one think that what

happened in the NFL in the intervening 20 years is very important

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and quite relevant to this investigation. This is a glaring gap, especially given the depth of the recent hearings with Major League

Baseball, and I think this defect, if it is not cured, will lead the

public to come to question the commitment, thoroughness and fairness of this committee in this process in general.

Mr. Chairman, I look forward to the testimony of our witnesses,

and I yield.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. Sanders.

Mr. SANDERS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And thank

you for holding this important hearing.

The issue here is not just what the NFL is doing, what Major

League Baseball is doing within their own organizations, as important as that is, but it is, in fact, more important is that for better

or for worse, major league athletes, professional athletes, are role

models to tens of millions of kids. Kids look up to them, and increasingly, as we all know, for worse, not for better, we are in a

culture, whether it is politics, whether it is athletics, where winning is everything, and it’s not how you play the game, but who

ends up with the Super Bowl. And if you cheat and if you lie and

if you do all kinds of bad things, that’s OK as long as you win.

And what ends up happening is that mentality trickles on down

to kids who are in elementary school, little girls who do gymnastics, and they look up and they see professional athletes, strong,

tough fantastic athletes, and they say, I’m going to do what those

athletes are doing, even if it endangers my health.

And you see coaches at the high school level who get tremendous

community pressure, you’ve got to within the championship in your

local athletic league, and look away if some of your kids are doing

illegal drugs.

So there is an enormous responsibility on those organizations

like the NFL or Major League Baseball and others for doing what

is right not just for your own athletes, but for millions of American

kids.

So today I thank the chairman and ranking member for holding

this hearing. It is very important for us to see what the NFL, certainly one of the major sports organizations in this country, is

doing to not only protect its own players and its own integrity, but

what they are doing, in essence, for millions of young people in this

country.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Bernard Sanders follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Ms. Norton.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I believe that every

parent in America would want to thank you and the ranking member for the way in which you have brought this subject into the

open so that all of us collectively can do something about it.

I appreciate that Major League Football is here and has been cooperative, and I particularly want to welcome Mr. Willie Stewart

from our own Anacostia High School here in a tough neighborhood

in the District of Columbia where youngsters would be especially

likely to look up to football players. You’ve got a good winning

record as well.

Mr. Chairman, you began with what I used to say when I was

a Chair of the Equal Opportunity Commission; you said, we begin

with the worst first, because that leads others to believe that they

better fall into line before we get to them, and you did that when

you and the ranking member began with baseball. Now we have

come to the best, but not the best it can be.

I appreciate that football has long been doing some random testing on and off season. The nearly perfect record would lead one to

believe that you have not kept ahead of the extraordinary advances

in steroid development and detection. The pressures on the players

simply cannot be discounted. The culture which reinforces the pressure on them, which comes from the fans, comes from the country,

comes from everyone, cannot be underestimated. How to break

through that.

There are real gaps, you’ve heard some of them from my colleagues, insufficient coverage even in what you’ve done in amphetamines, lack of testing of human growth hormone about which our

youngsters hear so much about these days. And I use one standard

through these hearings, and that is, what are we doing this for?

And we’re doing this basically because we’re concerned about what

is happening to young people, about the liver damage and the early

heart damage and the horrible role model that professional athletes

set.

So I exercise a presumption that American sports should follow

the policy America has insisted upon at the Olympics; perhaps

that’s a rebuttable presumption, but it seems to me that if that’s

the policy that we have insisted upon for the world, then it’s very

hard to understand why that policy would not be the same policy

we brought home to America.

Thank you very much once again, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Well, thank you very much.

We have a vote under way in the House, but we’re going to keep

the hearing going. Mr. Shays is over there voting and coming back.

We may have a picture of the House, and Mr. Waxman and I just

said we will forgo the picture this year. This is important for us,

so we will try to keep the committee hearing moving.

We are just really pleased with our opening panel today. We

have Willie Stewart, the head coach of Anacostia High School right

here in Washington, DC. Congratulations on your successful season, and thanks for being with us.

We have Bobby Barnes coming here from Buckeye Union High

School in Arizona. Thank you very much for being here.

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Steve Courson, former NFL player with the Pittsburgh Steelers

and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Steve, thanks for being with us

today.

Linn Goldberg, professor of medicine, Oregon Health Sciences

University. Thank you for being with us.

Gary Wadler, the associate professor of clinical medicine at New

York University School of Medicine. Thanks for being with us.

Dr. John Lombardo, NFL advisor on anabolic steroids and related substances.

And Dr. Bryan Finkle, NFL consulting toxicologist on anabolic

steroids and related substances. Thank you both for being with us.

We are the major investigative committee in the House, so it is

our policy that we always swear everybody in. So if you would just

rise with me and raise your right hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Coach Stewart, we’ll start with you.

STATEMENTS OF WILLIE STEWART, HEAD FOOTBALL COACH,

ANACOSTIA HIGH SCHOOL; BOBBY BARNES, HEAD FOOTBALL COACH, BUCKEYE UNION HIGH SCHOOL; STEVE

COURSON, EX-NFL PLAYER, PITTSBURGH STEELERS AND

TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS; LINN GOLDBERG, PROFESSOR OF

MEDICINE, OREGON HEALTH SCIENCES UNIVERSITY; GARY

I. WADLER, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF CLINICAL MEDICINE,

NEW YORK UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE; JOHN A.

LOMBARDO, NFL ADVISOR, ANABOLIC STEROIDS AND RELATED SUBSTANCES; AND BRYAN FINKLE, NFL CONSULTING

TOXICOLOGIST ON ANABOLIC STEROIDS AND RELATED SUBSTANCES

STATEMENT OF WILLIE STEWART

Mr. STEWART. Good morning to the Committee on Government

Reform.

For the record, I want to state that I do not support steroid use

by student athletes. On the high school level, the majority of student athletes want to attend a Division I school, so the student athlete feels he needs to use performance-enhancing drugs to become

bigger, stronger and faster; in other words, some student athletes

want a quick fix. Unfortunately, there are no quick fixes, meaning

down the road the student athletes who use performance-enhancing drugs are at risk for premature heart attacks, strokes, liver tumors, kidney failures, and other health complications. Really, the

long-term effects of this drug use outweighs the immediate athletic

advantage the student athlete achieves.

There were two instances in which I suspected steroid use by two

of my football players. I noticed an increase in weight and size.

First I questioned them; I then established a counseling program

in which a physician, nurse and athletic trainer discussed the

ramifications of steroid use. One of the two student athletes I suspected of using performance-enhancing drugs died 2 weeks ago of

kidney failure. He was only 28 years old. His death was just a

waste of a human life.

Student athletes look up to the pro athlete as a role model. They

see themselves in the same position in a few years. The clothes, the

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automobiles, the wealth and prestige are the assets they seek.

Given the seriousness of this issue, I urge coaches to get involved

in educating student athletes about steroid use, as well as encouraging them to engage in strength training through the normal progression.

And I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for inviting me this morning.

Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS [presiding]. We thank you, too, sir.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Stewart follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Barnes, you have the floor.

STATEMENT OF BOBBY BARNES

Mr. BARNES. Members of this committee and Mr. Vice Chairman,

I first would like to say that I am very humbled that any member

of this committee would consider what I have to say to be of importance. In no way do I consider myself to be an expert on steroids.

I have my thoughts on what has created the current situation as

it relates to high school kids in general, but my testimony is truly

only personal experience and opinion.

Our experience may not have as much relevance as you would

hope, but I do believe some of the core problems of our experience

are universal and not related to just our community. I believe I

could best serve this committee by answering your questions; however, I will try to give a sufficient accounting of my thoughts

through this presentation.

There is a great deal of blame to pass around as to what I feel

has contributed to the problem. If I were pressed to give a single

most important problem at the high school level, it would be the

loss of accountability for our actions and accepting the blame for

the choices that we make. Parents are not the sole blame for the

final actions of their children, but they are the start of holding

their kids accountable. There are those who sadly make excuses for

their kids and point fingers elsewhere. Coaches are culpable in

their drive for success measured by winning at all costs. The prevailing attitude in many schools is don’t ask and don’t tell.

I believe in our profession, but I know that in many walks of life

there will always be those that do not do the right thing. Peers

place a great deal of pressure on those that might not try steroids,

but for as long as there has been a gathering of youth, peer pressure has played a part in doing the wrong thing.

This brings me to society today and role models. I cannot speak

for the young men who have used steroids to enhance athletic ability, but it is my belief that our kids did not try steroids simply because some professional athlete had. It is my opinion they were

just trying to get bigger, faster and stronger the easiest and fastest

way they knew how. I considered their actions selfish and ill-advised.

In looking at all the circumstances, I believe they never felt that

what they were doing was anybody’s business, and I feel they never

worried about consequences. This area of consequences is very

much a touchy subject for me, and I believe this is where I have

the most to say to this committee.

Almost daily we see and hear through the media that a professional athlete has admitted to or is believed to have used illegal

drugs for the purpose of enhancing physical ability to perform, yet

to this date the consequences of their actions have been mostly

verbal. I do not wish any professional athlete to be made an example of, but if this committee and professional sports wants to see

results, they must come up with a comprehensive punishment

where the youth of today will see that all levels answer for their

actions.

Our kids were given felony charges and dismissed for the remaining seven games of their season. A school within a few miles

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of our community caught football players admittedly using illegal

substances, and they were suspended for two games and had no felony records. I do not believe that our kids or theirs should have

been given felony charges; however, our school followed school policy clearly known by our kids, and I assume the police filed charges

based on the law.

There must be a clear consequence at all levels so that they do

fear not only for their health and safety, but also for what will be

the end result of their actions. Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Barnes.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Barnes follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Courson.

STATEMENT OF STEVE COURSON

Mr. COURSON. First of all, it’s really a privilege to be asked to

be here to talk to you people today. I come from a very unusual

background in this dilemma that we’re talking about. I’ve been a

professional athlete, arguably part of one of the greatest football

teams in NFL history; a strength athlete, steroid user, high school

coach; and I have also given hundreds of steroid prevention seminars in high schools, junior high schools and colleges.

What we’re looking at is a very unpleasant reality of modern

sport. It is something that I believe is as much societal as anything

else.

When we talk about the health effects of these drugs, I myself

have had some heart problems. I was on a heart transplant list for

31⁄2 years, so I’ve had time to contemplate some of my discussions

very deeply, and fortunately through diet and exercise, I have been

able to completely reverse the symptoms of my illness. But when

we talk about health effects, even my health effects and my heart

problems, one of the problems is our lack of long-term research.

And Lyle Alzado, former Oakland Raiders star, and myself, I am

very suspicious of anabolic steroids’ relationship to my illness, and

I will tell you why.

If you understand heart disease, extreme heavy body weights are

a heart risk factor, and I feel some of the body weights in professional sports today, some of these people are going to be facing

some serious health consequences later in life, especially if they

don’t lose weight once they get done playing.

I would also like to talk about the health effects that affect children in particular. Stunting of linear bone growth is probably the

No. 1 thing that I talk about when I do seminars to kids. We’ve

seen the statistics among 8th-graders; we’re talking some studies

saying 80,000 8th-graders. If you’ve ever looked at the faces of 8thgraders and try to imagine the fact that they’re taking steroids, it’s

a very sobering experience.

As far as the NFL goes, anabolic steroid use, to the best of our

knowledge, started back in the 1960’s. In the 1970’s, it is probably

fair to say that every team had a certain amount of anabolic steroid use. At this time this was a result of the competitive aspects

of football, the fact that people were looking for an advanced training way to make themselves better, bigger, faster and stronger.

Again, I can’t underline the competitive nature of the sport, it’s

just the way it is.

But I think what the NFL has done, and to their credit, Bill

Fralic and the NFL Players Association in 1989 approached Commissioner Rozelle and they approached Commissioner Tagliabue

about instituting random drug testing in sport. And the NFL responded, creating the most stringent policy of testing in professional sports as we know it. The question is, is it enough? And I

think the BALCO investigation has shown us that there are holes

in drug testing, as there are holes with the example of the Carolina

Panthers. These we need to work to close.

When it gets down to adolescence, when you think about dealing

with this, I would like to be solution-oriented. I think there are

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things that we can do to help the adolescent problem. I think, No.

1, we need to develop a uniform high school steroid policy that everybody follows. I think No. 2, we need research on improving drug

detection, research on long-term health effects. And I would also

basically encourage legislation to prevent the nonmedical use of genetic engineering and gene doping before it becomes a problem.

I’d like to end with one statement. I’ve given hundreds of lectures and seminars in schools, and the most asked question I get

from kids at the end of my seminars is—far and away what they

ask me the most—they ask me, do I think I could have made it in

the NFL without drugs, and I think that should tell us a lot. Thank

you.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you all for your very honest and helpful testimony.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Courson follows:]

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Mr. SHAYS. Dr. Goldberg.

STATEMENT OF LINN GOLDBERG

Dr. GOLDBERG. Mr. Vice Chairman and committee members, I

am honored to participate in this important hearing. I am professor

of medicine at the Oregon Health and Science University, and codeveloper of the NIDA-sponsored drug prevention and health promotion programs entitled ATLAS and ATHENA for young athletes.

Over 50 percent of students participate in school sports, and

many feel pressured to perform at a high level. The CDC reports

approximately 1 million adolescents have used or are using anabolic steroids, and the latest University of Michigan data reveals

past-year steroid use among 12th-graders has never been higher.

As you’ve heard, steroid use can have significant harmful effects,

including stunted height for growing adolescents; cardiovascular,

kidney, liver disease; clotting disorders; and tumor growth. There

can be devastating psychological disturbances, and, for females,

usually lead to permanent development of male characteristics.

Research has shown certain factors promote or prevent adolescent use of anabolic steroids. Because factors vary by age and gender, a prevention cannot be a one-size-fits-all approach. Those influences include behaviors of high-profile athletes, media images in

advertisements, and, most important, family, peer and coach attitudes and practices. Because teenage habits cluster, those who use

steroids are more likely to use alcohol and other drugs.

With professional and Olympic athletes, what they do does matter. When Ben Johnson broke the 100-meter world record at the

Seoul Olympics, teen athletes reported that Johnson’s use of

steroids positively influenced them to use these drugs in the future.

After Mark McGwire’s use of steroid precursor androstenedione

was publicized, identification with Mr. McGwire was strongly associated with intended use of that steroid hormone. At the same

time, reports revealed quadrupling of andro sales, and national

data showed steroid use to increase among America’s youth.

Professional sports policies can influence performance-enhancing

drug use. While the NFL does have a strong in-season steroid policy and exemplary lab to perform tests, the unfairness of its preseason consequences which allow athletes to continue participating

while on steroids and lack of draft status impact when an athlete

tests positive combined could encourage others to use drugs to enhance their chances to make an NFL team. Furthermore, the lack

of game-day testing and the short list of stimulants are weaknesses

in the policy.

Images influence behavior as well. Each children’s toy, from GI

Joe figures to comic strip characters, have had makeovers reflecting unrealistic muscular body types. The blatant advertising tactic

using the term ‘‘on steroids’’ used to market products from automobiles to running shoes is a strategy suggesting that their product is so superb, it’s similar to being on steroids. No other drug

would be used in this egregious fashion.

Some coaches and administrators deny this problem exists. When

we surveyed coaches about the use of steroids among their athletes,

their response was, ‘‘Not in my school.’’ Coaches reported that steroid use occurred, but only at other schools. Recently a mother who

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reported learning of steroid use at a Texas school was derided by

the coach. School officials did nothing until nine athletes confessed

to use. A Connecticut high school football coach said he feared pressure on his football players was causing some to make unhealthy

choices. Last month six athletes in his school, including those on

the championship football team, were arrested for steroid use and

distribution. Despite this, the school superintendent said, ‘‘This is

not something I believe is a problem on our football team.’’

So how can drug use in teen sports be prevented? In addition to

drug-free role models and national campaigns, there needs to be a

local approach to provide schools with the necessary tools. With

NIDA funding and working with dedicated coaches and students,

we created and studied the ATLAS and ATHENA programs. These

gender-specific, peer-taught and coach-directed programs help students discover how to achieve their athletic goals using sports nutrition and strength training, and how to avoid steroids and other

health-harming substances. We found ATLAS and ATHENAtrained students reduced their performance-enhancing drug use,

including steroids; reduced alcohol and illicit drugs; lowered drinking and driving; and enhanced health behaviors.

Last October, Congress amended the Controlled Substances Act,

listing ATLAS and ATHENA as national models. Although funding

for steroid education is present in that 2004 act, those funds have

yet to be appropriated.

School sports provide an opportunity to influence health behavior. Deterring steroid use and other use requires exemplary role

models, insightful school administrators, educated coaches and

science-based programs that are proven to work. This will create

a positive team environment and promote healthy, well-adjusted

young athletes for the future.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Dr. Goldberg.

[NOTE.—The pictures are on file with the committee.]

[The prepared statement of Dr. Goldberg follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Dr. Wadler.

STATEMENT OF GARY I. WADLER

Dr. WADLER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I welcome this opportunity to appear again before this committee as you further explore

the issue of performance-enhancing drugs in professional sports

and its impact on the youth of America.

I am especially privileged to appear on this panel with two other

physicians with whom I have collaborated in the past and for

whom I have the highest regard, Dr. John Lombardo and Dr. Linn

Goldberg.

As you may recall my credentials in antidoping, I represent the

United States as an unpaid member of the World Ant-Doping

Agency’s Prohibited List and Methods Committee.

Last month, both in my prepared statements and in response to

questions by this committee, I addressed a number of deficiencies

that exist in Major League Baseball’s drug policy. Today I would

like to explore with you some observations concerning the policy of

the National Football League. Before I do so, I would like to state

that, in my view, the NFL’s drug policy is the most comprehensive

of the four major professional sports leagues in the United States.

But that does not mean there is no room for improvement. And I

am confident that the National Football League and the National

Football League Players Association would agree with me on that

point.

For years the NFL’s program has closely paralleled that of the

Olympics, and for that I commend them. However, since 1999, the

antidoping landscape has undergone a sea change, especially with

the establishment of the World Anti-Doping Agency [WADA], and

with the adoption of the World Anti-Doping Code.

In the past 6 years, we have witnessed unprecedented changes

of antidoping initiatives around the world. Now, as evidenced by

these hearings, it’s time for the major professional sports leagues

in the United States to follow suit.

Many of the best elements of the historic Olympic antidoping

programs have been incorporated into the World Anti-Doping Code.

Similarly, many of the successful and innovative elements, the core

of the current National Football League program, should be preserved and integrated into a more contemporary policy. As I articulated during the Major League Baseball hearings, it is my belief

that the World Code and its international standards should serve

as the backbone of enhanced policies and programs in professional

sports. The World Code is the gold standard.

I fully recognize that the NFL’s current policy is not only a product of the league’s unique history on antidoping, but it also is a result of the collective bargaining process. That being said, having

the World Anti-Doping Code as the backbone of the enhanced NFL

policy would only serve to further NFL’s commitment to

antidoping.

Having participated in the drafting of the World Code and its list

of prohibited substances, both of which I distributed to this committee when I last appeared, I would like to emphasize there can

be no shortcuts in documenting the league’s antidoping policies,

technical standards, or list of prohibited substance and methods.

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Simply stated, a detailed and very detailed written policy as exemplified by the World Code is in the best interest of both the players

and the league. Recognizing the delicate balance that exists between drug-free sport and the protection of athletes’ rights, there

can be no room for ambiguity and misinterpretation as doping

cases are adjudicated.

Time does not permit me to detail all the specific issues I believe

need to be addressed in the NFL’s current policy; therefore, I will

highlight but a few, and I’m sure others will surface during the

questions and answers that follow this panel’s opening statements.

With respect to the prohibited list, I believe the NFL and other

major sports should adopt WADA’s list as their own. Regarding the

NFL’s current list, I would like to direct your attention to the section entitled ‘‘Certain Stimulants’’ on page 12 of the 2004 National

Football League Policy and Anabolic Steroids and Related Substances, hereinafter ‘‘the Steroid Policy.’’

As you may recall, I expressed serious concern that Major

League Baseball had omitted stimulants such as amphetamines

from its list of prohibited substances. In my judgment, the NFL’s

steroid policy, as it relates to stimulants, also needs to be revisited

and revised. For example, the policy tends to omit the strongest

stimulants such as amphetamine, yet it includes substances such

as the very mild stimulant synephrine, which still remains categorized as a dietary supplement in the United States. In fact, of

the eight stimulants prohibited by the NFL in its 2004 steroid policy, two are not banned by the World Anti-Doping Agency, while

two others are only prohibited while consumed in large quantities.

It is odd that the NFL policy groups these weak stimulants together with anabolic steroids, potentially subjecting an athlete to

a four-game suspension for taking them. By contrast, WADA prohibits more than 40 stimulants, most of which are more potent as

performance-enhancing drugs than the stimulants banned by the

NFL’s 2004 steroid policy.

Furthermore, unlike the NFL’s steroid policy, WADA only bans

stimulants in competition because of their short duration of action.

However, recognizing that certain stimulants such as methamphetamine, cocaine and ecstasy are clearly drugs of abuse and are not

used to enhance performance, compelling arguments can be made

to treat those stimulants as drugs of abuse.

Offenders would face different consequences as set forth in the

NFL’s other drug policy entitled the 2004 policy and program for

substances of abuse.

However, the converse is also true. That is, if a particular stimulant is primarily used as a performance-enhancing drug, it should

be so categorized and its abuse should carry the same sanctions

that are associated with the use of other performance-enhancing

drugs.

Another subject worthy of consideration by the NFL is the concept of therapeutic-use exemptions. WADA has published an international standard and established a process that allows for

precompetition approval for the use of a drug otherwise deemed

performance-enhancing. Under rigorous medical supervision, this

standard allows athletes with legitimate medical needs to receive

proper treatment without fear of a failed drug test.

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Currently, the NFL’s steroid policy as I understand it grants

such approvals only after the fact. In my judgment, the NFL

should adopt WADA’s therapeutic-use standard in its entirety,

thereby according greater clarity, transparency and accountability.

Two additional subjects I would like to briefly address in my

opening statement relate to two anabolic agents, testosterone and

growth hormone. The recent revelations regarding the use of testosterone by a number of Carolina Panthers provides me with the

opportunity to emphasize to this committee that our limitations in

antidoping in great measure can be attributed to either, one, limitations of policy and/or to, two, limitations of science. Currently, to

test for doping with testosterone, we employ the T/E ratio method,

that is, examining the ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone. The

NFL has recently revisited its standard and adopted one implemented this year by WADA, effectively lowering the threshold for

a positive test from 6:1 to 4:1. This represents a change in policy.

The same subject, doping with testosterone, has also been addressed by the development of alternative technology that does not

use a T/E ratio. This technology is called isotope ratio mass spectrometry, and it represents a change in science. As new drugs and

methods appear that lend themselves to doping, the challenges to

both science and policy will become all the greater.

As my statement draws to a close, I would like to strongly encourage the NFL to implement blood testing, particularly for the

detection of growth hormone abuse. Sadly, growth hormone is increasingly being marketed to young people on the Internet from

sources around the globe. This is an increasingly serious health

concern. Whether the abuse of growth hormone actually increases

strength, improves recovery time or just increases one’s size, there

is a prevailing perception by users that it is performance-enhancing. By implementing blood testing, the National Football League

can send a powerful message both to its players and to its fans that

such behavior is contrary to the spirit of sport and represents a

dangerous threat to the public health.

Finally, I would like to reiterate that, in my opinion, the complexity of antidoping does and will continue to exceed the capacity

of professional sports leagues to design, implement and monitor an

effective, transparent and accountable program. Professional sports

leagues should heed the experience of the Olympic movement,

which recognized its credibility was compromised by doping. By

passing the antidoping baton to WADA and to national antidoping

agencies like USADA, Olympic organizers have been able to focus

their attention on fielding great events rather than on drug science

and policy. With the multidimensional problem of doping becoming

increasingly complex, with gene doping and sophisticated new drug

delivery systems lurking in the not-too-distant future, such a proposition seems not only practical but inevitable. I look forward to

your questions and comments and thank you very much.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Wadler follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

Dr. Lombardo.

STATEMENT OF JOHN LOMBARDO

Dr. LOMBARDO. I would like to thank Mr. Davis, Mr. Waxman,

Mr. Shays and the rest of the committee for giving me the opportunity to speak today.

Since my graduation from medical school, I have had the opportunity to work as a team physician at the high school, collegiate

and professional level, and I’ve served as an adviser to the NCAA,

the USOC and the NFL on various issues. As a practicing physician for over 27 years, I have viewed firsthand the problems with

the trends and issues concerning performance-enhancing drugs and

substances by athletes and nonathletes of all ages. I appreciate the

opportunity to share my thoughts with you concerning these performance-enhancing substances and the NFL’s role in decrying and

deterring their use within the league and by all athletes and nonathletes of any age. There is a segment of our society who searches

for the quick fix, fast-food answer and the magic pill to cure all our

ills. They want to overcome all their obstacles and genetic deficiencies with some type of pill or medication. Winning is the only

goal that satisfies these people, they are prepared to win at all

costs, and to them, the end justifies the means. My judgment and

education has told me that the end-justifies-the-means philosophy

leads to chaos, and that’s where it will lead. Performance-enhancing substances can be a staple in such an environment. With the

popularity of athletes at all levels and the rewards to be gained,

increasing adulation among friends, family, fans and the media,

the use of performance-enhancing substances by athletes can be

very understandable.

However, the use of these substances does not affect only the one

person that uses them. These are coercive. By that I mean that if

one person takes these substances, they force other people in order

to compete with them to take them also. That is the real problem

with these drugs. It is their coercive nature and the way they force

people to do things that they otherwise do not want to do.

On the other side, there are risks to being exposed as a cheater,

being sanctioned, losing a medal or facing adverse effects from

these drugs. These may very well pale in comparison to the young

athlete or any athlete to the potential positive rewards that the

athlete sees. Although we may all understand the athlete’s choice

to use these substances and the reason they do it, we can never

allow this to become an acceptable procedure. The adverse medical

effects of anabolic steroid use can be seen in a number of systems.

They affect the cardiovascular system, the immune system, the

musculoskeletal system, the reproductive system and psychologically. Groups such as adolescents and women have additional

specific adverse effects or consequences in addition to the general

adverse effects. In adolescents specifically, these general effects can

be intensified and magnified by their use of the steroids. If you look

at youth, there are many influences on the youth and on our young

athletes. These include the leaders in various fields, entertainers,

athletes, parents, coaches, peers, older friends and schoolmates. It

is difficult to say whether the reported actions of a professional

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athlete, the pressure of parents and coaches to succeed or the examples of older teammates or friends are the major influences on

the use of performance-enhancing substances. They all are influences.

Another important issue with adolescent steroid use is the significant percentage of nonathletes who use steroids not for a

competive edge but to attain the well-developed, muscular look.

This is not only young men but young women also who are less

likely to be influenced by anything that a professional athlete or

college athlete does or by anything that is sanctioned by some

world agency or any league.

Human growth hormone is another issue that has presented

itself to us, and it sets a new set of problems. Human growth hormone, which is not a controlled substance as are anabolic steroids,

is widely available through America on the Internet, through prescriptions by physicians, shipped across borders to institutions,

companies and to individuals. The obtained substances may be

human growth hormone or may be some counterfeit substance.

There are anecdotal reports of the use of human growth hormone

by athletes including NFL players. Light may be shed on these reports through ongoing investigations. However, attempts by us and

other organizations to assess the scope of human growth hormone

use have yielded little data and clarity. When compared to the effectiveness of anabolic steroids, the efficacy of human growth hormone to performance enhancement is not as well accepted either

scientifically or anecdotally among athletes. More importantly,

when it comes to human growth hormone, the adverse effect profile

of this substance is severe. It can have a severe effect on the heart,

liver, spleen, kidneys and other organs and systems. The credibility

of the medical and scientific community, lost early on the steroid

issue, is dependent upon accurate information, on effectiveness and

adverse effects. Care must be taken not to give inaccurate information concerning human growth hormone.

With steroids, the adverse effects are real and could be severe.

But the incidence is low and may occur later in life. This can be

a potential problem that the users don’t see these problems in

other people, only the positive effects. To combat this issue, a

multipronged approach must be used. A program must be developed that has a policy which is accepted by all involved parties and

which defines the goals of the policy, the banned drugs and the

other parts of the program. There must be an educational component which includes education about the drugs and the policy, testing, discipline and the availability of assistance to those who have

medical and psychological problems. Testing is a major weapon in

the arsenal of drug abuse. The amount of testing must be sufficient

so that the athlete does not know when the test may occur. The

test must be sensitive enough to identify the banned substances,

and the discipline must be severe enough to make it undesirable

for the athlete. I do not believe the number of positives is a good

indicator of a successful program as is the number of repeat offenders. When this number is low, it reflects an understanding on the

part of the players that the consequences of use, loss of pay, loss

of playing time, other embarrassment to themselves and their family outweighs the benefit of use.

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The NFL’s policy on anabolic steroids represents a cooperative effort between the NFL and the players association. The policy is

founded on three important principles. The maintenance of the integrity of the competition, a level playing field and protecting the

health and safety of the players, while most importantly setting an

appropriate example for our Nation’s youth. All the elements of an

efficient, fair and adaptable program are present. These include:

unannounced annual and random testing both in and out of competition, players are eligible to be tested at any time throughout

the year; stringent and exacting collection procedures, state-of-theart analytical procedures using the same laboratories that are used

by other testing programs including WADA; a comprehensive list

of prohibited substances, masking agents and methods; strict liability standards for violations; and a mandatory suspension without

pay upon first violation.

Throughout the past 15 years, all aspects of the NFL’s policy

have been regularly reevaluated by the NFL and the NFL Players

Association in consultation with a variety of leading experts, and

changes have been made to maintain a thorough and effective program. This is achieved by monitoring the latest scientific and technological advances; investigating reports of use patterns and new

substances; and acting quickly to make appropriate changes when

the evidence supports them. The policy works because the leadership of the NFL and the NFL Players Association view themselves

as guardians of the game of football and accept all the responsibilities which accompany this role.

Without reservation, I am proud of my involvement with the

NFL’s steroid policy and have every belief that it will continue to

be among the best and most effective in sports. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Lombardo follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

Dr. Finkle.

STATEMENT OF BRYAN S. FINKLE

Dr. FINKLE. Thank you, Chairman Davis, Mr. Waxman and

members of the committee.

I, too, very much appreciate the opportunity to participate in today’s hearing, and I certainly applaud the committee’s interest in

the NFL’s steroid testing program and its potential for adverse impacts on the young people of the United States.

By way of brief background, I am a scientist. For more than 40

years, I have been a forensic toxicologist with a continuing experience in toxicology of substance abuse and at least 20 years of involvement in sport antidoping toxicology. My association with the

National Football League’s steroid policy dates from its inception,

some 12, 13 years ago. Currently I serve as the chief forensic toxicologist for the National Football League’s steroid performance-enhancing drug program, also the substance-abuse program, for

which I have been jointly selected by both the league and the National Football League Players Association. I am responsible for all

technical aspects of the programs, including oversight of the laboratory performance, quality control and interpretation of test results.

I also provide support to the substance-abuse treatment program

and manage research studies designed to evaluate new analytical

technology and ways to improve testing. The NFL’s steroid policy

is a carefully crafted, thoughtfully negotiated program which is designed to detect and prevent substance use and abuse. It has

evolved over more than 10, in fact almost 13 years to its present

level of sophistication. Importantly, the policy is a living document.

It is one that requires mutual effort and agreement of the league,

the players association, the players themselves and the teams. The

laboratory analysis of urine specimens for which I am responsible

to detect prohibited drugs and their metabolites is just one essential part of an overall comprehensive program. It cannot stand

alone. Analysis not only can accurately identify drugs that are

being used but acts as a deterrent, creating the risk of being detected and the adverse consequences that occur as a result to those

who might otherwise wish or attempt to cheat. Scientifically, the

program features an extensive testing protocol which is followed

rigidly involving detailed procedures for specimen collection, defined analytical methods and blindfolded control processes. These

practices follow closely, very closely, those recommended by the

World Anti-Doping Agency and the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, and

I am confident that they would satisfy any reasonable review. Importantly, through periodic review of these methods and processes,

systematic improvements have been made to the program over the

last several years. This flexibility for program assessment and policy change is a very important feature of the NFL’s programs.

For example, working with scientists at the UCLA Olympic laboratory, we have taken advantage of new and refined techniques

for detecting many new substances and have introduced new forms

of testing to assist the detection of exogenous testosterone use. In

addition, we routinely consult with a variety of outside experts to

assist us in addressing specific concerns. This happened when the

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concern came up with the effects of ephedrine use on heat and hydration issues associated and also with growth hormone. While the

range of substances specifically banned by the NFL is less extensive than WADA, the NFL prohibited list is designed specifically

for football. Unlike WADA, which is responsible for monitoring use

in perhaps as many as 100 diverse different sports across the world

year round, the NFL monitors a relatively small population of athletes with common characteristics. They are young males with exceptional strength and speed. And we monitor drugs that influence

their performance goals.

Accordingly, the program as designed is based upon the intelligence and experience gained within the last 10 years and is tailored to meet the league’s goals of protecting the health of its athletes and preserving the integrity of the sport. The NFL banned list

is wide ranging. It is continuously reviewed and frequently revised.

The testing of these substances requires exacting forensic and scientific standards.

Currently, however, there is only one WADA certified laboratory

in the United States—that is the Olympic laboratory at UCLA—

that can routinely meet these standards of practice. In order to address the need for additional laboratory capability and capacity, the

NFL has joined the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency to fund the development of a new laboratory. It is the Sports Medicine Research and

Testing Laboratory located at the University of Utah. When fully

operational next year, it is anticipated it will be WADA certified

and will work in close collaboration with the Olympic lab at UCLA.

It will have the most up-to-date instruments and technology and

will be staffed by experienced analysts and toxicologists. In addition to testing, a primary function of the laboratory will be to conduct sponsored research studies to broaden our understanding of

performance-enhancing substances and to develop new analytical

methods. It will also be available to assist other sports programs.

The NFL’s collaboration with USADA to fund testing and research is unique in the United States and is evidence of its serious

intent to address steroid and other substance abuse issues as they

affect the health of athletes and the sport. So, in summary, for the

past 15 years, the NFL has had a comprehensive testing program

for the detection of steroids and other performance-enhancing substances. It is founded on the best science and technology and is bolstered by the continuing cooperation of the league and the players

association. Overall, it represents a proactive effort to eliminate the

use and associated health risks of performance-enhancing substances from its sport.

I would like to add just a couple of sentences based on something

we’ve already heard this morning. Let me emphasize for the committee, since I have the responsibility, amphetamines, methamphetamine and its analogs, are strictly banned by the NFL, and

they are tested for routinely in our programs. Their use is illegal

without a prescription. Team physicians act responsibly in these

matters. The inventories of amphetamine type drugs that are available on prescription to teams is audited and supervised. There is

some doubt in football from a pharmacological-toxicological point of

view whether amphetamines are indeed performance-enhancing,

but they are certainly misused and abused as substances of abuse,

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and we test for them. We test for them also in the window. Someone mentioned game day. It is possible on occasion to test on game

day, but in any event, we test within the window of time that

would allow us to detect the use of these substances in a carefully

designed program. Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Finkle follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

I want to thank all of you very much. Let me start with the

coaches. How prevalent is steroid use? Each of you have had some

experience with your players. How prevalent is it, and where do

they get it?

I will start with you, Coach Stewart.

Mr. STEWART. Mr. Chairman, again, I’ve only had two instances

where I’ve detected steroid use. Other than that, pretty much nil.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Do you have any idea where they got it?

Mr. STEWART. Not really. Because, again, both young men denied

even taking the steroids. So I have no idea where they got their

hands on it. But I would say probably—they were both weight

lifters. They lifted weights on a regular basis. So I presume they

got them around the weight lifters they were participating with.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Barnes, any idea?

Mr. BARNES. Yes, we know where our kids got their steroids.

They admitted to that in our meetings that we had. They went to

Rocky Point in Mexico, which is close of course to where our proximity is, and were able to buy them freely. There was just a story

that I saw on television, I don’t remember which one it was, that

talked about they even have doctors down there that give prescriptions if they want to try to make it look as legal as possible. That’s

all they do is give prescriptions for steroids and illegal drugs. It’s

freely purchased there.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. How many players did you have to discipline in the end?

Mr. BARNES. We had 10 that were removed from our football

team in that first year as a head coach. That was quite an experience for me.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. How did the other kids react to it? Did

they get the message?

Mr. BARNES. Well, the other kids were just like our whole community. This was a difficult situation. We all have to remember

that we were on the front end of exposure nationwide. I know that

there’s been steroids long before this happened to our high school.

But it hasn’t come to the forefront from a media standpoint as

often as it has in the past year or 2 years. So suddenly our school

became popular, and this of course has created a difficult situation

for our community because the parents are tired of the media attention that they’ve gotten. At the same time, I think that we have

a lot of parents that understand the importance of what happened

and the ramifications. There are many parents that are going to be

very unhappy that I’m here.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. They need to understand you’re here

under subpoena.

Mr. BARNES. Yes, they understand.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. I don’t think it’s a reflection on your community. In fact, you handled it right. You probably did more to prevent it.

Mr. BARNES. We have many people that are proud of the fact

that we took a problem and did something with it. It’s not just

those that are upset with the way that we handled it. There are

things that happened that it’s probably not important to this committee because it’s our own internal little problem of how things

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were handled. For instance, parents were very upset that, when I

did the interview process to get them to tell the truth, that they

weren’t allowed to be a part of the process. We could speak on that

forever. But the bottom line is, you know, there’s a lot of energy

being spent where parents I think need to be talked to about enabling their kids by saying, you know, that’s not the problem, what

you did, the problem is the way they wouldn’t let us come in there.

That energy that’s being spent, I think, could be better spent on

making our kids understand that their health was at risk here.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. Courson, you had a very successful NFL career, including

playing for a Super Bowl championship team, and you’ve been very

open about your steroid use during your playing days. Could you

try to elaborate on the steroids you used, the health problems you

suffered as a result?

Mr. COURSON. As far as my heart health problems, again, that’s

very unclear. My doctors, we don’t know. I’ve always said that I believe that they contributed to my health problems, and the reason

I state that is, if you understand heart disease at all, increased

body mass is a risk factor. That’s just a common understanding

with heart disease. The thing that I experienced from the shortterm standpoint was the increased aggressiveness. The thing I

guess that was the most addicting aspect for me about them as a

former user was the way they enhanced my training. In other

words, you almost develop a love-hate relationship. You love what

they do for your training, but you hate compromising yourself to

gain the advantage from a drug.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. But it did give you a considerable advantage, didn’t it?

Mr. COURSON. That is probably the most difficult aspect from a

competitive standpoint with this dilemma for athletes in general.

They work. And they work dramatically well.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Is it possible to get the same level of

achievement through ordinary means without taking steroids?

Mr. COURSON. All things being equal, someone who’s genetically

blessed, the drugs will always provide an example. You cannot

train to the same degree. You can make tremendous gains without

them, but the person who’s using, everything being equal, is always

going to have the advantage, in my opinion.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you. And thank you for sharing

your story with us.

Dr. Goldberg, you mentioned in your testimony that the Atlas

and Athena programs have been effective and successful in promoting healthy lifestyles and preventing steroid use. How many high

schools are currently implementing either Atlas or the Athena programs, and have they been adopted by high schools nationwide?

And why aren’t more schools using the program?

Dr. GOLDBERG. Good questions. First, there are about 60 schools,

I believe, across the country and more are doing it. We just had

100 curricula purchased in Texas. We’re going to Connecticut in 2

weeks for 60 coaches. I was just in Ohio last week with another

15. I think part of the hearings that you’ve had has increased and

highlighted this problem. Dr. Elliott and I are professors of medicine, and we’re not really marketing the program, so really people

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have to look at the model programs list to see whether they want

it or not. We implemented it in five schools in Nashville, TN, 2

months ago. So there is an increase, but that is coming more in

dribs.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

Mr. Waxman.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to thank all the members of this panel. I think your testimony has been very, very helpful. I do have some questions, and

I want to pursue them.

Mr. Courson, I guess my bottom line question to you is, in your

judgment, can players evade the current testing system? And if

that is so, that leads to a lot of other questions for you and the doctors. But what is your opinion of that?

Mr. COURSON. Well, I’ve written and stated publicly since 1988

about the various loopholes in drug testing. Obviously, we all know

about growth hormone. We also know about low doses of testosterone. The Balco investigation has probably exposed probably the

most dangerous threat to drug testing yet, and that’s designer

drugs. When you alter—basically when you alter the molecular

structure of a drug where you render it undetectable, undetectable

means undetectable, and that is a real challenge for Mr. Blotner

and his people without question.

Mr. WAXMAN. What changes would you recommend in order to

stop this kind of evasion?

Mr. COURSON. Well, what I would do personally, if I were boss

for a day, what I would do is basically help the U.S. antidoping

commission as far as funding to improve the technology, to basically deal with an ever-changing landscape. That also means the

threat of gene doping. That technology is here. It’s a matter of

what we call the diffusion of innovation. Who’s going to be brave

enough to try it?

Mr. WAXMAN. What percent of the football players, professional

football players do you think are using steroids today?

Mr. COURSON. That would be very hard for me to determine.

First of all, I’ve been out of the game for 20 years. I’m not around

those guys. I don’t train with them. But we do know that, of course,

drug testing has loopholes. We do know the intense pressure that

players are under. I think the NFL is doing the best job that they

can do with the technology at hand.

But, then again, when you look at the size of players today; diet

and training hasn’t really changed. So it would lead me to believe

that it’s out there, and that it is prevalent. To what degree, I don’t

think we’ll ever know, especially when you recognize the individual

and institutional denial associated with the use of these drugs.

Mr. WAXMAN. The NFL reported in the last 5 years that less

than 1 percent of players have tested positive for steroids. On the

other hand, some people are saying they are evading them, as you

think along those same lines. Former Olympic antidoping official

Robert Voy estimated in 2001 that one-third of NFL players were

using steroids. And current broadcaster and former Kansas City

Chief Bill Maas recently suggested that use has increased to levels

above those in the 1980’s before the league had a policy in place.

Does that sound like an overestimation to you?

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Mr. COURSON. Would it surprise me? No. Do I know that? Can

I quantify that or qualify that? No. I wouldn’t be able to say simply

because, again, I’m not around those players. But, then again, we

have to recognize the fact that line of scrimmages are bigger than

ever. And I think—to be honest with you, I think one thing the

NFL may want to consider—and I know the league is not going to

want to hear this—but maybe a weight limit in time.

Mr. WAXMAN. A what?

Mr. COURSON. A weight limit in time, especially with genetic engineering around the corner.

Mr. WAXMAN. What do the doctors think about these points that

Mr. Courson has raised?

Dr. Lombardo.

Dr. LOMBARDO. I think, on the aspect of size, I think you have

to look at the players. If we have a problem in the NFL, it’s the

same problem we have with the youth and with society in general.

It’s called morbid obesity. The game changed. I was a team physician for Ohio State for 14 years. In those years, I watched the linemen change from lean, fast people to people who were fairly big,

fairly heavy, extremely heavy, somewhat obese, because the nature

of the game changed.

The Pittsburgh Steeler line of the seventies that Mr. Courson

played on played a different type of football. If you watch the way

the game is played at the line of scrimmage, they have big people

who just get in the way and move people a little bit, and that’s the

name of the game. It has gone all the way down to high school. If

you look at the McDonald’s high school all American team or the

Parade high school all American team in the line, they all average

over 300 pounds. So this is not something that happens and blossoms when they arrive in the NFL. This is a problem all through

football and the game of football and the way it has changed. In

order to combat that, the people on the other side of the ball have

to have just the same amount of mass to hold the line of scrimmage.

Mr. WAXMAN. I guess the question I would have of you, and if

others can comment on it in whatever time I may have available,

is this just a natural phenomenon or is this the use of drugs? We

don’t see 300-pound roly poly players. We see 300-pound pretty

strong, muscular players. So the number of football players that

are much larger than the past is clear.

Dr. LOMBARDO. I’m not so certain that you see the 300-pound

muscular players as much as you would think as much as the 300-

pound roly poly players. I think we need to look at the body fat

level of the players, and either one of us would be deemed to be

correct on that. But I do think that’s a potential, whether it’s drug

use or whether it’s the nature of the game. If it is, like I said, these

previous players arrive in the league at 300 pounds, they don’t

come in the league and then become 300 pounds. As far as the percentage of the people who use drugs, I think anybody’s estimate is

what I call the guesstimates of people, because they have no idea

what the percentage of drug use is in the league, and I would never

hazard a guess as to what the percentage of drug use is in the

league. I just know that the testing we use is the same testing,

same analytic procedure, everything the exact same as used by

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WADA and every other doping agency. So, therefore, if there’s a

problem, it’s a problem that’s science-wise and not just programwise.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you.

Because my time is just about out, Dr. Wadler, do you believe

this testing regime that NFL has is stringent enough for amphetamines and other stimulants?

Dr. WADLER. I think I need to clarify that, and perhaps the NFL

could clarify that. They actually have two drug policies as I understand it. They have a drug abuse policy which deals basically with

what we might consider recreational drugs. Then they have their

steroid policy which deals with the sanctions and penalties as opposed to treatment. The first one, as I understand it, is to get people help if they have a problem with methamphetamines and

things of that sort. As I understand it, the steroid policy which lists

the eight stimulants is inadequate because those are not the stimulants we see in terms of performance-enhancing drug abuse. There

we’re talking 40, 50, at least. In fact, as we sit here this morning,

there’s a meeting going on in Montreal that they have devoted to

just what stimulants should be on the list. So that amphetamines,

in my view, and the related stimulants belong together with the

other performance-enhancing drugs and should be dealt with with

those consequences, because the use of those drugs are for treating,

they’re for gaining unfair athletic advantage. People who have

problems with MDMA, ecstasy, meth and so on, that’s a different

issue. So I think it needs greater clarity. And it may be true.

There’s a consequence if you’re caught in this policy or that policy

but if we’re talking about performance-enhancing drugs, the policy

as it is written is inadequate. It really does not address those stimulants which enhance performance or are thought to enhance performance for which there should be significant sanctions.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you very much.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. Souder.

Mr. SOUDER. Thanks. I have a number of questions, but I want

to followup directly on that one. Dr. Finkle also said he didn’t believe that amphetamines may actually work as a stimulant in football, and you just used the phrase that people may think work. Do

you believe they do or don’t, or could you enlighten us a little on

that?

Dr. LOMBARDO. First of all, the basis for something being on the

list doesn’t mean it necessarily works. There’s a question whether

growth hormone actually works. So that has never been a sole criteria. We use actually three criteria. The potential to enhance performance, the risk to health and violating the spirit of sport. In

terms of amphetamines, there is a long history going back about

amphetamine use in sports. Certainly, we know about it in baseball. We talked about it previously. Its effects, for example, increased arousal, increased alertness, increased reaction time, increased eye-hand coordination, weight reduction. I can go on. They

mask fatigue. They mask pain. They have been a quintessential

drug for years in sports. The first reported deaths ever in competitive athletics were two cyclists in the sixties from heat illness from

taking amphetamines. The ultimate question of whether there’s deVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:42 Jun 28, 2005 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00088 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\21242.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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bate as to how effective they are I really think is misdirecting the

nature of the discussion. That is not the criteria.

Mr. SOUDER. Let me say, for a lack of a better word, a super

Notre Dame hotdog, that I’ll take a couple of 280-pound guys that

can block Michigan as opposed to a rolly polly 300-pound guy. But

let me ask this fundamental question, are you in effect saying, any

of you, and I have another question, I’d just like somebody to react

to this, that often you hear an athlete comes out of high school, and

they haven’t had the correct weight training going into college.

Usually the 300-pound guys are already there. If they can play in

the NFL, they’re there in college, that you can’t get up to 300

pounds with going to year-round weight training using things that

are legal and that you have to use an illegal substance? In other

words, is weight not really a criteria here? It’s just if it’s sudden,

if it’s out of the size characteristic that body might be able to carry

or is this something over 4 years you can actually buildup and

change your body structure through legal substances that aren’t a

danger to your health other than that you may become obese later

on in life if you don’t readjust?

Dr. LOMBARDO. I think if everybody would just go back to the

time when they were 17 and think of the weight and size you were

when you graduated high school, or 18, and think of what you

graduated college at, and then what you are right now. Your body

undergoes tremendous change all through your life. Probably the

single biggest time of change is as you go through puberty and as

you go up to about the age of 22 which is why you see a lot of times

people come in as freshmen, they’re big, they may be soft, and they

firm up a little bit and gain weight. Part of that is the natural

weight gain you’re going to get with proper nutrition and with

weight training. So you can get up to that point without the use

of drugs. I firmly believe you can, if that’s the goal and that’s the

place you want to be.

Mr. SOUDER. In fact, one of the challenges of competitive sports

is that, in anything highly competitive, you kind of distort your

body characteristics. I think it’s fairly safe to say that most Members of Congress, if they weren’t ADD before they became Members

of Congress, they developed those characteristics after they’re in.

That we certainly have certain things that we have to get much

more fine tuned. An athlete who’s a runner is going to get his leg

muscles disproportionate to the rest of his body if he’s going to

work his legs aggressively. The question is, are you cheating or

doing things that are inordinately damaging to your health that

aren’t recoverable and where are those lines? The implication here

was, is that it can’t be done naturally and what you just said as

I understood it was that there is a logical body weight, but we’re

obviously going to push these guys past their logical body weight.

It’s how far can you go for how long and how do you do that and

in that type of question as far as testing.

I want to make sure I get this question in to Dr. Finkle. Do you

believe the problem was much greater before your policy went in?

Dr. FINKLE. Yes, without question. I was first involved with the

National Football League as a consultant during Commissioner

Rozelle’s time in the 1980’s, and it was freely known and acknowledged and addressed during the last years of his tenure as commisVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:42 Jun 28, 2005 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00089 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\21242.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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sioner that there was a very serious problem and health problem.

He set in motion, it was picked up by Commissioner Tagliabue

when he came into office, to address that problem. So absolutely

the problem was much worse a generation ago, and it is under control now. It is not perfect. We still have serious problems, but it

is under control now.

Mr. SOUDER. I want to ask this question. Last night on ESPN

Outside the Lines, Super Bowl XXX, 9 years ago, most valuable

player and Dallas Cowboys cornerback Larry Brown said he believes that 40 percent of the players in today’s NFL are using

steroids. He has been here long since the time that you were. Do

you believe that statement has any logic in fact? Is it possible that

40 percent of the players could be getting through? If you can just

elaborate on that.

Dr. FINKLE. Anything is possible, of course, but I’m a scientist.

I like to see data. In this world of substance abuse and social

issues, we’re constantly faced with anecdotes, stories, news stories.

I’m not saying that the people who make these statements don’t believe them. I’m simply saying that, when challenged, usually when

challenged to produce the data or the foundation for their opinion,

it is sadly lacking. The consequence of that is that I greet with

great skepticism what I read for the most part as off-the-cuff statements like that unless I can see some data to support it. And I

know of no such data.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Let’s turn

to the issue of penalties. The NFL policy calls for a four-game suspension for a first violation of the policy and a six-game suspension

for the second, each without pay. I understand that these suspension periods are not insubstantial in light of the relatively short career of NFL players. However, these penalties are much lower than

the standards currently in place for Olympic athletes which require

a 2-year ban for the first violation and a lifetime ban, which I like,

by the way, for the second. Moreover, under the NFL’s policy, players who test positive during the preseason must serve their fourgame suspension during the regular season but are allowed to

practice and play with the team during the remainder of the preseason.

Dr. Goldberg, do you think that the NFL should incorporate the

WADA penalty scheme into the policy for anabolic steroids and related substances?

And then, I would like to know what you think, Dr. Wadler.

Dr. GOLDBERG. I have a little different opinion. If I were the king

and said that I wanted to try and erase anabolic steroid use in any

team sport, the Olympic model is a paradigm for individual athletes. You’ve got swimmers, wrestlers, boxers, track and field. And

so the penalty goes to that individual and rightly so. You’ve got a

team, and sometimes teams and team ownership can try to coddle

a player, protect a player. If you’re going to really try to get at the

heart of the issue, I think, if I were king, that I would construct

a team penalty where it could impact on draft choices, where it

could impact on win-losses, and there would be a team penalty. If

there were a team penalty, then you would have—the teammates

would exert peer pressure on the other teammates who were posVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:42 Jun 28, 2005 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00090 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\21242.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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sibly users. You would also see management effect a change among

those individuals. So if I were the king and I wanted to eliminate

it, I think that would be the best way.

Mr. CUMMINGS. While you’re up there in the king’s seat, would

you—let’s hang right there. Would you also give a penalty to the

player?

Dr. GOLDBERG. Oh, absolutely. But I’m saying that, in a team

sport, which is a very different paradigm than an individual sport

which WADA is enforcing, and these are makeshift teams when

they’re put together, when we have USA Basketball or USA Baseball, they are diverse people and they’re not working together. But

we have essentially a business in baseball, football, basketball,

then we’re talking about a real team, with management.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I have to ask you this. You just said something

that was very interesting. You said the management or whatever—

I am not trying to put words in your mouth so you correct me if

I am wrong—tend to coddle players. What does that mean?

Dr. GOLDBERG. I can just go back to my own experience with a

player who trained in our laboratory in the 1980’s. He went to his

NFL team. He made the team, and then he called me up, and he

asked me about using steroids. I told him not to use steroids. His

wife called a few weeks later and told me she found a bottle of

steroids in the bathroom with his jersey number on it. So that told

me something about the use back then. I know there have been

changes. But often people try to protect their own kids, parents,

coaches, and there’s a halo around them. As I described when we

talked about our coaches, when we said, are kids using steroids on

your team, they said, not in our school, not on my team, but other

teams are using them. So I think that’s sort of a natural habit to

coddle, to put a halo around the athletes that you deal with. And

sometimes you feel they wouldn’t do that when in fact they are.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Dr. Wadler.

Dr. WADLER. Yes. With respect to the world antidoping code,

there is a section on consequence to teams, article 11, which I will

not bore you with. But it does make provisions for target testing

where an individual team member tests positive. So there is some

provision for it. There’s another element to this which I think is

worthy of at least some discussion. That deals with the hearing

process when one has a positive test. I understand fully the nature

of the collective bargaining agreement between the players association and the union, but there are sports—I cite men’s professional

tennis as an example—using the WADA example whereby there is

a process in which the vested interests of management and the

players have an arm’s distance relationship and the decisionmaking to go through a hearing or an adjudication process. I think

that ought to be looked at. I certainly understand the complexities

of collective bargaining. But, for example, let me cite men’s professional tennis. I know they are going to appear before you at some

point. If management found a positive urine test in a professional

tennis player, that ultimately would go to a tribunal independent

of the management of the sport, independent of the union of the

sport and the experts in that case, a doctor, a lawyer and a forensic

scientist, would review the evidence and make a decision. That

would be the sanction. It deals with the issue of any appearance

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of any other interest that you may have been alluding to and removes it.

It’s complicated and certainly complicated in the context of collective bargaining, but I think it would enhance public perception that

everything is out in the open. I’m not suggesting everything is not

out in the open, but there is always the perception. I think some

of the questions today alluded to the perception. Do we think it’s

going on? My answer to that, by the way, it’s what we think that

doesn’t matter. It’s what we know that matters. And what we know

really has to be embodied in a comprehensive testing program.

That’s why I feel the world antidoping code is in fact the gold

standard we should use to find out the questions rather than speculation.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you. Before they go, just one other

question for Dr. Lombardo.

In an AP article this morning, the chairman of WADA, Dick

Pound wonders that if 9-year-old girls are taking steroids just to

look good, then what are the odds that the enormous players in the

NFL are on steroids? That is a question he would like to ask the

NFL medical advisers, and since he couldn’t be attending, I’ll ask

it for him. With everybody doing the things that are going on, why

don’t we catch more people?

Dr. LOMBARDO. I could turn that around to any testing situation.

Why doesn’t any testing situation catch more people? On the one

hand, Mr. Cummings is talking about a zero tolerance policy, stopping the use, eliminating the use. On the other hand, you want to

judge a program by the number of positives that it has. I think

there’s a little contradiction there. And I think that one of the

things we have to look at is these people are going to cheat. The

majority of players that test positive in the NFL have a reason that

they are, that’s the only chance they have to make it in the league.

That’s the reason. It’s not the star players who are setting records,

and they’re tested a phenomenal amount of times using the same

strict analytical procedures that Mr. Pound’s organization uses. We

use the same analytical techniques. We use the same labs. We use

the same testing procedures, same collection procedures, same substances and essentially come up with our results. So, again, I do

not think that the number of people that are caught is an indicator

of the prevalence of the problem nor do I think it is an indicator

of the success of the testing program.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Let me say this. I understand that testing

now occurs on a random basis throughout the week. Is it true that,

previously, testing was limited to a certain day of the week?

Dr. LOMBARDO. No, it’s been probably 8 years since we changed

that. Everybody has to be tested the day after the game. And then

they can be tested any other day the remainder of the week.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. How long does it take to get a steroid out

of the body?

Dr. LOMBARDO. It depends. That’s a very difficult question. It depends on what you use, how you use it. There’s no average. I think

it would give you a false sense of what the problem is if we——

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Could it be 12 hours?

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Dr. LOMBARDO. It would be very difficult to say something is

going to get out of your body and not change your profile within

12 hours.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Yes, Dr. Wadler.

Dr. WADLER. I want to emphasize something I mentioned before.

The limitations of policy and the limitations of science. I think

most of us are concerned regarding those individuals who are taking testosterone below the level which you can detect it using T/

E ratios. By narrowing the window from 6:1 to 4:1, the likelihood

of finding somebody is greater.

But the concern I have and others have is that there is this pretesting going on by athletes who are learning how to keep their

ratio, say at 4:1, keeping it at 3:1. We see this in another form of

drug abuse, with EPO where red blood counts are very carefully

monitored just below the detection. So if I were to cheat and I can

find a laboratory that would monitor my blood or my urine and

constantly tell me, I could run 3:1 using patches and creams, not

injections, so I have an even level, I’ll beat you every time. That’s

a real concern. And that’s a limitation of science. Not a limitation

of policy. That’s a real issue and probably one of the most important issues in terms of the National Football League.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Dr. Finkle.

Dr. FINKLE. I would just like to respond briefly to that. Yes,

there is indeed a limit of science, and indeed the athletes who are

intent upon cheating and using testosterone can get up to all kinds

of quite sophisticated ways to defeat the test. But some have suggested that our testing program is not sufficient with respect to

testosterone, and I would like to just try to alter that perception

a little bit. The fact is that no testing organization has more stringent tests than the NFL for this particular steroid. We have adhered strictly to the same testing standards as WADA and the

Olympics. We used the 6:1 ratio when it was standard for them

and for us. When the Olympics moved to 4:1, we moved this January. After bargaining and discussing with the players association

and the league, we moved to 4:1. And we would be willing to

change it as our science permits us to do so. We have discussed

this issue and agreed to adopt the new and more stringent standard. Any suggestion that the prior NFL standard of 6:1 was higher

than what was allowable by the Olympic standard is simply not

correct.

The NFL also pioneered, by the way, the use of highly sophisticated tests that you heard earlier, CIR, carbon isotope ratio analysis. We use that. We use it in the UCLA Olympic testing laboratory

in our program. We use that test data to confirm tests that show

that T/E ratios exceed our threshold. This is the same protocol

that’s followed by other antidoping agencies, including WADA.

Let me say, with respect to people that may use creams with testosterone and have very low levels of testosterone in their body,

yes, they may well and probably will on occasion come in with a

test that we cannot at the laboratory by our criteria report as positive to our medical adviser or to the league. That is a true statement. On the other hand, even recently, where there have been low

levels allegedly used of testosterone, we see aberrations in urine

profiles, and we monitor those players through Dr. Lombardo in

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the future. So the players are not entirely beating the test in the

way that they would like to think all of the time. But it is a limitation of science, and we do the best we can with the science and

technology available to us.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much.

Mr. Sanders.

Mr. SANDERS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I think we all understand that this is a complicated issue. We

understand the limits of science. We understand false positives, etc.

But in terms of policy, let me just ask a very simple question, picking up on a point that Mr. Cummings made a moment ago. That

is that, under current NFL policy as I understand it, players who

test positive during the preseason must serve their four-game suspension during the regular season, a four-game suspension and

that, if they are found positive again, it is a six-game suspension.

Given the severity of what we are discussing today and the seriousness of the issue, I think many people would say, excuse me, some

guy has been found using steroids and what you’re saying, making

millions of dollars a year, you’re going to lose a little bit of money,

but no problem, you come back, and you’re using it again, you’re

only going to be suspended. Some people might think that this is

a fairly weak policy. Could we get some response to that?

Dr. FINKLE. Frankly, I think it’s draconian.

Mr. SANDERS. You think it’s draconian.

Dr. FINKLE. I do indeed. If somebody said to me, as an employee,

I was about to lose, first offense, at least 25 percent of my gross

income and not be able to practice my profession for almost a quarter of my season in this case, that is a very, very serious penalty.

Mr. SANDERS. But if somebody told you, if there’s a kid three

blocks away from here who’s dealing in drugs and is arrested, that

kid also pays a pretty serious penalty. That kid goes to jail for

years and his life is destroyed. He doesn’t make millions of dollars.

I don’t quite understand that answer. What we’re talking about is

people doing illegal activity, and you’re saying, it’s weak? I would

respectfully disagree with that.

Dr. GOLDBERG. If I were to violate the law in my practice of medicine, I would not be able to practice medicine. It would be more,

I am sure, than one-fourth of my year of practice.

Mr. SANDERS. Anybody else want to comment on that? I think

the American people might think, and again understanding that we

want to make sure that the testing is right and people have the

right to appeal it, and we have independent testers. But on the surface—and please explain to me what I’m missing, because I surely

disagree with Dr. Finkle on this. If a guy is found using an illegal

substance, money is taken away from him; he is not paid for four

games. Then he’s back, and he does it again, and all we’re doing

is suspending? I think most Americans would say that’s kind of a

slap on the wrist.

Mr. COURSON. I think one thing that’s very evident from the

baseball hearings is that athletes in general don’t comprehend that

breaking the rules is also in this day and age breaking the law.

Mr. SANDERS. That’s a very good point.

Mr. COURSON. We see that throughout the sports world, not just

in the NFL.

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Mr. SANDERS. Yes. Dr. Wadler.

Dr. WADLER. I think we have to ultimately be serious about this,

to paraphrase Mr. Selig. There needs to be zero tolerance, and

there have to be consequences, provided we have a fair hearing

process.

Mr. SANDERS. Absolutely.

Dr. WADLER. That’s very, very—I cannot emphasize that enough.

Assuming a fair process, the entire process, and somebody blatantly cheated using anabolic steroids or growth hormone, I personally believe there should be a 2-year suspension.

Mr. SANDERS. You think that the current policy is too weak?

Dr. WADLER. Not only in football, I think in any of the sports

we’re talking about. If you took anabolic steroids, cheated and went

through a hearing process, defended yourself, the whole 9 yards,

and at the end of the day, you were guilty, I think the consequence

should be 2 years.

Mr. SANDERS. Our high school coaches, do you want to comment?

Mr. BARNES. Mr. Courson brought up a great point from our

standpoint. Our kids aren’t sure that they did anything wrong still

to this day.

And they believe that what they did was personally for their

gain, and that it didn’t have anything to do with the outside world

feeling like they broke a law. Our kids knew that the school policy

was you don’t use steroids; our kids knew that it was against the

law to use steroids, our kids broke the law and broke a policy, but

to this date, I don’t really feel like they have focused on the seriousness of what they did and the ramifications that it has had for

not only our community and our kids, but this is all a part of what

we’re all here for. What caused this? How do they see this.

Do we blame professional sports? Our kids don’t. I don’t believe

professional sports had anything to do with our kids using steroids.

Do role models create a problem? Yes, they do. And for any of these

gentlemen to say that role models are not responsible are incorrect.

They took that position, maybe not willingly, but it is given to

them, it is thrust upon them. And yes, NFL players, professional

baseball, Congressmen, our Senators all are role models to our

kids. Our kids don’t say a football player was a role model and this

is why I did this. You could ask them, do you have another role

model, and it could be a teacher, it could be a Congressman, it

could be those kind of things.

But what he had to say was correct, they’re invincible, they don’t

feel like healthwise they’re going to get hurt, and they don’t feel

like they’ve really broke the law because they see things out there

that there has been no punishment.

Dr. GOLDBERG. Can I make a comment? The problem is sort of

a trickled-down effect where we get from professional and highprofiled athletes down to the high school level, and I have worked

with high school kids all over the country. And the problem is—

and Chairman Davis asked me the question about our Atlas and

Athena programs, why aren’t they in a lot of places. Well, a lot of

these schools can’t afford new books, and they don’t have the

money for programs.

In the Anabolic Steroid Control Act of 2004 there is an education

policy, and there is money devoted to education for steroid use, but

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no money has been appropriated by Congress. You’ve got it in the

act, but there is no appropriation. So as long as that continues, you

are not going to get the high quality education efforts in the high

schools.

Mr. SHAYS [presiding]. OK, thank you.

Ms. Brown-Waite.

Ms. BROWN-WAITE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

You know, when we started talking about steroids, I was kind of

nonplussed by it; but my grandson, who is like a super soccer star,

I start talking to him about it, and he said oh, yeah, he said in junior high. So I would ask the coaches, do you think that maybe we

have the focus on the wrong ball of maybe going after marijuana

and alcohol in the schools, as opposed to also looking at far-tooearly in-life use and even exploration of steroids?

When he made that comment to me, he said everybody wants to

be like the big superstars, whether it’s soccer or whether it’s baseball or whether it’s football, and if they think even remotely that

they can achieve that. It was at that point, Mr. Chairman, that I

realized how important these hearings are. So I’d like to ask the

coaches if maybe they think we’re—no pun intended—but if we

have our eye on the wrong ball.

Mr. STEWART. I think they need to widen. They need to widen

beyond marijuana and alcohol because a problem exists. And personally, I wasn’t really abreast on steroid use until I lost the young

man a few weeks ago. And so I think we need to broaden the field

to include performance-enhancing drugs; because again, so many of

the athletes have aspirations to get to that level. And lifting weighs

twice a week—Kenny Barnes can attest to this, lifting weights

twice a week and running is not fast enough. They want to speed

it up, so they take the route of using the performance-enhancing

drugs to get to where they want to be.

Mr. BARNES. Well, I agree with Coach Stewart. There is no profound answer to your question because there is a pursuit of who

do we go talk to to keep these things from happening from our education process today. It’s not as though we’re out there blindly letting kids do things and our educational system doesn’t care. I see

a lot of programs in our area where they’re concerned about these

things that are going on and they’re attempting to communicate

with the youth of today to try to stay away from these things. How

much more media attention can there be right now on the BALCO

situation, and especially in our community? To be honest with you,

we’re very tired of the attention that we’ve got in our little community because it’s as though that’s all there is to our community.

So the media is doing their job of giving us all there is to know

that there is a problem right now.

Ms. BROWN-WAITE. Can I ask a followup question?

Mr. SHAYS. Your green light is on.

Ms. BROWN-WAITE. Tell me what steps the education system is

really using; do you have film strips, do you have people come in

and talk to the students? What exactly is being done to discourage

this kind of steroid use in schools?

Mr. STEWART. Well, I brought in a medical staff, a certified athletic trainer, school nurse and our team doctor, and they discussed

the hazards of using steroids. And again, most of our kids believe

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that nothing is going to happen to them, they are invincible; but

we all know 5 years from now, 10 years from now, 15 years from

now, they’re going to have a problem.

Mr. BARNES. Our programs are pretty much left to each individual school, but the AIA, which is Arizona Interscholastic Association, requests that we spend as much time as possible on talking

to kids about the problems with drugs, etc., and that’s on a complete community of the school, it’s not just about football players

or athletes. So I want to make it quite clear that it’s not just a football or baseball or basketball situation, it’s important to all of our

students and our student athletes. So we focus on trying to talk to

the kids and give them—for us and our football program, we have

a meeting each year—which I’ve got to be at tomorrow at 7

o’clock—and we talk to our parents, we make sure that we meet

with our parents and we say here is what we need to watch out

for. So we’re active and proactive with this stuff. There are schools

that I know of in Arizona that are trying to be proactive.

Dr. GOLDBERG. Can I make one comment? Film strips, doctors

talking, lectures don’t educate kids about drugs, they just don’t.

Just say no does not educate kids about drugs, it has to be delivered, I think, by kids delivering them to kids who are training with

the coach support, I think that is the only way you can do it. And

that is what the paradigm that we use to reduce alcohol, illicit

drugs and steroid use.

Mr. COURSON. I’d like to answer your question, also. I had 7

years of high school coaching experience myself, so I can really relate to the two gentlemen here on what they deal with firsthand.

I think one of the issues I think we really need to look at—and

this is more from a philosophical standpoint—part of the problem

that we have with all performance-enhancing drugs deals with the

win-at-all-costs mentality. And I think what we really need in our

school sports is a change of philosophy where coaches, administrators, basically we want to put the intrinsic value of sports on a pedestal equal or perhaps above winning. And what I’m saying is the

game of football has taught me some great lessons, not to quit, prepare for success through hard work, being a team person, all of

those are valuable tools in the game of life, but when we hire and

fire coaches even at the high school level based on winning and losing, our coaches don’t get the opportunity to basically prepare kids

for life. I think we should look at our high schools and our junior

highs as training camps for life. And until we can address that

philosophically as a country, we’re going to have a very difficult

time in addressing this issue.

Ms. BROWN-WAITE. Thank you.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much.

Dr. LOMBARDO. Can I just say one thing to followup with that?

Mr. SHAYS. Yes, of course.

Dr. LOMBARDO. Just something everyone can identify with. What

is the first question you ask your child when they get home from

playing a game? Did you win? That simple question tells the child

exactly what’s important in the games. Without a doubt, that’s the

first thing—and if you ask a group of parents, they will deny it,

but it’s the first thing they ask them. If you don’t change that,

you’re not going to change this problem one bit. And I really—I

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firmly believe that and agree with Mr. Courson on that, that until

we change that win-at-all-costs philosophy, we’re never going to

solve this problem.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you very much.

Mr. Lynch.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Dr. Lombardo, I’d like to start with you. I’ve been trying to get

a complete copy of the collective bargaining agreement—Mr. Chairman, I don’t know if I need to make a request for that, I didn’t see

it in the documents that we requested it for the hearing, but maybe

that is best in the hands of the commissioner in the next panel.

But in the parts of the collective bargaining agreements that I’ve

been given, I don’t see anything in here that says that upon a positive test there will be public notification.

Dr. LOMBARDO. I’m not sure if it’s in the policy, exactly as those

words in the policy, but there is public notification of a positive

test.

Mr. LYNCH. Where does that come from?

Dr. LOMBARDO. It comes from the league office, and the commissioner can address that.

Mr. LYNCH. Is that memorialized somewhere, that there shall

be——

Dr. LOMBARDO. I’m not sure if that’s—again, I don’t know specifically if that line is in the policy, he will be able to answer that.

Mr. LYNCH. I know you’re involved in the whole testing policy

and you’re central to that. I mean, when is the—well, maybe I

should leave that for the next panel.

Let me move on. Mr. Courson indicated earlier today that in

2004 there were 350 players over 300 pounds. If you compare in

1983 there were 5 players, and in the last year there were 350

players over 300 pounds, I want to read you something that Dr.

Frank Katz, who is an expert in human physiology and he has formerly consulted with 5 NFL teams, he indicated that the only way

to explain this startling increase in size is steroid use. He said, ‘‘No

one can prove it and no one is going to admit it, but how else can

you explain it, there are just too many guys who are too huge.’’

Going from 5 players in 1983 who were over 300 pounds to 350

players who are now over 300 pounds, is something going on here?

I’m going to ask the other gentlemen as well.

Dr. LOMBARDO. In 1983 the rules of football were that you could

not use your hands to block, you had to have your hands in close.

Somebody over 300 pounds would not have been able to play the

game of football at that time.

If you look at college weights, those have significantly increased

over the same amount of time. If you look at linemen weight in

high school, they have significantly increased over the same

amount of time. If you look at the body composition of these professional football players, these are not your 12 percent body fat, 300

pound behemoths that are artificially induced, many of these are

25–30 percent body fat, obese individuals who are playing a sport

that is now designed for a large person to play and being opposed

by a person who is the exact same nature to stop them from moving.

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Mr. LYNCH. So let me get this straight. You’re saying this is because we are selecting big people, we’re not building big people.

That is your statement there——

Dr. LOMBARDO. They’re selected from high school——

Mr. LYNCH. That this 6,000 percent increase from 1983 to today

is because we’re picking people, and we didn’t need big football

players in 1983, we need them now.

Dr. LOMBARDO. In high school they’re selecting them to play,

they’re selecting them in college to play that, and those same individuals are coming to the National Football League over 300

pounds, yes.

Mr. LYNCH. I heard you say that earlier.

Now, do you track these—I mean, from what we’re seeing, it’s

not only that they’re bigger, but at a certain period in their lives,

in their young careers, they’re actually getting very big very fast.

Do you track these kids from high school? Do you have some data

there what the kid is coming—weighing coming out of high school?

The colleges, you get a lot of your players out of colleges, they track

the weights of their players and then you get them, do you track

these players to see if there is any unusual spikes in their weight

and their growth?

Dr. LOMBARDO. I was the team physician for a high school for 27

years, I’ve been the team physician for Ohio State University for

14 years prior to this, and working with the NFL for many years,

basically they’re spikes—they’re not spikes that come up as you follow a player’s career, they gain weight as they go overtime. Watch

them as they come in as freshman, they’re 260, 270 pounds, then

as they get to be seniors, juniors, they’re up to 290, 300 pounds or

over. Some of them come to the college at 300 pounds and they

move up. I don’t think that is an indication of steroid use, I firmly

believe that the majority of the reason for that is the fashion of the

game will give those people who are that weight, that size an advantage, and that’s what is used.

Mr. LYNCH. Dr. Wadler, what are your thoughts on that, those

numbers and the statement of Dr. Frank Katz, the consultant to

5 NFL teams?

Dr. WADLER. Well, certainly it raises questions clearly, I mean,

those shock anybody. But I certainly expect the experience that Dr.

Lombardo has seen at the high school, collegiate and professional

levels. But certainly it is something that needs to be studied. We

need to know more about the body composition of the league athletes in football, we need to know the same with body fat and body

mass; and I think we need to have an air-tight testing program regarding drugs, including growth hormones—speaking of size—

which means blood testing, which is still not implemented in the

NFL.

So I think we’ve got to do all of those things. Clearly it’s an

unhealthy situation on the merits of the weight alone, but clearly

we need to understand how much of this is related to nutrition and

related matters, how much of this is related to drugs, how much

of this is related to steroids, how much of this is related to growth

hormone; and I still would like to get back to the growth hormone

because I don’t think we should walk away from this so easily.

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Mr. SHAYS. Sir, your time has expired. You have gone a minute

over your time. The Chair would recognize Mr. Sweeney.

Mr. SWEENEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And welcome to all of

you.

As one who has worked pretty extensively on this issue for about

7 years, the better part of 7 years, since I’ve been here, I’m very

happy to be part of this. I will say it’s pretty obvious that there

is a lot less stress or antagonism in this hearing than there was

a couple of weeks ago with baseball, and I think that’s a direct acknowledgement of the work that Commissioner Tagliabue and Mr.

Upshaw have done, and I congratulate you on that. But I also really want you to understand that we need more—there is a long way

to go. And it starts with this notion that there really needs to be

independent oversight in some places.

And I agree with you, Dr. Goldberg, we need an education program. I had an approps bill this year—here’s the catch in my problem, it ought not to be all on the taxpayers. Professional sports entities, recognizing that they’re in the business to make money, have

resources, they also have some responsibility, if not, indeed, culpability here, and we need them to step up to the plate. I know the

NFL has done some things to help certainly with USADA and expanding its technologies, but we need to do more.

Let me get to the independent oversight pieces, and I want to

talk to Dr. Lombardo and Dr. Finkel specifically about it. And this

relates to some of the recent history that we’ve had in all sports

as it relates to medical staffs. We know at the University of Washington a physician, a volunteer physician loosely affiliated with

their athletic department was passing out—was convicted of passing out and overprescribing medications.

We know that the doctor in South Carolina that’s been accused

of prescribing steroids to the three Carolina Panthers, while not affiliated with the team, that allegation is out there, it taints the

good work that’s been done, and makes us question whether we

have the proper structure in place to get to where we need to go.

What rules or ethics do you promulgate now with each team, and

what are the league mandates as it relates to those rules of ethics

to medical training staffs?

Dr. LOMBARDO. There are certain—there is prohibited activities

for teams. If a team physician or an athlete or someone within the

team were to give a prohibitive substance to a player, there is a

significant—and again, I don’t know the exact administrative fine

or dismissal or suspension, but there is a sanction for that activity.

So, again, I think that along those lines, there are rules and regulations that the team and the team physician, the medical staffs,

must also follow, as well as the player.

Mr. SWEENEY. Are you intensely training physicians and medical

staff? Are you updating them?

Dr. LOMBARDO. We talk to the trainers two to three times a year,

and to the physicians one to two times a year, and the players as

many times as we——

Mr. SWEENEY. Who derives those standards, is that you?

Dr. LOMBARDO. I act as an advisor, I will advise the NFL as to

what I think should be done, and we will work together accordingly

to put them in place.

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Mr. SWEENEY. So there is a league-wide policy written and prescribed to by each team?

Dr. LOMBARDO. I believe so. I think that Mr. Tagliabue can answer that better, Mr. Henderson can answer it better than I as far

as the exact way the rule is written.

Dr. FINKLE. Could I just address your question with respect to

independence? There is perhaps more independence in the League’s

program than you might first imagine. The League has advisory

committees made up of independent scientists, physicians and

other knowledgeable people that meet at least twice a year and advise the League, very frankly and openly, about the kind of issues

we’re talking about here today, our deficiencies, how they might be

rectified and how they might be improved.

Mr. SWEENEY. My point is who chooses them? How independent

are they?

Dr. FINKLE. They’re independent in the sense that they’re certainly not employed by the National Football League; neither am

I, neither is Dr. Lombardo. I’m an independent consultant to the

National Football League, but I also am a consultant to WADA and

to the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, and I consider myself an independent professional person. I provide as frank and as open opinion

based on my profession as I can to the National Football League

when I’m asked, and if they don’t accept my advice, that’s the way

it goes. But I’m independent to that extent.

I just wanted to point out that the programs as a whole, including the treatment program, have these advisory committees that

advise the League and look after them. So it’s not entirely an inhouse closed room in which decisions and policies are made.

Mr. SWEENEY. I will conclude. I’ve got some other questions I

want to submit to you, Dr. Finkel.

But the NIH has already studied and recognized that there is a

shorter life expectancy among NFL players, and I’m wondering if

you have done any research or looked at the notion that it could

be connected to the steroids use of other substances because there

is a long way for the NFL to go——

Mr. SHAYS. We need a short answer to that, a yes or no, have

you done it?

Dr. LOMBARDO. The commissioner stated a committee to look at

cardiovascular disease, and that issue; and they will start working

on that this year. It was put together last year.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Davis, you have the floor.

Mr. DAVIS OF ILLINOIS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

And I want to thank all of the witnesses for participating in what

I think is one of the most serious discussions of this issue that I’ve

heard, and I really appreciate the fact that you’re here.

I want to go back to the philosophical construct because I think

that sort of determines to a great extent what we do and how we

do it, and how we try and arrive at where it is that we’re trying

to go. And while I know that there are no simple solutions to very

complex problems, it seems to me we’re not certain how effective

we are in curbing or beating back or holding down the use of performance-enhancing drugs.

In your estimations—and I guess they would have to be quick

answers because of the time—how effective are we being? And

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would you have any concrete recommendation for us? I mean, what

can we, as Members of Congress, do that will help reduce this problem, especially as it relates to the national programs of athletics

that we have, but also the impact on young people growing up? Because I happen to believe that drug use and abuse is one of the

most serious challenges that we have in our country today. So if

you could just respond to that as quickly as you could, I would appreciate it.

Mr. COURSON. I’d like to respond to that. I think one of the

things that we need to do, as I mentioned in my opening statement, is to work together with the high schools to develop a standard school policy that everyone has to follow; I think that’s a positive first step.

Second to that, obviously we need to do more research as far as

cleaning up some of the loopholes in drug testing and research in

the long-term health effects.

And third, obviously any school policy is not effective without an

educational component. And a uniform code of either discipline

and/or treatment to deal with offenders. And then on top of that,

again, I’m repeating myself here, but I do believe we need to nip

in the bud the oncoming problem with genetic engineering, I can’t

repeat that enough. It’s here.

Dr. WADLER. And I think, as I said earlier, that we’ve seen a sea

change since Senator McCain’s hearings back in 1999. I think it’s

had a profound effect. And if you look over the last 6 years, there

has been many steps on the road which brings us here today. But

I think it’s not a time for adjustment at the margins. I really think

it requires a paradigm shift in our thinking. And I, again, put out

for this committee and for all those who are seriously studying this

issue that we adopt a world anti-doping code as our gold standard,

as our road map and make those adjustments so they can apply to

the various sports as appropriate. But it’s time to move away from

the little changes and add this substance, do this little thing, do

that little thing, it really requires that paradigm shift.

We now have a global standard, I think we should endorse that

global standard, and I think that will enable us to address issues

like genetics and gene doping, it will allow us to address creative

ways of developing educational programs, it will enable us to provide the necessary research funds to do the research that is absolutely necessary as we go forward, and it will provide us with the

standards of lists of substances to be addressed, it will give us the

process for adjudicating cases where individuals have been accused

of doping. I just think it’s time for a paradigm shift and to move

away from just slight adjustments at the margins, which is what

we have been tending to be doing.

Dr. LOMBARDO. Mr. Davis, I think that when you use the word

philosophical, my Jesuit training takes me back to the essay. The

world is an essay, it’s not a multiple choice and objective test. And

the essay starts with what’s the cause of this thing, and the cause

of this thing still comes back to that one thing, that winning is the

only thing that counts, no matter how you get there, and that’s

what we espouse.

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When we bring people and take winners, put them on pedestals,

give them so much adulation and praise, then that’s what our

youth are going to want to be.

The other thing is we have to take a realistic look at ourselves.

Genetically I would never play in the NBA, so I cannot be anything

I want to be. There is no drug, nothing that could have got me

there. But there are people who think they take a drug and they

can become that type of athlete, the genetically special people. Realize our limitations, take winning out of the equation, I think you

have a start. And then educate people along the lines of the program that Dr. Goldberg says.

Mr. DAVIS OF ILLINOIS. I thank the gentleman, very much.

I consider myself a pretty staunch libertarian in terms of individual rights, individual liberties, but I do believe that we’ve allowed

standards of expectations to slip, and we do need to look at changing the paradigm shift.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SHAYS. I thank the gentleman. I haven’t yet asked questions,

and I would like to start by asking you, Mr. Barnes. I’m a bit unclear as to the reaction of the parents—I don’t want to dwell a long

time on it. But the 10 students that were suspended also have

charges against them, and I just want to know if the parents basically were reinforcing your suspension or questioning it, and that’s

what I wanted you to just focus on.

Mr. BARNES. Realize, of course, that I have to go back to my

town——

Mr. SHAYS. I understand.

Mr. BARNES. And coach these parents and their kids that are

still coming out, so I’m going to be as diplomatic as I can with this

answer; but I can tell you that their focus was out of their concern

more for their personal rights of being allowed to come in the interviewing process when the kids were asked to tell the truth. They’ve

had a great deal of focus on that. They’re very upset with the

school principal at that time and myself—I’m the only one that’s

still there.

Mr. SHAYS. OK. I get the gist of it. But the bottom line is you

sent a tremendously positive message to every kid that follows, and

I hope that you’re not inclined to back off——

Mr. BARNES. Oh, I don’t in any way apologize for what I did. I

prayed and studied on this daily, and it was a difficult time for me.

And I feel like I stuck with and did the right thing. And there are

many in our community that were proud of the way it was handled, it’s not just that. But these people are the parents of these

young men, who they love.

Mr. SHAYS. I understand they love their kids, but they also are

teaching their kids an incredible message.

Evidently I’m needed on a vote. Mr. Waxman, I’m going to give

you the gavel. And we will go to Mr. Clay. I’m sorry, Mr. Souder

is here.

Mr. SOUDER [presiding]. I’m sorry. We’re having a recorded vote

over at Homeland Security, and Mr. Davis and Mr. Shays and I are

all there.

Mr. Clay.

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Mr. CLAY. Mr. Courson, you have stated in your testimony that

human growth hormone and testosterone in low doses have long

been a strategy used by athletes in many sports to avoid detection.

Do you have evidence that football players are using human growth

hormones?

Mr. COURSON. I don’t have any direct evidence, all I know is

what has been reported in the 60 Minutes piece. That was the combination that they reported, testosterone creams and the growth

hormone, talking about growth hormone, which makes sense, understanding some of the frailties in drug detection.

Mr. CLAY. Have you ever witnessed any player using——

Mr. COURSON. Anabolic steroids back in my time? I’ve witnessed

a lot of anabolic steroid use, but back in my time there was no

stringent policy like the NFL has today. I played before random

testing and before the NFL basically started their testing program.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you for the response.

Dr. Lombardo, the NFL’s policy bans human growth hormone but

doesn’t provide the testing for HGH. Since HGH is detected

through blood tests and the policy does not provide for blood testing, why doesn’t the NFL test for HGH?

Dr. LOMBARDO. I’m going to defer this to the scientific consultant

that we have who tells us whether tests are to be used.

Dr. FINKLE. Certainly there is a validated test for growth hormone that was applied at the Athens Olympic games; it is not perfect, there is much yet to do in development.

Ideally we would like a test where we continue to use urine

specimens, or even alternative specimens such as saliva. It would

be up to the negotiating parties, the League and the Players Association, to agree that this problem—on the basis of advice from people such as me and others—needs to be addressed, and at the point

that they address it and decide that blood sampling needs to be

taken and analyzed, we will be ready to do it. That is the position

as we are today.

Mr. CLAY. Thanks for that response.

Dr. Wadler, you recommend that the NFL conduct blood tests for

the human growth hormone. Why do you think it is important to

test for HGH?

Dr. WADLER. Well, clearly it is a feeling in many quarters that

it’s being abused. We know there is no urine test that is acceptable

at the present time, so the only option we have is a blood test. And

knowing its limitations, that does two things; one, it sends a message that you could get caught; and second, if one is caught, there

are consequences to pay. I’m saying there are other things we can

find out from blood as well the NFL doesn’t test for, like EPO,

which deals with endurance. But with respect to growth hormone,

I think there is strong reason to believe it’s being abused, and we

currently have no test for it in urine. If we have any way to detect

it other than intelligence, being caught with the goods, if you will,

it’s by blood testing.

Mr. CLAY. According to the——

Dr. FINKLE. Just to followup with a very brief comment if I

might. About the worse thing we can do, certainly as a scientist,

is to put in place a test that is not full proof with respect to detection. If we announce to any population of suspected drug users that

101

we’re going to use a test to catch them and they learn that test is

inadequate, then it is completely ineffective. And I think the degree

of conservatism exercised just at the moment with respect to

growth hormone is well placed.

Mr. CLAY. You’re going to have to cut it short because my time

is running out, but doesn’t the Anti-Doping Agency have a blood

test that’s reliable?

Dr. LOMBARDO. The answer is yes. We ran the test in Athens

that was validated, it’s an isoform test, and that’s the answer.

Mr. CLAY. OK. Dr. Wadler, according to the NFL, random in-season testing typically takes place on certain set days of the week.

Newer steroid creams and patches can be used in such a fashion

that they are undetectable even after only a day or two. So if a

player knows he will only be tested twice a week, he can take

steroids on a schedule that will allow him to pass tests given on

those 2 days.

Would the NFL policy be improved by changing the testing

schedule so that it is impossible for players to predict the day of

the week in which they might be tested?

Dr. WADLER. As I said previously, steroid testing should be done

365, 24/7; you never know when they’re going to come for a specimen.

Dr. LOMBARDO. Mr. Clay, I think there is one misconception

about that.

The individuals who use steroid creams can stay under any level

because what they’re doing is masking and staying under the level

of 4–1. So regardless of what day of the week it’s testing, regardless of what organization does the testing, the same labs do the

testing, the same labs are looking for it, therefore creams could be

used the day of the test in a WADA test or our test. We still have

a problem.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you, Mr. Clay. I yield back to Mr. Shays,

since I cut him off earlier on his question.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you. Mr. Barnes, let me just say to you, you

did the right thing. And it’s a tough decision, I know parents love

their kids, but these kids are learning life’s lessons. But the thing

that disturbs me a little bit, and I would like comment from all the

panelists, when I hear of high school kids that are involved in this,

they’re arrested, they’re charged with a felony, I don’t hear that

when I hear major league sports players get it. Somebody explain

to me why would the kids become felons and with the League guys,

they don’t. And maybe, Mr. Courson, you could start off. Is your

mic on, by the way?

Mr. COURSON. Yes, it’s on. That is a very interesting question,

applying the law tougher to minors than you do to adults, again,

that doesn’t make sense to me. Again, that probably reflects on the

elevated stature that athletes at the elite level are given. And obviously that’s not what I would call a great message.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Finkle, maybe you could respond to that one?

Dr. FINKLE. Well, just briefly. Clearly the National Football

League is not a law enforcement agency. As you well know, players

like any other citizen that contravene the law are indeed arrested

with some frequency and are prosecuted. And the League supports

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that as far as I know, and supports it when it involves drugs,

which involves me with the testing.

With respect to why law enforcement agencies don’t charge, on

a regular basis at least, players that have used or possessed or distribute steroids, I can’t answer that, I don’t know.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me ask a question of all of you and just go down

the line. I would be interested to know whether you think that

there should be a uniform policy in the NFL, Major League Baseball, the NBA and the NHL, a uniform policy on steroids which, if

there was, it would probably involve the Federal Government encouraging that.

Mr. Stewart.

Mr. STEWART. I think there need to be one policy for all the professional teams, because as has been mentioned today, there are

some loopholes, depending on what major sport you’re participating

in, baseball compared to football compared to hockey.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Barnes.

Mr. BARNES. Well, obviously the effect of this, just as you said,

and there does need to be uniform laws down the road, all the way

through from professional sports. Don’t contain it just for professional sports; the college level, the high school level, the kids need

to know and the parents what the judgment is going to be for being

held accountable. And that’s something that we didn’t have, we

didn’t have an equal accountability for our situation. That’s hard

for me to answer to those parents.

Mr. SHAYS. Mr. Courson.

Mr. COURSON. I think a uniform testing program is a good idea

but, I might add to what Coach Barnes said is that the NCAA is

big business also, and when we talk about the—we were talking

earlier about the sizes of the linemen; the cycle starts in high

school, and then it goes to college and then it goes to pros. So the

NFL is caught between a rock and a hard spot because they get

what comes to them.

Dr. GOLDBERG. Harmonization of all the policies, I think, would

take pressure all off the leagues, too; so I think it sounds great.

Dr. WADLER. I think I have been making that point kind of consistently. I believe there should be uniform policy based on the

World Anti-Doping code for all professional sports, not limited to

anabolic steroids, but also to other performance-enhancing drugs.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you.

Dr. LOMBARDO. I think that there is individual differences among

the different sports that have to be maintained and respected before someone puts a uniformed code. Things have a tendency to migrate away from superiority to mediocrity when you band things together.

Mr. SHAYS. I don’t understand that, but I would like to come

back if I can.

Mr. Finkle.

Dr. FINKLE. Yes. I believe that in general principles. For example, I think that all sports should stand together and ban unequivocally these kinds of drugs, absolutely unequivocally.

Mr. SHAYS. And have the same basic penalty as well? In other

words, with baseball it’s five strikes, with football it appears it’s

four strikes.

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Dr. FINKLE. It might be a nice thought; how that would apply,

given—I’m not a lawyer or an executive of these sports, but I think

those things are so intimate to the negotiation process in sports

that it would be wrong and inappropriate for me to make such a

statement that all penalties across all sports should be the same.

But I think the basic principles should be uniformly applied. We

all condemn the use of these drugs, they are very serious, have

very terrible health consequences. But I think the application can

be a little bit different——

Mr. SHAYS. My time has expired.

Dr. FINKLE [continuing]. As the needs arise.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Towns.

Mr. TOWNS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Let me begin by first saying the name John Walters; does that

ring a bell to you, Dr. Finkle?

Dr. FINKLE. Yes, I know John Walters.

Mr. TOWNS. How about you, Dr. Lombardo.

Dr. LOMBARDO. No.

Mr. TOWNS. How about you, Dr. Wadler?

Dr. WADLER. Director of the Office of National Drug Policy.

Mr. TOWNS. That’s correct. And the reason I asked that question

is it seems to me that you should have some discussion with him

along the way. If he is in charge, I mean, it seems to me you should

be talking to him; there should be some dialog and communication

at some point in time.

Dr. WADLER. I have, since 1999, communicated regularly with

the Office of National Drug Control Policy; they have been intimate

in the development of the World Anti-Doping Agency, the World

Anti-Doping code. They sit on the executive committee of the World

Anti-Doping Agency, have chaired some of their educational initiatives of the World Anti-Doping Agency. They certainly have been

a very active player over the past 6 years.

Mr. TOWNS. What about you, Dr. Goldberg?

Dr. GOLDBERG. I worked with him also since 1999. Tomorrow I’m

going to New York to meet with magazines about the problems of

drugs in sports. In fact, this is my packet from Mr. Walter’s agency. And I’m going to—I spoke last week in Dallas, TX about drug

testing in adolescent sports. So they’ve been very active and very

helpful, from conferences and dealing with the media in the National League, meeting with press for many years.

Dr. FINKLE. The same is true for me. And likewise, I have given,

even in the past year, talks for ONDCP at high schools and high

school programs. And I might add the senior person employee at

ONDCP was, for a long time, a member of an advisory committee

to the NFL; so there was a relationship.

Mr. TOWNS. Well, I’m happy to hear that at least some of you

know him, I’m happy to hear that.

Let me ask this question: Do you feel that the Congress really

should be involved in this issue? And just go right down the line,

yes or no. Do you feel that the Congress should be involved in this

issue of steroids?

Dr. FINKLE. To the extent that these hearings heighten the

awareness of the public in general in all of the aspects that you

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have heard today, I think it’s extremely important that Congress

has a voice in this problem.

Mr. TOWNS. Dr. Lombardo.

Dr. LOMBARDO. As leaders of the country, you set the tone for the

country. If you call this a severe problem then it can be viewed as

a severe problem; if you don’t, it won’t be.

Dr. WADLER. As I said, going back to 1999, I think the Congress

led the way in the hearings in the Senate, addressing Olympic

sports. In the 6 years since then, I think the Federal Government

has played a significant role. We already saw the reaction of baseball when they had to testify before this. I understand that even

as a result of these hearings today, some modifications in the NFL

policy, which may have occurred anyway, I don’t know; so I think

it’s an essential role, and I look forward to it being a continuing

role.

Mr. TOWNS. Dr. Goldberg.

Dr. GOLDBERG. There are potentially dangerous drugs, Congress

has made them illegal. They are drugs that have infiltrated adolescent sport. I think it’s important to address this issue head on, and

Congress has done that, and then expanded on the list just this

last October. And I think it’s important that Congress do be involved.

Mr. TOWNS. Mr. Courson.

Mr. COURSON. Yes. I really agree with Congress being involved.

All I have to think about is 500,000 to a million adolescents using,

I think that says it all.

Mr. TOWNS. All right. Thank you, thank you very much.

Mr. Barnes.

Mr. BARNES. Yes. Continue to be involved. And support those

that do the things that you feel like are right and make sure that

the media puts that out there also. When the NFL does things that

you think are good versus what baseball is doing, expound on that.

Challenge their own peers. Let baseball say to themselves, if

they’re happy with the things that the NFL is doing, we need to

get our act together. And stay involved, but continue to challenge.

Mr. TOWNS. Mr. Stewart.

Mr. STEWART. I also feel that you should stay involved. We need

big brother looking down on the rest of us to make sure we’re doing

the right things. Again, we’ve got young folks’ lives at stake, we

want to protect that.

Mr. TOWNS. Let me just ask a followup question because my time

has expired. In your discussions with Mr. Stewart, at any point in

time did he propose a national testing—a toxicology lab, a national

toxicology lab? Walters, I mean. John Walters.

Dr. FINKLE. Not in any discussions I’ve had with his staff, no.

Dr. WADLER. No that I’m specifically aware of. But clearly, again,

they have been intimately involved with the laboratory aspects of

the World Anti-Doping Agency, including USADA. But in terms of

a national independent one, I have not—I’m not aware of that.

Mr. TOWNS. Does that make any sense?

Dr. WADLER. Well, I think the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency is well

equipped. They have a WADA certified laboratory, really state-ofthe-art. There is some 32 labs in the world.

105

Mr. TOWNS. But we’re talking about in the country, we’re talking

about uniformly, we’re talking about all the way through in terms

of all sports, even in high school, I think, as Mr. Stewart mentioned early on. If we’re talking about that, then why don’t we

come up with a national lab, toxicology lab for everybody to send

it there, they evaluate it and tell you, because I think that’s important.

Dr. WADLER. I don’t think it’s a matter of the process. We now

have standards for anti-doping laboratories, which is different than

forensic laboratories and clinical laboratories. The question is how

many should the United States have to meet the demand? And I

think that’s a practical issue. As you heard, there is going to be an

NFL lab now in—is it Salt Lake? In Salt Lake. We may need one

on the east coast to accommodate testing.

It’s a very expensive business, it’s a very technical business. And

Dr. Finkle can certainly attest to that. So I think we have a mechanism to produce the laboratory—as many laboratories in this country as the demand requires. The standards are there. We don’t

have to reinvent the wheel in that regard. It’s just the numbers of

them.

Dr. FINKLE. I agree with that statement, but there is a need to

support all this testing with research. And some countries in the

world have, in fact, adopted a national laboratory for that purpose,

for doing research, being a central resource, and providing the

operational laboratories, the testing laboratories in their particular

countries with that kind of support as they go about the testing.

And I think that is something that can be considered very seriously

in the United States.

But funding is an issue; I mean, you’ve heard a lot from Dr.

Wadler about the World Anti-Doping Agency today, but even they

are struggling with money; I mean, they’re going to cut back testing by quite a bit because they don’t have enough money to do

what they think is the right thing to do.

Mr. TOWNS. See, now you make an argument for centralizing it.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Towns, you’ve gone over quite a bit already. I

understand the problem that you’re addressing, but we need to

keep it rolling.

Mr. Ruppersberger.

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. I was one of those members who was reluctant, when we had the baseball hearings, whether or not it would

just be a media show or it would be productive; and after that

hearing and this hearing here today, I think it is extremely productive because we’ve put the issue on the table. And one of the main

reasons that we’re here is because of the impact that our professional players have on our younger generations, and it is important

that we deal with that issue. Now with that in mind, I want to talk

to the coaches or ask the coaches some questions.

We’ve been identifying some problems, Congressman Towns just

raised the issue and went through the questioning on whether Congress should be involved. My issue to you first is, what resources

do you think that you need that you don’t have now, whether it’s

congressional oversight, whether it’s education, whether it’s money,

whether it’s your principals, your school district superintendents;

what are the resources you need to address the issue that we’re

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dealing with respect to the use of steroids as it relates to younger

players?

Mr. BARNES. I don’t know that our resources are really the major

problem in our situation. I mean, again, I can’t speak for across the

Nation, but I can speak for our particular situation.

But obviously money and the ability to educate the parents and

the kids is always important; that’s the way that you hope that you

stop the problem. We can talk about punishment and that type of

stuff all we want, but if we could just educate the parents and the

kids where they didn’t feel infallible. The kids really believe I can

take these steroids, and nothing is happening to me right now, so

I’m not being harmed.

And things like what this committee is doing and the things that

the media has brought out through the BALCO situation, that’s all,

as far as I’m concerned, positive in educating our kids.

Like has been mentioned before, I think Dr. Goldberg, you can

bring in film and you can bring in speakers all you want, I truly

believe that you would be a waste of money, I hate to say that, but

that’s my gut feeling; because then we get back to what we’ve

talked about before, it is the peer pressure, it’s the enabling by the

parents, it’s what they see with their role models, it is a combination of all these things that are going to have these young people

feel invincible and I’m going to give it a try. And I may have talked

in circles here and not given you an answer, but I don’t know for

sure that’s it’s doing all those kinds of things.

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Let me ask you this; those of us who played

sports will say our coaches had a tremendous amount of impact on

our life, you have to be disciplined, you have to sacrifice, it’s teamwork. There is a school in my district, Delaney High School, that

requires each player to sign—ahead of the season to sign a form,

and then the coaches go over with the player that you’re going to

be held to a higher standard, that if you are involved with alcohol

you will be disciplined. And again, do we need to educate our

coaches more, the coaches who have the discipline and really have

the influence over these kids?

Mr. BARNES. Well, I think coaches clinics would be a great place

for that, but with the proper funds and funding——

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Well, I’m talking even more than just a

clinic, a system that is going to deal with this issue. I’m going to

get to you docs soon. Do you have anything to say on what I asked?

Mr. STEWART. I would just like to add that I still feel that the

education in my situation would be a big help. I don’t see any additional funding really addressing the problem, we just need to get

the word out to the young men and young women.

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. But we need to have a system to make sure

that we implement it. Let’s go to the docs.

Dr. GOLDBERG. I’ve been studying this problem for 18 years, and

I’ve literally talked to hundreds of school districts around the country and in Puerto Rico, when we put our programs in, and people

that would like our program.

I think most important is funding. It doesn’t cost a lot to do education funding, say for our program it’s about $5 a kid, that’s about

it.

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Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. But you know, we always talk about funding. We need to have a standard in the system of where the funding is going to go.

Dr. GOLDBERG. Well, I think what you have to do, there are verified programs by the National Institute on Drug Abuse that have

been verified to work, and there is model programs. And Mr.

Sweeney had said, well, government can’t cover everything, and I

agree with that——

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. My light is coming on, and I’m going to get

something out because then you can talk but I can’t.

First thing, we need to involve the parents, that’s an important

issue that we really haven’t talked about, and what programs are

available. But before we even have any of our students play these

sports, do we need to bring them all in, individually and as a family? That’s another thing.

There is the issue of online purchasing of steroids, I want to ask

you all to think about how we deal with that. It’s tough, it’s coming

from other countries, and we clearly need to deal with that because

it’s accessible, one way or another the kids are getting it. So let’s

talk about how we implement and what we’re going to do to focus

on that. Comments, and then my time is up, so you can keep talking.

Dr. WADLER. Regarding coaching, I do think we need to address

in this country the issue of coach certification. If you get your hair

cut, somebody has to get credentials, if you get your nails done,

somebody needs to get credentials. We have no credentialing, as far

as I know, mechanism of coaches who have this enormous impact

on young people. The coach says jump, the kid says how high; the

parent says jump, I’m not jumping. So we need to address that,

somewhere along the line, the way we deal with coaches in this

country.

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. OK, Dr. Lombardo.

Dr. LOMBARDO. You need a multipronged effort. I mean, the one

effort is education. You have to educate people, otherwise there is

no chance for them at all to have anything to change because they

don’t know any different. I think you’re going to have to implement

something with parents. Unfortunately when we went to school,

the parents—if I got in trouble with school or you got in trouble

at school, we were in trouble at home. Here, the school is in trouble

and the child comes home in trouble. That’s an attitude we have

to change; that’s educational.

I think there has to be research because we don’t know enough

about a lot of these things, we need to know more. And we’re always going to need to know more because there will always be

more coming out there. There is a dark side to this. As BALCO

brought out, avery intelligent biochemist made those drugs, this

wasn’t somebody make it in the bathroom. And I think some research needs to be done, and ongoing research funds need to be

available in order to fight this battle.

Mr. COURSON. I think you also need a deterrent, and when we

talk about drug testing at the high school level, with the expense

of it, I think most school districts will cringe. But in Pennsylvania,

for instance, part of the work I do is geared at overweight kids,

childhood obesity. And in Pennsylvania we’re implementing body

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mass indexing of our kids; and what you could do to offset the prohibitive costs of drug testing at the high school and junior high

level, is use body mass indexing to basically chart some unusual

growths that would occur, and then use the limited testing on those

kids to basically funnel them to the appropriate discipline and

help.

Dr. GOLDBERG. If I could comment on that. That sounds like a

great way to deal with those athletes that are increasing mass.

Take a look at the first baseball player in Major League Baseball

that was caught, he was not a big guy, he was a regular size guy

that was using something. And so you’ve got small wrestlers,

you’ve got small weightlifters, you have all different people that

can use this for recovery and not necessarily for mass. So there is

a difference in just doing that.

Mr. COURSON. Right. That’s true, but you could use limited drug

testing randomly throughout the rest of the athletic population

also, and the students. It’s just cutting down costs.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you. I wanted to ask Mr. Stewart and Mr.

Barnes, have you had athletes that have been recruited by colleges,

NCAA?

Mr. BARNES. Yes.

Mr. SOUDER. Do you know what the rules are as far as what colleges can give you? How many contacts they can make to your

kids?

Mr. STEWART. Yes.

Mr. SOUDER. And do you follow those pretty rigidly?

Mr. STEWART. Oh, very much so.

Mr. SOUDER. Would you say high school coaches follow that more

rigidly and are more concerned about that than they are steroids

in this instance?

Mr. STEWART. Well, quite a few of the coaches do because, again,

you want to continue to have those coaches recruit your schools;

and if you break the rules, NCAA will come down on the university, and in turn, they will probably stop recruiting in schools.

Mr. SOUDER. Don’t you think it’s interesting, because as an

alumnus of Notre Dame, one of the things they make crystal clear

to every alumnus, if you take any possible recruit out to even

lunch, you could put their whole program in danger. If you recruit

illegally. Why do you think there is so much concern about that

and so little, comparatively, in the system about steroids? In other

words, is it the sanction? Because what you immediately raised

was the sanction, they might not recruit, the university might not

recruit because they might lose their ability to build their ball

game. And when we alluded to this earlier, maybe some of the

problem here is that there needs to be penalties broader than the

individual, and would the behavior—let me ask Dr. Finkle this

question.

Do you believe that if the team was told that if one of their players was caught, that they would not be eligible for the post season

games, that they would implement different drug testing policies?

Dr. FINKLE. You’re speaking at the college level and the high

school level?

Mr. SOUDER. I think I have clearly indicated at high school and

college, that the fear of sanctions creates major behavior changes

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at every high school, every college, not about narcotics, but about

recruiting—which is less dangerous to the kids, less dangerous to

the universities than narcotics—and when they stand up to communicate it, they didn’t all of a sudden say this is a lot of money,

this could impact our university and so on; what they saw was they

might get suspended as a team, in addition to the players.

And the question is, because this comes at the core of can you

catch it or not, if a given team like the Indianapolis Colts felt that

if one of their players, maybe even a second tier player could keep

them from being eligible to go to the playoffs, would they implement a different drug testing policy.

Dr. FINKLE. Well, I don’t think the team can implement the policy, the League and the Players Association in agreement would

have to implement the policy.

But to answer your question, of course such very, very severe

consequences for detection of players or a single player that was

using an illegal drug, that would have a tremendous effect, there

is no question about that.

Mr. SOUDER. So you believe they would actually change their

policies?

Dr. FINKLE. I don’t know whether the League or the Players Association would change the policy or not. The club doesn’t have a

policy, the League and the Players Association have a policy.

Mr. SOUDER. The fundamental question here is can it be done?

And that suggests it could be done, what it is, is there a will to

get it done?

Dr. FINKLE. Absolutely, that is the question, is there a will to do

such a thing and how effective it would be.

Mr. BARNES. Mr. Souder, could I say something to that? I’ll be

quick.

It concerns me that we—and I know that you’re trying to get to

a positive end to this, but it concerns me that we would go so far

as to punish a whole team for the actions of one particular man.

And I’m a team person, that’s what I try to teach our kids is that

we’re in this together. Now the punishment phase, having everybody punished, is punishing those that have done everything right,

with the exception of a particular person.

If we get so deep into this that we’re going to punish the whole

program over the actions of one particular young man, then I don’t

think the punishment will fit the crime. That’s just a personal

opinion I’m just throwing out there.

Mr. SOUDER. So you disagree with the NCAA——

Mr. BARNES. I’m concerned that it punishes those that are doing

things right when you go that deep as to punish a whole program.

Mr. SOUDER. I understand the concept. But you disagree with the

NCAA sanctions on these universities that illegally recruit?

Mr. BARNES. No, I think that they’re the best thing that could

happen.

Mr. SOUDER. Then that was punishing the university over an individual case because often the coach doesn’t even know. The university doesn’t even know. Universities have lost their ability.

Mr. BARNES. But I believe in the university level there’s a personal punishment before there’s a team sanction.

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Mr. SOUDER. But if they have a team sanction, they have to report it to the NCAA. Then the NCAA looks at the sanction, and,

in fact, it’s treated as a team. Even if an alumnus does something

on their own and the university doesn’t know it, the coach doesn’t

know it, because we decided that the problem was so great that the

only way to get this is to say, get real. You have to get down there

in that. We had this in baseball. We may get into it today in football.

One thing we didn’t followup on that I found very interesting at

the tail end of our baseball hearing, it had been a long day, and

we had heard that these things were negotiated and that a team

couldn’t actually do anything because it was a negotiated contract.

But it was interesting, because Mr. Towers said, at San Diego—he

said after Ken Caminetti—and he said he was so frustrated with

Ken Caminetti, who was a friend of his, and he hadn’t seen it coming, he was astounded by what happened, that he said, we cleaned

up our minor league system and our locker room.

Afterwards as I reflected and looked at some of the testimony, I

thought, what did he mean when he said, I have 100 percent confidence we don’t have it in San Diego? It may have meant that his

players had to give a waiver to do it, but I’m not convinced, and

if you’re telling me, in fact, that the union or management would

be the block here, and that this is a negotiated-type thing whether

they’re going to follow the law, that suggests we may have to intervene.

But the key question here is that if there were sanctions that

were broader—because if this is tough to catch, and it takes things

like probable cause, shifts in body weight, shifts in performance behavior and so on, a random preseason testing with occasional testing before—particularly as the new variations wear out and you

don’t necessarily get to, is it 24 hours, is it 72 hours, how long is

it in the system, how do you track it; all those kinds of questions

suggest the team has to have a direct incentive as well, and the

trainers, and we have to basically award trainers in the locker

room, the key people who can see this and do this, and they have

to be viewed as quasipolicemen.

Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, before you recess, I just want to

ask one last question of this group. You were asked whether there

ought to be one uniform standard for all sports. I would like to ask

a question similar to that, and that is whether you think there

ought to be some independent group that runs the testing program

rather than the league itself, because if the league comes up with

a small figure, people will say, maybe they’re not doing an adequate job. So for the integrity of the tests and for the public confidence that the tests are being done appropriately, what do you

think of the idea of having an independent group do it? Whichever

way. We could start with you, Mr. Stewart, if you’re ready. If you

don’t have an opinion on it and you want to think it over, that is

fine, too.

Mr. STEWART. I think to me the issue is credibility, and an outside source shows a credible group.

Mr. BARNES. Being at the high school level, it would be difficult

for me to answer that question. So it’s probably better if these gentlemen do.

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Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Courson.

Mr. COURSON. I think an independent source would take away a

lot of the headaches.

Dr. GOLDBERG. I agree with that.

Dr. WADLER. That’s the point I’ve been trying to make. So many

times I’ve made speeches at this microphone, but I do think you

need that independence to provide the credibility that the public so

desperately wants.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you.

Dr. Lombardo.

Dr. LOMBARDO. Since I’m intimately involved in this, I don’t

think it’s necessary to have an independent group. I think it can

be adequately handled and is being adequately handled to the

same extent that it would be by any independent agency.

Mr. WAXMAN. Dr. Finkle.

Dr. FINKLE. I just want to emphasize what I said earlier on the

same matter, and that is actually the program has a remarkable

amount of independence now, and maybe we should emphasize

that, find a way to put that out in an appropriate fashion so that

the perception is not that in this case the NFL somehow has its

cold hand on this. There are enormous independent aspects to it

right now.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you all very much. I very much appreciate

the time you have given us.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. I appreciate it. It has been a long morning

for you. We will recess the hearing and, because we have intervening votes on the House floor, come back about 2 o’clock. Thank you

very much.

[Recess.]

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Commissioner, thank you. Mr. Henderson,

Mr. Upshaw, thank you for your patience on this. Unfortunately we

had a series of votes. I hope you at least got a lunch out of it.

The committee will come back to order. We will now recognize

our distinguished second panel. We have Mr. Paul Tagliabue, the

commissioner of the National Football League; we have Harold

Henderson, the executive vice president of labor relations for the

National Football League; and we have Gene Upshaw, the executive director of the National Football League Players Association.

It is our policy we swear everyone in before you testify. Just rise

with me.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you. I think you know the rules.

Mr. Tagliabue, Mr. Commissioner, we will start with you. Take

what time you need. Your entire statement is in the record. Again,

we appreciate your patience. Thank you. Let the record note, too,

they sat through the whole first panel to hear everybody testify out

there in the audience. I know that everyone appreciates that as

well. I know you have a high interest in this. We appreciate your

proactivity in this area.

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STATEMENTS OF PAUL TAGLIABUE, COMMISSIONER, NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE; HAROLD HENDERSON, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT, LABOR RELATIONS, NATIONAL

FOOTBALL LEAGUE; AND GENE UPSHAW, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE PLAYERS ASSOCIATION

STATEMENT OF PAUL TAGLIABUE

Mr. TAGLIABUE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the

committee. I’m very pleased to be here with Harold Henderson,

who’s the head of our labor relations group for the teams and the

league, and with Gene Upshaw as the executive director of the

NFL Players Association, which is the collective bargaining association of our players. Gene, of course, played in the league during

three decades and is a Hall of Fame player. He’s one of two players

in the history of our league to play in Super Bowls in three different decades, in the 1960’s, the 1970’s and the 1980’s. The only

other such player is Jerry Rice. So I think Gene is very well suited

by dint of his service as a player and as the head of the players

union to speak to some of the issues about what has gone on or

not gone on in locker rooms in the NFL in the past as well as currently, and I’m sure he will speak to that.

I want to take my hat off to the prior panel because I think they

illustrated for us something that we’ve tried to make an article of

our business operations, which is to reach out and listen to people

who are dealing with different aspects of sport at all levels of sport,

and in particular I want to express thanks to Steve Courson and

the two high school coaches, because over the term of my 16 years

as commissioner, one of the things we’ve tried to do is have excellent relations with high school football in an effort to understand

the challenges that they face and to see whether we can do something to help them, and if so, what that might be. So this was a

continuation of a dialog that we’ve had going on.

For my own part, I think I’m here not just as commissioner of

the National Football League, but as a parent and as a grandparent, and also as someone who has spent most of his life, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, involved in sports. I would not

be where I am had I not had the opportunity to go to Georgetown

on a basketball scholarship, having grown up in Jersey City, spending 8 or 10 hours in school yards playing every sport under the

sun. And so sports for me has been a great part of my life, and I

still view youth sports and college sports as important to me as

professional sports.

The issues that the committee is considering are obviously wideranging and address a wide range of concerns, the health of athletes who use these substances, the values of sport that are either

promoted or debased by what people in sports do, and the proper

role of government and the private sector in combating the use of

these substances.

I’ll say right at the top how I view our responsibility. We feel

that our program is the best in American sports, but we have the

responsibility to make it even better. It is often said, if it ain’t

broke, don’t fix it. I’ve tried to operate for 16 years as commissioner

on an opposite premise, which is if it ain’t broke, fix it anyway, beVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:42 Jun 28, 2005 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00116 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\21242.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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cause things can always be made better, you can always improve

your operations. That’s the attitude that we come here with.

For two decades, the National Football League has had very

strong programs in place to rid its locker rooms and its playing

fields of performance-enhancing substances. During that period we

feel we’ve also been a positive force in helping youth football address these issues. We have not had all the answers, but we have

worked with leading institutions, top scientists, top physicians and

others to stay ahead of an ever-changing curve. Our policies, which

have included stiff discipline and sanctions as well as other elements, we feel have been constructive over the long term.

Today I would endorse what Steve Courson and others said earlier, that the quickening pace of change in medicine and science,

including genetics, is confronting all of us with challenges in the

future that will make those of the past seem relatively easy to deal

with.

In our efforts, we’ve had strong support and active participation

in all of our programs, including our youth football efforts, from the

NFL Players Association, which, as I said earlier, is the collective

bargaining representative of our player-employees. Together we

continue to have, intend to have, very strong policies and programs

to deal with the scientific, the medical, the ethical and the legal

issues that are generated by the ever-escalating availability of

body-changing, performance-enhancing substances. They are bodychanging, they are performance-enhancing, and eventually they are

going to be gene-altering. That’s the environment that we’re in.

More than 20 years ago, in 1983, my predecessor Pete Rozelle notified all NFL players that anabolic steroids were within the categories of drugs prohibited for use in the National Football League.

In 1987 and 1988, the league did testing to identify the dimensions

of the problem and to educate players as to the risks that they

were undertaking when they would use steroids or other performance-enhancing substances. In 1989, when I was the league attorney, Commissioner Rozelle suspended players for the first time for

violating the league’s then drug testing prohibitions. I want to say

this, because I really believe it’s important. We’ve been at this for

20 years. It didn’t take Congress in 1999 or the creation of WADA

5 years ago for us to address these issues. We were there in the

early 1980’s, the mid-’80’s, and the late 1980’s, and we’ve been improving our program ever since. I’ll come back to that issue a little

bit later.

Shortly after becoming commissioner in late 1989, we instituted

a number of changes in the league’s substance abuse program and

in our relationships, meaning that we tried to get better and better

services from independent outside parties. These changes took account of the growing complexity of the issues, the increasingly varied types of substances that were out there, as well as the need to

ensure fairness in all of our processes. And Dr. Lombardo and Dr.

Finkle from whom you’ve heard this morning have been key parts

of our program.

In the early 1990’s, we also worked closely with the National Institute on Drug Abuse, with the White House Office on Substance

Abuse. We made every effort we could to avail ourselves of the resources of NIH and other Federal agencies and programs aimed at

114

interdicting drug use by Americans. I must say at that time, there

were no federally financed programs for testing for steroids. There

certainly was research going on for cocaine testing, marijuana testing in the transportation sector and other areas, but we funded,

along with the Olympic Committee, certain labs along with universities. I believe the first two labs that were in place were at UCLA

and one in Indiana. The one in Indiana then went bankrupt, and

we’ve continued with the UCLA lab, which is an Olympic and

WADA-certified lab. But we’ve been investing in research right

from the beginning.

Two other matters are key. The first is the subject of human

growth hormone. Dr. Lombardo spoke about it a little bit this

morning. We’ve prohibited this substance since 1991. Currently

there is no readily available test. There was mention this morning

of the fact that we’re not testing for human growth hormone. Well,

there is no lab in the United States that does test for human

growth hormone. We understand that later this year, there may be

one or more labs with this capability in the United States, and if

there is, and if we can satisfy ourselves that lab has a test protocol

that is validated and reliable, then we will consider how to incorporate the program addressing human growth hormone based upon

blood testing, if that is what is necessary, into our programs. But

when people say that the NFL’s program is deficient because it’s

not testing for human growth hormone, that’s because there has

been no tests, and there have been no labs. The WADA tested, and

of 11,000 Olympic athletes, I believe, in connection with the Athens

Games, 300, there were no positive tests, and so there is an issue

as to the scale of use of this substance among athletes. But the

basic point is that those tests were in Europe, the labs were in Europe, and there are no tests in the United States. So our standards

there and our capabilities there are in line with everyone else.

Second, on testosterone, this is an area that we’ve worked on for

a decade or more. It is a substance naturally appearing in the

body. We have been leaders, as Dr. Finkle said, in developing the

testosterone, epitestosterone ratio tests that are used to identify

the presence of illicit amounts of testosterone in an athlete. We

have worked together with the other organizations to take the ratio

down from 6:1, they’re now down to 4:1, and to see whether there

are even additional ways, as Dr. Finkle suggested, by comparing

urine samples or the time line for a player’s testosterone levels to

show, to figure out that he has been using illicit amounts of testosterone, even if a single test doesn’t hit the ratio.

The one thing I think is critically important in this area is for

us to be factual and complete and not selective and self-serving as

we analyze these issues. Some things were said this morning that

I don’t think meet that standard. There was comments about our

out-of-competition testing versus WADA’s out-of-competition testing, and the suggestion was made that we are administering too

many out-of-competition tests compared to WADA.

We don’t feel that our players are out of competition at any time

of the year. They are employees, obligated, subject to collectively

bargaining rules, to work 12 months a year. So there is no time of

the year that they are out of competition. That’s one of the reasons

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we subject them to year-round drug testing for these performanceenhancing drugs.

Another area is with respect to therapeutic use exemptions. We

don’t give them because our players are not out of competition. The

therapeutic use exemption in this context can become a fishing license to see who will give a prescription for a substance that we

don’t want used. So we have a system on our appeal process where

it has to be raised as an affirmative defense.

To suggest that our program is deficient because they do it one

way and we do it the other way is to say that the rules of procedure in the Federal courts are deficient because the State courts

do it differently. It’s a minor point. Both programs have a great

deal of validity. What you need is a process that’s fair and balanced, and we have that.

There are other areas that I also feel that there has not been a

balanced approach. On the issue of the size of our players, we’ve

been aware of it. You would have to be blind not to be aware of

the fact that athletes in general are growing. We have Yao Ming

playing in the NBA. No one saw Chinese players of that size playing in the NBA 20 years ago. One statistical point of interest is

that over the past 20 years, based on the studies I’ve seen, our

players have become both smaller and bigger. We have a far greater number of big players and a far greater number of smaller players, under 6 feet and under 190 pounds. It reflects the specialization in our game, a so-called flea-flicker-type receiver or the fleet

defensive back. At the other end of the spectrum we have the large

player.

With respect to the large players, we don’t believe that they are

getting there because of steroids. If you read all the literature

about steroids, what does it do? It reduces body fat. It makes athletes lean and sculpted. It has an effect on muscular and skeletal

structure. These large players are exhibiting none of those characteristics. To the contrary, they have high body fat. They tend to be

the antithesis of the sculpted, lean athlete.

If steroids were raging in the 1970’s in the NFL, and I think everyone admits that their use has declined today, then we would

have had more 300-pound players in the NFL in the 1970’s. That

strongly suggests it’s not related to the use of steroids.

The other thing is the data itself. Gene Upshaw is going to talk

about 300-pound players that he blocked against in the 1960’s.

Where the notion comes up there were only 5 in the league 20

years ago when he played against 10 of them in his career in the

1960’s, I don’t know. The next question is, if more players are over

300 pounds today, how many were between 285 and 299 20 years

ago? We don’t have that data in front of us.

We created a special committee on obesity about 18 months ago,

I appointed it, chaired by a team physician who is, I believe, at

Johns Hopkins to address this issue of the large size of the players.

We feel we have a universe of individuals that’s nowhere else found

in America. We’re concerned about that. We want to make sure

that we don’t do things with those athletes, don’t ask them to do

things that will have long-term negative effects for their health,

and perhaps in the process we can learn things about others in society who are going to have to deal with issues of obesity.

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So we’re studying it, we’re studying it seriously, but we’re certainly not going to jump to a conclusion that because we have larger athletes today, there is increased steroid use in the National

Football League. I think it’s nonsense. Whoever thought we would

have a quarterback like Daunte Culpepper? Bart Starr used to be

the paradigm. Billy Kilmer used to be the paradigm. Today we

have a young man who’s 6 feet 6 and 268 pounds playing quarterback. Are we to conclude that he’s using steroids? I don’t like to

smear people in that fashion.

I’ll make a final comment about youth football. We started a

youth football fund about 5 years ago. We funded it with our players association. The players gave up money that would ordinarily

go into their salaries, about $150 million over 5 years, to fund a

youth football fund, which Gene Upshaw and I co-chair. One of the

leading things we’ve done with this program is to put out materials

like this for high school and youth football. This is a four-volume

series that we published. It’s published in hard copy. It’s on the

Internet on a Web site, NFLhighschool.com. It’s on a lot of other

Web sites. It was prepared with our funding in conjunction with

the Yale University School of Pediatrics, the American Red Cross,

the National Athletic Trainers Association, the Institute for the

Study of Youth Sports at Michigan State University, and it’s out

there and can be downloaded in any house in America that has a

computer, or in any school. We’ve distributed it to every high

school in America. It’s called Health Concerns for Young Athletes.

It’s a four-volume series.

There’s a whole section in here on substance abuse, emphasizing

that for the high school—young high school football player, steroids

are definitely a concern, and they’re prohibited. But coaches need

to know that other things, according to Federal statistics, are even

a more severe problem, including alcohol, marijuana, cocaine, ecstasy and other recreational drugs. We have a whole section in

here on anabolic steroids.

So we agree 1,000 percent that dealing with this problem among

young people is critically important, and we stand ready to intensify our efforts in that area. As many of you probably know, we

have the longest-standing public service television program advertising series in support of the United Way. We could do additional

things in this area. If messaging is important, if programs are important, we’re prepared to fund programs as we have been doing

around the country emphasizing these concerns.

I’ll stop there and be prepared to take your questions. We certainly appreciate the committee’s interest in these matters and the

fact that you have focused everyone’s attention, including our own,

on these issues.

If it’s permissible, I’ll turn it over to Mr. Henderson and then to

Mr. Upshaw.

Mr. WAXMAN [presiding]. Thank you very much for your testimony.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Tagliabue follows:]

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Mr. WAXMAN. Let’s hear from Mr. Henderson next and then Mr.

Upshaw.

STATEMENT OF HAROLD HENDERSON

Mr. HENDERSON. Good afternoon, Chairman Davis and members

of the committee. The commissioner introduced me. I’m Harold

Henderson, appointed by the commissioner in 1991 as executive

vice president for labor relations. I also head the NFL Management

Council, the multi-employer bargaining unit. In that capacity I am

directly responsible for all matters related to the players in regard

to their employment by the clubs in the National Football League,

including negotiation and administration of the collective bargaining agreement. That’s with the players and the players association

that represents the players.

When I arrived at the NFL in 1991, labor relations was nonexistent. Following a players strike at the expiration of the contract in

1987, the players returned to work without an agreement. Several

years of antitrust litigation followed, during which period the union

disclaimed continuing representation of the NFL players and

ceased doing business with the NFL. The parties were unable to resolve their bargaining differences ’til after a 3-month-long trial

through the whole summer of 1992. Then we spent the next 6

months negotiating a new CBA with Gene Upshaw and his union.

While we ultimately reached an agreement that is viewed by

many as the best in the history of professional sports, that 6-month

period was one of hard-fought negotiations, often contentious and

acrimonious. The total lack of trust on both sides of the table made

the situation especially difficult. In short, we fought about everything.

After negotiation of the CBA terms related to economic and system issues was completed in March 1993, the union and the Management Council turned their attention to the policies on drug and

alcohol abuse, and steroids, and performance-enhancing substances. This was against the background of nearly 5 years without

a collective bargaining agreement and 3 years without union participation, during which time both programs had been modified

substantially. Discipline was instituted and subsequently increased, a strict liability standard was instituted, and additional

substances were added to the banned list.

Despite these changes, and despite earlier union objections to the

discipline process and other policy provisions, the negotiation of the

collective bargaining provisions concerning the policy on anabolic

steroids and related substances was agreed in a relatively short

time with very little debate or acrimony.

The union agreed there was no place for steroids in the National

Football League for three reasons. Their first concern was for the

players’ health. Even at that time there was sufficient medical indication of adverse medical effects on people using these substances.

Second, they were concerned that the use of these substances

would threaten the fairness and integrity of the athletic competition on the field as well as the competition between players vying

for a position on the team. It was considered unfair and undesirable that players who did not wish to use those substances would

feel forced to do so in order to compete effectively with those who

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did. Third, they recognized that our players are role models and

that use of such substances may well influence young athletes to

use them as well. Those were exactly the same reasons the league

wanted a strong policy.

After a thorough and detailed review of the then current policy,

it was adopted by the NFLPA, making it part of the collective bargaining agreement without significant change. That included continuation of the league’s adviser for anabolic steroids and related

substances, Dr. John Lombardo, who spoke earlier today, and adoption of the same testing laboratories which had been used. It also

carried forth the principle of strict liability. A player is held responsible for what is in his body.

Others here today have described provisions of our policy in detail so I won’t get into it. The NFL steroid policy has been modified

almost every year since the Management Council and the NFLPA

agreed. Most of those modifications involve adding to the banned

substance list. It has been our practice to make those changes in

the spring of each year, effective upon publication to the players in

May of each year. Further, we meet twice a year with an advisory

panel of experts in the field unrelated to the NFL steroid program,

whose advice is used to ensure that our program reflects all current scientific and medical advances in the field.

Over the years we’ve discussed with the players several times

the appropriateness of the discipline schedule in our steroid policy.

Our goal has been to balance deterrence and punishment with appropriate fairness for the individual. A first violation is punished

by suspension of four games, regular or postseason, without pay.

Our players are paid on a per-game basis, usually 17 paychecks

over the course of the season, so that for the 4-week suspension,

a player loses nearly 25 percent of his annual salary. Additional financial losses are incurred by forfeiture of signing bonuses or a

failure to make incentives because they weren’t on the field. For a

second offense, a player is suspended for a minimum of six games,

and a third offense for at least 12 months.

These are severe sanctions for a professional football player. I

think it is significant that in my 14 years with the league, there

has never been a player suspended for a second time. The purpose

of the discipline and our policy is as a deterrent, and we believe

that it works.

Education and awareness is also an important part of the program. We communicate to the players through direct communications and newsletters from Gene Upshaw and from me, bulletin

board posters at team meetings. We established a toll-free telephone line on which players can get information about dietary supplements and other potential sources of unintentional ingestion of

banned substances. You heard here about our newly established

supplemental certification program where manufacturers of food

supplements can have them certified by an independent lab to contain no substances banned by our program.

In summary, in a labor relations environment in which nearly

every issue is hotly contested and debated, frequently resolved

through arbitration or litigation rather than agreement, in the area

of steroids and related substances, the league and the union have

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ers and the clubs, we maintain a very effective policy, tough but

fair, which works for the clubs, the league, the players and the

public.

We will continue to be alert for new performance-enhancing substances and new ways to avoid detection. We will continue to use

the most effective, reliable state-of-the-art methodology and equipment to detect illegal use of banned substances. We will continue

to invest in research and development to keep us current on the

scientific and medical developments in this area, in part through

a new laboratory funded jointly by the NFL and the U.S. AntiDoping Association. We will strive to continue to ensure that our

players are positive role models for America’s youth, athletes or

not.

I welcome your questions.

Mr. DUNCAN [presiding]. Very fine testimony, Mr. Henderson.

Thank you very much.

Mr. Upshaw.

STATEMENT OF GENE UPSHAW

Mr. UPSHAW. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am Gene Upshaw. I’m

the executive director of the National Football League players association. We’re an exclusive bargaining agent on behalf of all the

players in the National Football League.

There are numerous issues in which management and labor disagree, and we are presently involved in a very serious extension of

our collective bargaining agreement. But I want to start by saying

there is no disagreement when it comes to this issue of steroid use

and performance-enhancing drugs in our game. We will do all we

can to get it out of the game and out of our society, because there

is no place for performance-enhancing substances in our American

life.

Our collectively bargained program on anabolic steroids has been

in place for several decades and is the most comprehensive in

sports today. How did we get here? In 1967, when I was drafted

by the Oakland Raiders in the first round, I entered into a league

that had no drug policy, that had no testing, that had no education,

that had nothing in the form that we see it today. I played through

the 1960’s, the 1970’s and the 1980’s. I retired after the 1982 season and became the executive director of the NFL Players Association.

Back then, no one was keeping track of sacks. If you asked Deacon Jones today, he would say he would be the sack leader if someone had kept track of that. It was the same way with 300-pound

players. I had to play against guys that were 300 pounds in 1967

when I first came into the league, and they were still there when

I left in 1982. Just to name a few, Buck Buchanan, Ernie Ladd,

Louie Kelcher, Wilber Young, Bob Brown with the Green Bay Packers. I also believe my old teammate and roommate for 15 years

might have tipped the scales at 300 a few times or two.

In 1987, the NFL began testing players for steroid use. In 1989,

we began suspending players. And in 1990, we instituted a yearround random testing program. Today I would like to believe that

we have sorted out a lot of the issues that we need to sort out over

that period of time.

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You have heard from the commissioner and from Harold Henderson on what our program looks like, but the one thing that has

been clear about our position and about where we are today, there

has never been any doubt that the players in the National Football

League wanted it off the field. The reason that we have always

wanted it off the field, because players have always stressed to me,

and they did it when I was playing, and they are doing it still

today, that if you don’t get it away from the other guy, we’re forced

to take it to compete. We also understand the health effects that

it causes. We also understand our role as role models and leaders

in this area, and we intend to uphold that. We have always been

in favor of getting rid of steroids out of the National Football

League and anywhere else it is in our society.

When you look at our collective bargaining agreement and you

look at the disagreements that we’ve had over the years with the

NFL, the only place that you find random testing is in this area,

because we believe strongly in it. The players know that there is

no way to escape if you are using performance-enhancing substances, including steroids.

I must say, we would be naive to not be aware that there are

people out there trying to stay ahead of the curve. We will continue

to monitor that and try to stay ahead of them. We can only know

what we know. And as soon as we find out something, we do something about it. In 2003, the laboratory at UCLA turned up a new

substance, a designer steroid that we all heard about today, THG.

They informed us of it, we talked about it, and I think we did it

over a phone call. Immediately it went on the list. Even as ephedra

came on the market 3 years ago, even though now it seems to be

back in some form, it still remains on our banned list because we

understand the effects that it has on our players.

Someone said that we need active players here. I talk to active

players, I spend most of my time in locker rooms around the NFL,

and I can tell you this: Over the years that I’ve been in this position in the locker room, and I did include some quotes from active

players in my testimony that’s part of this record, but I want to

point out one thing that I think is very important. We have never

had one player in the National Football League defend another

player, his teammate or anyone else that tested positive for using

drugs and using steroids. Not a one. You are responsible for what

you put in your body. We stand behind that. Our players support

that. We believe our program is fair.

I heard a word today when I was sitting back there that said

codify, and I started thinking, what is that? We don’t believe that

our system codifies any player. That is the main reason it is not

in the hands of teams and clubs. It is independent, away from

them. We will look at it in a way that if you test positive, you will

be suspended. Players expect that. We believe that it is a severe

penalty to be suspended. If there are changes that need to be made

in our policy, as Harold has pointed out, we’re not above changing,

wherever change needs to be. We want to have the best, and we

want to make our program even better. We have always strived to

do that. But there is no room for this substance in our sport or anywhere in our society when it comes to athletic competition.

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The players will support this committee, and we do support this

committee, and we also support what the NFL and the players

have been able to accomplish over a long period of time. We didn’t

just come to this dance a couple of weeks ago. We started out

many, many years ago, and we’ll stay until the song is over. Thank

you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Upshaw follows:]

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Chairman TOM DAVIS [presiding]. I want to thank all of you for

your testimony and your patience being with us today.

Commissioner Tagliabue and Mr. Upshaw, there has been a lot

of discussion about the cooperation between the NFL, the players

association and even this committee leading up to today’s hearing.

I think you are both to be commended for facilitating such a positive working relationship.

The first panel answered this question, and I want to get your

answer as well: how the average American is supposed to look at

the size, strength and speed of today’s NFL linebackers and not

conclude that they might be taking performance-enhancing drugs?

That’s chatter. That’s not data. The first panel addressed it in

terms of specialization and the like, and I just want to give you an

opportunity to do the same.

Mr. UPSHAW. Well, I think the NFL is a particle of what we get.

It starts at the college level. You heard the statistics about the

high school players and the size that they are. They are getting

bigger. They come to us the size that we get them. What’s really

amazing about the size is that one of our strictest fines is overweight. When they come to us that big, we try to reduce them

down. One of the biggest fights I had with Harold is the amount

of fines that the players get for being overweight for a period of

days or weeks. It’s pretty close to $200 a pound per day for being

overweight. So we are trying to get them down. They come to us

at a certain size, and we just accept that.

But everyone has also pointed out, and the Commissioner has,

too, the rules have changed. When I was playing, there was a

Green Bay sweep, and everyone ran it, and they had guards that

looked like me. I couldn’t play tight end today. But the rules

changed that now we have basically five tackles across the front.

You don’t have an offensive guard, a center and two tackles; what

you have is five tackles, and they all get in front of each over, and

they push each other around.

That is the difference in where we are today when it relates to

size. Obviously when you see a young, aspiring athlete out there,

and he sees this size, and he decides I need to be that big to play,

we’re not saying that they’re not doing things that they shouldn’t

be doing, but the NFL is basically getting what the colleges and the

high schools are providing.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thanks.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. Mr. Chairman, I guess if I could—just to add a

point. I think what we’re seeing in athletics today, not just at our

level, but at the youth level, is specialization. We read about it constantly in the sports pages, parents complaining about the fact that

their son or daughter is 12 or 13 years old, and all he or she wants

to do is play one sport. They want to play football all year, they

want to play soccer all year, they want to play women’s basketball

all year.

Coupled with specialization goes weight training. Sometimes it’s

weight loss. In wrestling, doctors have expressed to me concern

about high-schoolers losing weight to get down from 185 to the 152-

pound division. Then we see people gaining weight through strict

weightlifting programs.

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Our players now are employed 11 months of the year. Mr. Henderson has a story about his own son that illustrates, I think, what

perfectly clean, drug-free workouts can do in terms of body size. I

know you don’t want to beat this to death, but I’ll turn it over to

him.

Mr. HENDERSON. Several Members have spoken about their children and grandchildren in sports. I had the experience a few years

ago, my son was a four-sport athlete in high school locally in Fairfax County. He wrestled, captain of the wrestling team and football

team his senior year. He would wrestle at 152. He played football

at about 165. He was blessed with his mother’s genes. He was

about 5 foot 8 in about his 10th-grade year. He’s still 5 foot 8. He

went to college. He played football in college. He went from a high

school program where he cut weight, put on weight, cut weight, put

on weight, to full-time football, around-the-year training there, and

he went from 165 to about 180, to about 190, and his senior year

he captained the team at his college at over 200 pounds. I am as

confident as anything that he never took any kind of substance to

enhance his growth. He’s still 5 foot 8.

We have players now who come into the NFL, and unlike the

1970’s and 1980’s when Mr. Courson and Mr. Upshaw played, it is

a full-time job now. They don’t come in in July and play ’til Christmas and go home and take it easy anymore. By March 1st, sometimes earlier, they’re back at the facility lifting weights, training,

running, year around, putting on bulk, working on dietary programs and nutritional programs and weight programs for the purpose of putting on weight. And it’s effective. I’ve seen it in my own

household. If you work at it, you can do it on an ordinary body. I

think that’s the element that we are disregarding too quickly, that

hard work can produce the bulk, muscles, size as effectively as anything else.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Let me just ask one other quick question. I noted in my opening

statement the momentum is building behind the idea of an advisory committee. Mr. Waxman and I talked about it on March 17

at the Major League Baseball hearing. Is it safe to say that the

NFL and the players association support this concept, an advisory

committee of sports figures on that?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We would like to know a little bit more about

what is going to be done, and we’d like to make sure we’re investing our resources wisely, but we would certainly look forward to cooperating. We think there can be a very powerful statement here

and an enhancement of what we’re trying to do. Of course, there

are programs out there like the Partnership for a Drug-Free America and many other things, but we will certainly support programs

that are positive through the committee.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. Waxman.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to commend the

three of you for not just being here, but for the proactive way you

have tried to deal with the steroid problem. If you could look back

to the 1980’s, there were reports of widespread use of steroids in

football. Since then you have worked to refine and improve the

policies. You didn’t wait until the problem just couldn’t be ignored

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any longer, you tried to make sure that you could do something

about it.

I think one of the issues that we have is that getting a clear picture of how much steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs

are used in the various professional and amateur sports, and for

obvious reasons, since it is against the law, sports figures don’t

want to talk about it. You can understand that to be the case. No

one questions whether the NFL has made a good faith effort to police steroids. You have, and you seem to be testing—you have testing numbers to back it up.

But it is also true that a lot of people who follow sports closely

believe that maybe some of the players use performance-enhancing

drugs but evade detection. That report about the Carolina Panther

players reinforce that view. That is one of the issues we are trying

to sort out today.

What is your perspective about the extent of steroid use in the

NFL? You had a serious problem in the 1980’s. Do you believe that

the problem is under control?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We believe it is. It’s not perfect. We do about

9,000 tests a year. We have very extensive random testing, unannounced. We think that there is a tremendous deterrent element

in there. As you know, we’ve suspended 54 players over the period

of years. Fifty-seven others have tested positively and just left the

game. So we’ve had about seven a year.

Our experience is very consistent with the WADA experience in

2004 and USADA. In 2004, USADA tested fewer athletes than we

did, 7,600 versus 9,000. They did it in 45 sports. We did it in one

sport. They had nine positive tests. On average we have about

seven. So we don’t think the low level of positives indicates a weak

program any more than their low level of positive indicates a weak

program. We think that the programs are effective.

The three difficult areas are those that you have identified. One

is testosterone when it’s calibrated to be under the now ratio of 4:1

testosterone to epitestosterone. Two may be human growth hormone. I say ‘‘may be’’ because it’s not yet clear that really does accomplish what some athletes would like to accomplish, but there is

no current test for it. And the third is the designer steroid issue

that Mr. Courson emphasized, of which THG in the BALCO investigation is only one.

But our feeling is that, as Gene said, the culture of our athletes,

the overwhelming number of our athletes, is to stay clean, to play

clean, to be as dedicated to the same values of the game as the

Vince Lombardis and the Bart Starrs and the Roger Staubachs and

right up to today with the Donovan McNabbs and the Tom Bradys,

and we don’t feel that there is rampant efforts to cheat in our

sport.

Mr. WAXMAN. Are you doing an investigation of that report from

60 Minutes?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We are investigating. We do have our security

department interviewing those players, and we will—at some point

I will have—our security department is headed by a former top official of the FBI, and we are interviewing those players, cooperating

with the DEA in trying to get to the bottom of that investigation

in South Carolina.

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Mr. WAXMAN. When you finish your investigation, we would like

to see a copy of that.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We would be pleased to share with you the results of our interviews and all we get from the DEA.

Mr. WAXMAN. We are all in agreement about the goal. We want

to get steroids and performance-enhancing drugs out of sports. I

have asked this question of others. It came up this morning, and

I would like your view on it. Do you think the adoption of a single

uniform steroid policy across sports would help in reaching this

goal?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I don’t think so. I think that in this area, it’s a

question of general rules versus specialized programs. Both have

their place in society. I think we have a specialized program, directed at our sport to deal with our needs, which incorporates all

the best elements of the other programs. To some extent we’ve set

the standard for the other programs. When I go to Europe, they

praise the way we govern our sports. They have major issues in

German soccer right now with game referees having taken bribes.

I happen to believe that Americans can solve American problems

just as well as anyone else in the world. I think when we apply our

mind to it, we can be the best in the world. And if we’ve got to

start outsourcing or offshoring our drug programs, then I think

we’re in trouble.

Mr. WAXMAN. I wasn’t thinking of that. I was thinking of——

Mr. TAGLIABUE. But that’s what the WADA is. It’s outsourcing

and offshoring our drug program. I think we can do it better here.

Mr. WAXMAN. If we’re going to do it better here, don’t you think

it would make sense to have baseball have the same policy as football, the same as others?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. In terms of testing technology, in terms of

science, in terms of perhaps even test protocols, the more we can

do together, the better. If we can get $10 from 10 different sports

instead of just $5 from one sport and invest in better science and

research, yes. But when it comes to process and other considerations, including discipline, I think we can deal with our own sport

better than a uniform standard, which in many cases is going to

become the lowest common denominator.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you very much.

Mr. Upshaw.

Mr. UPSHAW. I just want to add one thing. From what you heard

this morning and what we already know, we all are using the same

experts. We all are using the same labs. We all are using the same

testing protocol, I mean, in a sense, and we’ve been doing this for

years.

The Commissioner remembers the days when this program was

not in the shape that it’s in. It’s simply because of his leadership

and his integrity that we were able to come together under a program in which the players feel very, very confident that they’re

treated fairly and that every player is treated the same. That has

been the reason. When we go back to the early 1980’s or the late

1980’s and start talking about why do we have testing, it was the

players who said, we want it, we need it, we don’t want it in our

sport. That’s why we are where we are today.

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Mr. WAXMAN. Don’t you think what is good for football should

also be good for baseball?

Mr. UPSHAW. No. I couldn’t hit a curveball. I don’t think so. On

the other hand, when it comes to trying to get it out of the sport,

we should all be on the same page. I think we are on the same

page. The difference is, where we are, we’ve been doing it for 20

years, and we’ve been trying to evolve and stay ahead of this. They

haven’t done it that way, and they have to do what’s best, because

I get asked all the time, what advice would I give baseball? I can’t

give them any advice. I’m more concerned about our league, our

players, our teams and our sport. That’s where I am.

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you very much.

Mr. DUNCAN [presiding]. Thank you.

I’m going to go for questions to Mr. Shays, but first I want to just

say that a few weeks ago just before and just after our hearing

with the baseball executives and players, there were a lot of media

reports. I saw one about a boxer who had lost both of his legs because of steroid use. I saw other reports about high school kids

having mental problems and even committing suicide.

There was some criticism of this committee about holding these

hearings. I even said—I told the media, this is my 17th year in the

Congress. I have never seen so much media coverage. Some people

said, well, we should have been holding hearings on some of the

more important issues. This committee has about the broadest jurisdiction of any committee in the Congress. We have held hearings

on every major issue there is out there, from the war in Iraq to everything else, and a lot of times those hearings aren’t well attended. We couldn’t help it because there was more media interest

in this than some of the other things.

But I think holding these hearings has brought attention to this

issue like never before, and a lot of young people now know how

dangerous some of these things are. I appreciate your attitude and

your cooperation with this committee in regard to these hearings.

I will tell Mr. Tagliabue that my constituent and good friend

Lamar Alexander I know is a good friend of yours from law school

days, and he certainly thinks a lot of you.

Finally, I would just say, I’ve told people the biggest thing in my

district is Tennessee football, and that the colors orange and white

are almost more patriotic than red, white and blue. But I found out

how tough pro football was a few years ago when we had an AllAmerican linebacker named Chazon Bradley, and he was cut by

the New York Giants. He told me later that when he came up, they

moved him around like he was a toothpick. I have never forgotten

that. So pro football has to be a very difficult profession.

Go ahead, Mr. Shays.

Mr. SHAYS. I want to say that this hearing today with all of you

and the earlier panel is like light years different from Major

League Baseball. I want to thank you for your cooperation. I want

to thank you for being here before and listening to the first panel.

I want to thank you for providing us all the data that we needed.

And so I have nothing but admiration for—Commissioner, I want

to thank you for knowing what the hell is going on. With all due

respect, the commissioner of baseball hadn’t even read the document that he had given us. They didn’t even seem to know that in

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the document they gave us it said a penalty or a fine. Then they

said, well, a fine really wasn’t part of it. And then after the hearing, they said they voted to take the fines out as if they were part

of it.

I kind of love you guys, and yet I shouldn’t because I still have

problems. The problem I have is you still have four bites, and I

don’t understand it. I don’t understand why someone who’s breaking the law, who’s cheating, should have one bite, should have two

bites, should have three bites before they are asked to leave. So I

need you to explain to me why you think that is OK.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I don’t want to quibble, but I don’t know what

you mean by four bites. As soon as a player tests positive for a performance-enhancing——

Mr. SHAYS. Let me explain what I mean then so you won’t have

to wonder. You don’t suspend him the first time permanently, you

don’t suspend him the second time permanently, you don’t suspend

him the third time permanently. They still get to come back and

play. And the fourth time, I think they’re out. I’m not sure, but I

think they’re out.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. Maybe I could just answer it in two parts. It’s

definitely worth discussing, obviously. First of all, as soon as a

player tests positive for any one of these substances, or if he refuses to give a test, he’s suspended for four games.

Mr. SHAYS. That is one bite.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. In other sports, that’s equivalent to a 40-game

suspension. In baseball, that would be a 40-game suspension. In

the NBA, it would be a 20-game suspension.

Mr. SHAYS. Baseball has 10 days.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. But ours is equivalent to 40 games in baseball,

if they had the same policy.

Second, it works. It’s easy for me as the almighty God on high

to be peremptory and say, throw them out of the sport. That’s not

fair. It works. We’ve had 54 violators and never a repeat. So four

games works.

Mr. SHAYS. So you really don’t need the second at six games and

the third at 1 year. That’s what I’m wondering. I don’t have a problem with the first pass.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. But we don’t have a first pass. We got 54 violations, we’ve had 54 suspensions. There were two positive tests, and

those—on the second time through, and those players retired. So

the deterrent has worked. We’ve never gotten to the second.

Mr. SHAYS. You have had two repeats?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We’ve had two repeats, and they retired from the

game.

Mr. SHAYS. When they were caught the second time?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. When they were caught the second time, they retired. We had 54 players; 52 of the 54 were disciplined once, and

there has never been a repeat. So it works.

Mr. SHAYS. I’m impressed by that, but then maybe you all should

be considering not having the third time being 1 year.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. That’s a fair point. Maybe we can take a fresh

look at how these things are sequenced.

Let me just make another point. We heard this morning about

other sports with 2-year suspensions, including the WADA. They

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had a lot of exemptions from that. It’s not actually as advertised.

They have a bunch of exemptions, all the way down to warnings,

as exemptions from the 2-year policy. If a player can show that

what he did was not intentionally designed to violate the policy, he

gets a warning, not a 2-year. We have absolute liability.

Mr. SHAYS. Let me ask Mr. Upshaw to comment.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I’d like to make one further point. In many

cases, if we went to something like a 2-year suspension for the first

offense here, A, I think it would be unnecessary to deter, and, B,

it would be the end of the player’s career. He would go back in the

street. In some cases he’s going to be a young man whose only path

out of the ghetto is football. He’s going to go back and never return.

Mr. SHAYS. Before Mr. Upshaw makes his point, I am not arguing that the first time be 2 years. I guess what I had a problem

with was looking at the three and the four.

Mr. Upshaw.

Mr. UPSHAW. As the commissioner has pointed out, we have not

had repeat offenders. The thing that you have to also remember is

that once you’re in this program, you’re randomly tested at least

24 times per year for the rest of your career. So you’re always on

the edge from that first time. There are not many clubs willing to

take a chance when you’re that close to basically losing it all. That

is all part of being in the position where we feel that it has worked

for us. We’re not close-minded to what they’re doing at WADA, but

that’s a different story, but we feel this works for our players, and

our players believe it works because we don’t have repeat offenders.

Mr. SHAYS. I think that’s an impressive statistic. I think it

speaks volumes. What I will just conclude by saying is it strikes

me then that it may be unnecessary to have a perceived third bite

of the apple.

Mr. UPSHAW. Let’s hope we never have to get there.

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We will take a look at that to see if we can make

it clearer that this is peremptory.

Mr. DUNCAN. Mr. Cummings.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much.

Let me say first of all to you, Mr. Tagliabue, to Mr. Henderson

and to Mr. Upshaw, I sat through the entire baseball hearing, all

11 hours of it, and I got to tell you that this is a breath of fresh

air compared to what we heard and what we experienced that day.

I want to thank you for your testimony.

One of the things—and I just want to pick up on where Mr.

Shays left off. Mr. Tagliabue, having said what I just said, you said

something just now that really kind of struck my interest. When

Mr. Shays was talking about possibly, I guess, suspending folks for

a lifetime, or putting them out of the game, you said for some of

these folks, it’s their only path out of the ghetto. Is that what you

said?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. Yes. Some of our players.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I live in the ghetto, all right? I’ve been there for

a long time. I live within a shadow of Ravens stadium. I represent

people who can’t afford to go to the game. I represent people, if

they are caught with a Schedule III drug, they go to jail. I am here

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to tell you, I feel no sympathy, none, for people who cheat, who

make it harder on other players, and in the words of Mr. Henderson, I think Mr. Upshaw may have said it, too, what happens, it

almost forces folks to say, well, if they’re doing it, then I’ve got to

do it.

That is the thing that bothers me. These guys are getting paid,

big time. Nobody says that kind of stuff to my guys on my street

who are being arrested as we speak. They don’t get any sympathy

from me.

What I would like to see is that after that second time, that they

be thrown out of the game. We need to send a message to some

of the kids in my neighborhood that professional sports, where people can bulk up or do whatever—I am not so worried about the

weight stuff, I am more concerned about the example. They sit

there and they say to themselves, you know, this is my—see, there

is another way to look at this. This is my way out of the ghetto.

But they don’t understand that on their way trying to get to one

of those games and be a part of the game, they may be derailed.

And if they are derailed, they got major, major problems.

So I guess what I am saying to you is that I hope that you do

take a look at throwing folks out after the second offense. And I

know and, Mr. Upshaw, I heard you and you, Mr. Henderson, you

were very sincere, and I really appreciate it, but part of the reason

why we hold these hearings, I think, is to try to send a message

to our young people not to mess with not only these kinds of drugs,

but other drugs.

I heard you, Mr. Tagliabue. I know you to be an honorable man,

and I hope that you will consider that. It is not just the guys that

you are worrying about, at least they’re making some money. My

guys when they get arrested, you know what happens to them?

They’re sentenced to life with no—when I say life, I mean they

can’t get a job, they can’t have certain occupations, they can’t do

a whole lot of things. They may not ever have a sentence where

they serve a year or two, but just that record. And so they see this

as a ticket out of the getto. Your players running around, it’s a

wonderful magazine with the fancy uniforms that you showed, the

fancy uniforms, they’re looking good. My guys can’t get in the stadium. You follow me? And so I would appreciate it.

Do you want to comment on that?

Mr. UPSHAW. I would like to comment on the end result of the

second offense. That is where we are focused. We focus on the repeat offenders. We don’t have repeat offenders. We all understand

the economics here. That’s why guys are playing the game. That’s

why guys in the game want this banned substance and steroids out

of the game. They don’t want it in there. That’s why we’re talking

about it. And when it gets to going to try to educate other students,

younger students, younger athletes, we have been on the cutting

edge of doing as much as we can possibly do.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Moving over to Mr. Tagliabue, one of the things

that you all said, which is very interesting, was the thing about the

athletes and how small they are. We had a program with the NFL

in my district where they were working with us on obesity issues

in some high schools. I walked into the auditorium, and I’m expecting to see these big guys. These little tiny fellows—I’m almost finVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:42 Jun 28, 2005 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00158 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\21242.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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ished, Mr. Chairman. These little tiny fellows. I said, what are you

doing? They said, we play for the Ravens. I was shocked. So I know

what you are talking about. There are a lot of pretty small fellows

in the league.

Mr. UPSHAW. I just want to comment on that. That gets to the

rules. Last weekend we went through the draft. There was a lot of

discussion about one of the rule changes that we made on what you

can do and can’t do with a receiver as he goes 5 yards past the line

of scrimmage. You will see a change in the defensive back, the way

that they look, the size that they are, and what they can and cannot get away with based on what rules that we have.

So when you have these big, huge Mack trucks sitting in the

front blocking, you need some little, smaller guys to kind of ease

through that hole, because they can’t open up a hole big enough for

a guy that’s 240, 250 pounds. That’s the gist of what happens in

the game today.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I guess, Mr. Cummings, I think you and I agree

on most everything here on the terms of discipline. We want it to

be stiff. We don’t have repeat offenders, as Gene just said. We have

not had a repeat offender stay in the league in this area. And my

only point was that at some juncture, I’d rather save a life than

destroy it.

Mr. CUMMINGS. You heard my comments.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I think we agree on most everything here.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Dent.

Mr. DENT. Thanks, Mr. Chairman.

Good afternoon. I sat through several hours of hearings when

Major League Baseball appeared before this committee. Like some

of the previous speakers, Mr. Shays and Mr. Cummings, I do applaud you for your forthrightness, for your interest in this issue,

and for how you have tried to be proactive on this issue over the

years.

My question—one of the questions I had asked Major League

Baseball that dealt with sports betting, betting on baseball; if you

bet on baseball, you’re gone. I take it that the NFL has a similar

policy. I remember a case several years ago, I think, of a prominent

quarterback who was betting, and he is no longer in the game. You

do have a policy, Mr. Tagliabue, on sports betting?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. Yes.

Mr. DENT. What are the penalties for a player who bets on football while an active player?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I guess it’s up to me.

Mr. DENT. Up to you. So it is not like Major League Baseball

where basically you’re banned for life.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I’m sure I could ban someone for life. It would

depend on what he did.

Mr. DENT. I asked this question of baseball, and I will ask it of

you. Do you believe that the steroid issue is as serious or more serious than the sports betting issue among players?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I think it’s just as serious, but I think it’s comparing apples and oranges. I guess the way I look at it is that an

effective program in this area really has to go to about five points.

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One is education. One is strict enforcement of access to these substances, and I think that’s a real, deep, big problem in our society,

especially for young people. I’ve been told by experts that you can

get some of these substances by going online, getting an 800 number, no matter where you live, calling a call center. The call center

will switch you to Bermuda and get you a prescription. You can get

drugs prescribed, and then they will be FedEx’d to you from someplace overseas. It’s flooding in. Internet pharmacy.

Education; enforcement relative to access; effective testing, which

is a major deterrent; strong discipline; and at some point rehabilitation and giving people a second chance, I think those are the elements, and I think that’s what we have.

I think this is as severe as gambling. I think the challenges for

young people here are greater because of confusion about what’s a

legitimate drug and what’s illegitimate. We talked about stimulants this morning. A big part of the issue there is increasing prescriptions of wonder drugs for ADD and ADHD. I think this is a

little more nuanced, I guess, than the gambling. I think they’re

both very severe problems, and they should be addressed severely.

Mr. DENT. I understand and respect your answer. I guess I was

hoping that we might say that this steroid issue is more serious because both sports gambling and illegal steroid use affect the integrity of your game to be sure, but the steroids certainly affect the

health of the players considerably.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I think this is a lot more complicated than gambling. We’re in an environment where gambling can be a big problem in our society. That’s probably another week of hearings. Of

course, that’s being condoned in ways that it shouldn’t be. Thank

you.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Towns.

Mr. TOWNS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

First of all, let me associate——

Mr. TAGLIABUE. Including video poker on ESPN.

Mr. TOWNS. Let me first associate myself with the remarks made

by a couple of my colleagues in saying that dealing with you is a

breath of fresh air when you compare it to Major League Baseball.

Also, I want to commend you, Commissioner Tagliabue, and, of

course, Mr. Upshaw and Mr. Henderson, for how you have actually

dealt with the problem in terms of working together to deal with

the whole drug abuse issue. I want to salute you for that.

I just want to make certain that I fully understand what you are

doing. Will you describe the process by which a player who is notified he has tested positive can appeal? If a player has tested positive, and he would like to appeal, what is the process? Maybe I

should go all the way through.

Mr. HENDERSON. I can answer that. A player who has tested

positive is first notified by Dr. Lombardo, who is an adviser to the

administrative head of the program. I think that his first step after

advising the player of the positive test is to discuss with him

whether there is a legitimate reason that he had a particular substance in his system, such as a prescription from a doctor or something like that.

Once he makes that determination, either the case is dropped as

not a positive, it’s not considered a positive, or advanced. There

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may be some circumstances in which he’s not fully satisfied of the

player’s innocence, but feels there is not enough conclusive evidence to go forward with the case, and we put him on probable

cause testing, reasonable cause testing, and he’s tested indefinitely

at the program’s discretion, randomly, several times regularly after

that. Or if there is no adequate rationale, no reasonable explanation for the substance in the player’s body, and no issue of proof

with the evidence, he’s given a notice of discipline.

A letter is issued from people in my office notifying him that he

is suspended immediately for 4 weeks and that he has a right of

an appeal. If he wishes to appeal, he can bring a representative,

including a lawyer of his choice, and his union representative to

take advantage of his opportunity to have a hearing.

A hearing, if he wants a hearing, an appeal hearing is held before a designated hearing officer with full due process afforded

under the CBA, an opportunity to present evidence, witnesses. We

also have—he can bring in a toxicologist of his own to refute any

evidence that we have. Sometimes these hearings may be as short

as an hour or so, but I’ve known them to take 8 hours or more.

After he has fully exhausted his defenses, a decision is rendered.

Mr. TOWNS. Let me make sure I understand that. Let me make

sure I understand the appeals process. For instance, you’re saying

that you have tested positive, and I am saying, no, that’s not the

case. What happens to the player during that process?

Mr. HENDERSON. What happens to the player?

Mr. TOWNS. Yes, during that process.

Mr. HENDERSON. Discipline is stayed pending the appeal, if that’s

what you mean. Nothing happens to the player prior to his appeal

hearing.

Mr. TOWNS. Right. So he can still continue to play.

Mr. HENDERSON. If it’s during the season, yes, he would continue

to play.

Mr. TOWNS. How long does this appeal process take?

Mr. HENDERSON. It varies. Obviously during the season we make

every effort to expedite it. We try to have it resolved, certainly

within 30 days or less if possible, with lawyers involved and witnesses and things like that. Sometimes the process takes longer to

put in place. In the off-season, the penalty is deferred until the season starts anyway, and so people are inclined not to rush it as

much. There is not the same urgency, and sometimes it’s as late

as this time of year, May or even June, before those cases are resolved, because the discipline would be imposed only in September

when the season starts.

Mr. TOWNS. I know some suggestions were made up here about

them being suspended for life and all that. Let me ask you, up to

this point, how do you feel that the program has actually worked?

Mr. HENDERSON. How do I feel that it’s working?

Mr. TOWNS. Yes.

Mr. HENDERSON. I think it’s working very effectively because—

I never played football, unlike Mr. Upshaw and Mr. Courson, but

since I’ve been here, I’ve spent a lot of time talking to players. I

go to the teams, I spend time in the locker room, I spend time on

the sidelines before the games. We have players come to the combine. We have players come to the competition committee meeting,

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and even some of our own committee meetings we have joint meetings with players involved. So I talk to a lot of players.

The players believe that it’s working. I cannot tell you how many

players I’ve talked to who say, I can’t believe anybody can beat a

test. I’m tested every time I turn around. Unless there’s some real

serious hole in it, I don’t know anybody that can beat the test. The

players generally don’t believe that people are beating the tests.

Mr. UPSHAW. There was an article in the Washington Post today,

and there were several active players that basically commented

about the program. One was our president, Troy Vincent. As president of the players association he fully supports and understands

exactly what we’re talking about here today and how much he supports it. He’s in the locker room with his teammates. He understands what’s going on.

I happen to have been in a locker room with a player who has

passed away. I was there at the end. He to this day believes that

steroids led to his death. That was Lyle Alzado. That was his

words. So to be there firsthand to deal with it, to understand it,

to know it’s there was very—had a very, very profound impact on

all of us.

Mr. TOWNS. I guess the only thing that I would say, and I know

my time has expired—we’ve got a vote, I know. The only thing I

would say is that if you can find a way to sort of assist in terms

of making young people aware of the dangers, maybe some of this

money when you suspend a person, take some of that money and

put it into a program of that magnitude, I think might be helpful

to the young people because that is a real concern, because they

really look at football players as role models. And, of course, that

is something that we—I think we need to just spend more time and

energy some way or another getting the message to young people.

They are 25 percent of our population, but they are 100 percent of

our future.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back.

Mr. SOUDER [presiding]. I, too, want to say I believe football has

a much better policy than what we saw out of baseball. But I have

some concerns, and I want to raise some. I am going to raise some

different concerns. Some of this you can maybe respond back in

writing because it’s far too comprehensive here.

One is after you heard the three Carolina football players who

were in the Super Bowl admit to steroids, did the NFL do any

after-action report where you went and talked to the players and

say, how did this happen? What could we have done differently?

And if you did do an after-action report and made any changes,

could you provide that to the committee?

Point No. 2, we have heard, with all due respect, on the earlier

panel from the NFL doctors and hear a lot of whining about how,

oh, this starts in high school, and it moves through college, and

then proceeded to also hear ‘‘first time.’’ Give me a break. This isn’t

a first time. You yourselves have testified all day today that most

likely, unless you have an exception like you talked about in the

one league, where you say if indeed they can prove it’s the first

time, that probably it has been a habitual pattern all the way

through high school and college where they were bulking up.

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One of the questions—this is a series of questions, but it comes

to the fact that the San Diego Chargers’ first-round draft pick Luis

Castillo tested positive to andro and didn’t get a penalty. If you are

so concerned about what is happening in high school and college,

how come he didn’t get a penalty? That is a clear way to send

something.

In the process here is—do you have a drug testing program for

incoming players? Is there a gap in testing between the players’

final college game in November and the NFL combine in March?

What happens if they test positive there? Do they come under suspensions?

I would like to hear what happens with Mr. Castillo. Clearly the

way to get ahold of it is as soon as they’re coming in. You can’t say

it’s a first time because I just don’t believe that in most cases it

is actually the first time.

The third thing—and this comes to a core question. I don’t know

whether this is true or not. I want to give Mr. Upshaw a chance

to respond. Last night on ESPN, you are probably aware of this,

Gary Plummer, a linebacker for the 49ers and the Chargers, said—

you said, Mr. Upshaw, that you had been working on this for 20

years. He said:

The NFL had wanted us to make that part of the collective bargaining agreement

to agree to steroid testing. And, you know, the players association, Gene Upshaw

and the rest of them, were just vehemently against it. No, no way. Now, remember

that these were the guys that came up in the 1970’s when all were doing it. I’m

sitting in the back of the room waving my arm, like waves arms, are you kidding

me, Gino? You give up this stuff for more money? Give up this stuff for more

money? Let’s do it today. Let’s do it yesterday. You know. And there were some guys

that felt that way, but I did get some guys turning around, and he turns around,

looking at saying, who’s this young guy in the back wanting to agree to steroid testing? You know, there were a lot of players at that time who wanted no part of steroid testing.

Is that statement true?

Mr. UPSHAW. No. I think the record will show that I have supported and continue to support and have been a strong supporter

of testing for steroids. I don’t know what Gary Plummer is talking

about, but knowing that he’s a linebacker, I sort of take that into

the balance of this also.

But I am not here to defend my position on steroids. It’s very

clear. It’s very clear. There is no room for steroids in the game.

There never has been. I never have supported steroids in the game.

It’s true, I played in the 1960’s, the 1970’s and the 1980’s, but I

never left the locker room. I’m still in there today, and I can’t find

one player that believes anything that has to do with steroids was

connected with money, not then, not now and not in the future.

So my record is there. I’m proud of what we’ve done and what

we continue to do and what we’re willing to do.

Mr. SOUDER. So you don’t believe there was anybody else in the

room who would say there was such a debate that occurred?

Mr. UPSHAW. I can’t even recall Gary Plummer being in a meeting in 1987. We didn’t even have a collective bargaining agreement.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Tagliabue, what about Mr. Castillo? Was there

a penalty on him, or do you have one planned?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I think under our existing policy, the consequence of a player testing positive at the combine is that he goes

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into—once he signs a contract to play in the league, he gets tested

24 times a year. At this point, I don’t think we do have a disciplinary component to a preemployment test. I think we should look

at that. Whether it would be lawful, we’d have to check out with

the attorneys. But I think that’s the short of it.

Mr. SOUDER. One of the key things is much like I talked about

in the first panel with the high schools, they know, for example,

that any alumnus who walks around, if they have inappropriate

contact, what that strong penalty message is.

Last, did you do an after-action report with the Carolina Panthers?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. Yes. We discussed it, I believe, with Chairman

Davis maybe when you were out. But the answer is we’re in the

process of doing it. We’ve been coordinating with the DEA, and

without interfering in the law enforcement investigation, we are

doing our own interviews through our own security department,

and we will furnish the results of that to the chairman as he requested.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

Mr. Lynch. I’m willing to miss a vote if you’re willing to miss a

vote. I will yield to Mr. Lynch.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you.

Just for the record, Mr. Upshaw, I am familiar with your record

over the years. I did see that telecast last evening with Mr. Plummer, but his comments were not consistent with the record of

progress that we have seen in the league and under your leadership of the union.

As a former union president myself, I saw what was going on in

Major League Baseball, and I have to say this is in stark contrast

to that. I think your leadership—you personally deserve much credit because of the credibility that you have with the individual players. That is enough about that.

Mr. Tagliabue, if I could, Commissioner, this is just a housekeeping measure, but we did, in response to our request for documents, get a summary of requested testing data from 1989 to the

present. I am just going to point out one thing. You have referred

in your testimony to 54 violations, right? And then on this sheet,

if I count up the number of program violations from 1989 to 2004,

it comes to like 109 or something like that. Is that because one

player might have several violations? Is that the deal?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. No. I believe what I said earlier, and I believe

what is a fact, is that we had 54 positives where the player was

suspended and 57 where the player just retired, having been notified of the positive. I think the total was 111.

Mr. LYNCH. OK. You are right. That explains it. But there were

111 positives; 54 of them resulted in suspensions. The other the

players either retired or——

Mr. TAGLIABUE. They chose to retire, which suggests to me it was

a marginal player.

Mr. LYNCH. That is fair enough.

I have gone through—you were nice enough to provide this collective bargaining agreement. I went through it as well as I could

to try to figure out the notice that the public gets regarding these

violations. One of the problems that we saw with Major League

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Baseball, which, again, it is in contrast to what you have done and

what the NFL has done, and you deserve credit for that, but one

of the problems with Major League Baseball was that there was,

I think, an attempt or a willingness to hide the violations. They

would let the players pay a $10,000 fine, and their violation of the

steroid policy would remain secret.

And so I am curious. I don’t see anything in writing regarding

the players association and the league and how they deal with a

violation publicly, because that is a huge disincentive to players if

they think that their opportunity for endorsements—and obviously

these are people who enjoy hero worship in our society, so if they

were guilty of steroid abuse and a violation of the league policy

there, and then that violation was made public, it would be a tremendous force, I think, positive peer pressure, that would encourage them not to engage in that activity. I just was wondering if you

had something worked out that is not written.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. It’s in the policy itself, which says that the confidentiality of a player’s medical condition and test results will be

protected to the maximum extent possible; however, recognizing

that players who are disciplined for violating this policy will come

to the attention of the public and the media.

So we do announce every suspension. We respect confidentiality

during the appeal process that Mr. Henderson described, but once

a player is adjudicated a violator, it’s made public, and of course

he disappears from his team’s squad because he’s no longer playing

for that team for four games. So that’s well known to everybody.

Mr. LYNCH. But, Commissioner, with all due respect, that talks

in the passive context. It doesn’t say the league shall notify or anything. It just says, recognizing that the violation may come to the

attention of the public.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. It says will come.

Mr. HENDERSON. As Gene and I were the signatories to the

agreement, we put it in there, it was not necessary, it was not

deemed to be necessary here because of the nature of the policy.

A player who’s guilty of an infraction is suspended. We don’t have

fines. We don’t have warnings. We don’t have interim discipline. A

player is suspended. And the league has long held in place a policy

governing how notification is given when a player is not going to

be with the team, and it comes out of the league office, out of our

communications department, distributed uniformly to the clubs and

the media at the same time on every player who’s being disciplined

under the policy.

Mr. LYNCH. That was my question. You are telling me that every

single violation—when you have had a violation, every single time

the public has been notified of the suspension, although not of the

medical condition, the confidential information regarding the player.

Mr. HENDERSON. With the exception of those 57 people who

chose to leave the league. There was no need to make a public announcement about them. They no longer were associated with us.

Mr. LYNCH. OK. Thank you. I yield back.

Mr. UPSHAW. We have people covering this league that cover everything. That was how it was with this Gary Plummer deal. That

shows you the extent of coverage we get. When a player disappears

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off the field, everyone knows that he’s gone, and there is a reason.

Normally what we try to do is to protect the confidentiality until

we can be sure that we, in fact, are right.

Mr. LYNCH. The one point I wanted to make on this, the HGH

gap, and that is a principal concern that I have is that in some

cases we have gaps where technologically there is the opportunity

at least to conceal the violation from the league and from the

union. HGH, it appears that in connection with the Olympics in

Athens, they developed labs that can test for this in Europe. I

know the NFL has NFL Europe where you actually have—I believe

you have a team in Cologne, which also is the host city for one of

these HGH capable labs. I don’t necessarily see the difficulty, and

I asked Dr. Wadler about this, about taking the urine samples and

have them tested in Cologne at that lab to verify for the presence

of HGH. It doesn’t seem like a huge obstacle for a multibillion-dollar business. I am just curious to hear your response to that, Commissioner.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. The gentleman’s time has expired, but you

can answer the question. Thank you.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We’ve been staying closely on top of this development of this supposed test for HGH. To my understanding, there

are at least two different kinds of tests, to my understanding. They

are still seeking validation of the reliability of the tests.

There is no testing lab in the United States. Should we take

blood samples here and ship them to Cologne? It’s an issue we’re

looking at. But we do not intend this—once the science gets to the

point where it’s reliable, we will act upon that science and close

that loophole. Right now it has been the absence of testing, of a reliable test and of testing labs, that has been the constraint.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. Souder.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Chairman, I had a brief clarification with Mr.

Upshaw, because I may have misspoken, but I want to make sure

we were on the same page.

Gary Plummer said in 1997 during the strike, not in 1987, and

I thought in your answer you said——

Mr. UPSHAW. He misspoke because we didn’t have a strike in

1997. This is like—maybe we should have had a strike, but we

didn’t have one in 1997. The last strike we had was in 1987. We

returned to work without a collective bargaining agreement. What

he talked about until 1993, there was no agreement. And part of

that time there was not even a union. Whatever Gary Plummer remembers doesn’t square up with the facts.

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. Sweeney.

Mr. SWEENEY. Thanks, Mr. Chairman.

Welcome to the commissioner and Mr. Henderson and Mr. Upshaw. I said earlier you are due some recognition. You indeed—I

am a former labor commissioner. I think you have shown clearly

in this hearing that your priorities are in better places than some

of your colleagues in other sports.

Mr. Upshaw, you in particular I wanted to note that, because I

think as compared to some of your colleagues, you have decided the

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health of your representation, who you represent, is significantly

important. You are to be saluted for that. We have a long way to

go, Commissioner.

I want to talk a little bit about the process for banning substances and get your sense of the collective bargaining agreement

and how it works. You rightly mentioned—we have been talking

about the growing challenge of designer steroids. Last year we

passed legislation; it was real hard to get the legislation all-encompassing, and I think we failed here in some respects in doing what

we needed to do to allow you the tools to protect your athletes as

well. Are you required to wait until a controlled substance or a substance is actually scheduled as a controlled substance before it is

banned, or do you have an independent mechanism for designer

steroids in particular, but any of the other products, to add them

to the list? How does that work?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We view ourselves as having an independent

mechanism, and we add to the list. We added THG, as Mr. Upshaw

said, when it came to light, and also I think our language says, and

related substances. So if there was a similar molecular structure,

and it was differentiated in some way, we would consider that to

be encompassed within our policy.

Mr. SWEENEY. Would it not be helpful if the FDA issued the long

overdue good manufacturing rules for supplements? Would it not

provide you additional knowledge, information? Maybe Mr. Henderson is the more appropriate person to answer that. Is it not a problem that the FDA has not moved forward on DSHEA and things

like that?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. It is, and it isn’t. We banned ephedra before the

FDA did, and we’re going to continue to view ephedra as dangerous

and banned for our players despite the recent court ruling in Utah,

because we feel there is sufficient scientific data and medical opinion that shows that for athletes with the characteristics and the

work requirements of ours, it’s a dangerous supplement.

The FDA issue in some ways is a broader and different issue focused on the population at large. We presume to have the authority

by agreement with the players to ban things that the FDA does not

ban.

Mr. SWEENEY. Is it not true that the NFL independently and voluntarily last year contributed money to USADA to expand their

testing capabilities on substances?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. Yes, we contributed $1.1 million over 5 years to

create a new lab jointly with USADA at the University of Utah to

promote their research and detection techniques.

Mr. SWEENEY. Would the NFL be interested in helping as well

in establishing a nationwide elementary-school-on-up education

program?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We have it. Perhaps before you came in, we have

published through our youth football fund a series of booklets, four

in number, on young athletes’ health. We have one volume on

strength and conditioning without supplements and steroids. We

have another volume that specifically addresses dangerous substances, which is what I’m holding up. It’s on our Web site. It’s on

other youth football organizations’ Web sites, available throughout

the country. It was done in conjunction with a number of univerVerDate 11-MAY-2000 11:42 Jun 28, 2005 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00167 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 D:\DOCS\21242.TXT HGOVREF1 PsN: HGOVREF1
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sities and other institutions, including the American Red Cross.

And I said earlier that we would put additional resources into additional distribution if that served the purpose, which I think it

could.

Mr. SWEENEY. I would also like to talk to you about an expanded

in-school program at some point, but given your past behavior,

frankly, I don’t think it is as big a problem.

Two final points. On the issue of tainted supplements, a current

football player was suspended, I think, in 1999. In baseball, it’s a

common occurrence. You have taken a look at it because you have

been involved in the proactive approach longer than baseball has

been. What do you do to protect players?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. We agreed with the players’ association on a sort

of a certified supplement manufacturer program, which I’ll let Mr.

Henderson or Mr. Upshaw explain. It’s in place now.

Mr. HENDERSON. This was an effort aimed principally at providing a means for players to use legal supplements that are deemed

to be helpful to use without running the risk of taking inadvertently a banned substance. We put in place a certification program

in which the manufacturer of those supplements can submit his

products, and, in fact, all his products have to be submitted and

an independent lab retained, but not affiliated, by us or the union

would do clinical examinations, would do random testing of things

coming out of the batches and lots off the shelves, do testing and

certify that none of the products produced by that particular supplement manufacturer contained the banned substance. There is a

certification symbol that’s put on the packaging. A list is provided.

At this point we don’t have a large number of companies that

have participated, but the purpose of that was to provide sources

for players that would know it is not tainted, because when they

come with a positive test to their appeal hearing and say, I bought

it down at the GNC or some other store and something was in it,

that’s not an excuse that gets them off. The fact is that they are

held strictly accountable for what’s in their body, and that’s why

we moved to that kind of a testing program.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you.

Mr. Ruppersberger, last but not least.

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Last but not least.

First off, I want to thank you all for being here today. I’ve said

before—and I was a little concerned about the hearing that we had

for baseball. I want to commend the chairman and also the ranking

member for the hearing because I think it has put the issue on the

table.

One of our key issues is the influence that professional players,

whether it is football, baseball or whatever, have with respect to

our younger generation. That is an important issue. During the

baseball hearing, I referred to your policy from a positive point of

view. I think that you have a strong policy. It can always be

stronger. But I think that your policy has worked, and I think the

evidence of that is that it is my understanding, correct me if I’m

wrong, that of the 42 violators that you have had in your program,

you have not had that same individual be charged with another

violation; is that correct?

Mr. UPSHAW. That’s correct.

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Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. With that said, and I think that you have

come a long way, there are a lot of issues that you can deal with.

We just had the incident that, I’m sure it has been referred to, I

wasn’t here before, and we are going to continue to have incidents

like that when you have an operation like the NFL.

I want to ask this question. I guess you first, Mr. Tagliabue. Why

does the NFL performance-enhancing drug policy test only eight

stimulants compared to the 42 stimulants tested by the Olympic

standards?

Mr. TAGLIABUE. As was explained this morning by Dr. Finkle

and Dr. Lombardo, we feel those stimulants are the ones that are

of principal concern and that are the focus of our concerns for football players. The Olympic Committee is dealing with many, many

other sports. Blood-doping techniques and other things that are of

concern there have not been a concern for us. We are looking at

that issue now to see whether we should expand the number of

stimulants.

I said earlier that one of the issues, a key issue, for us in this

area is prescriptions being given for ADD, attention deficit disorder, and ADHD and whether those are being abused. We are

looking at those issues, and we will see whether——

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. I am glad you said that you are looking at

those issues. Amphetamine, I think you test once a year. Amphetamine can be used for different reasons. The bottom line from a

macro point of view is that we are talking about the perception of

anyone in sports using a drug that will help them perform. Not

only is that illegal, and not only does that have an effect on the

younger generation, but it also is cheating. I know based on your

standards in the NFL, you don’t want anybody to perceive that you

are cheating.

I would ask you, so Congress doesn’t have to come in and deal

with the issue, to police your own industry. You have done a good

job, but you need to go further. Hopefully this hearing will have

you reevaluate on where you need to be.

Mr. Upshaw, what is your opinion about where we need to go,

to go beyond? Even though the NFL is right out there, other than

the Olympic standard, it is still, as indicated by what happened

with the Panthers, isn’t enough, and one or two bad apples affects

us all.

Mr. UPSHAW. We are looking at that issue as we speak, the

whole amphetamine issue. We understand that if there is cheating

involved, we want it off the field. We will look at this the same way

we did ephedra. When we found out the effects and what was going

on, we immediately banned it, and it stays on the banned list because we understand how it addressed our football population. So

each year, and all the time—it doesn’t take a bill passed here in

Congress for us to act, because we won’t have a chance to act. But

what we try to do is do what’s best for our sport on a timely manner. When we understand that there is a problem, we deal with it,

we meet it head on, we use the best research and science, and

that’s really what we’re talking about here.

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Let me ask you this question because I

think negotiation is important, and my time is almost up. It seems

that you have come a lot further than baseball. Is it because of you

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representing the players, that the players want to police it themselves; because that really is what is going to, I think, make a difference is the influence of other players. Because all of our sports,

previous generations created a sport that a lot of people are benefiting, and it is your duty, I think, not only to look after the influence on children, but also to hold this in trust for future generations.

How did you negotiate with the NFL to get where you were versus where you think baseball is? That might be a hard question,

but I would like the answer.

Mr. UPSHAW. It’s not a hard question. It’s an easy question.

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. You don’t like baseball?

Mr. UPSHAW. No, I actually love baseball. I wanted to play baseball. My dad wouldn’t let me. On the other hand, what you have

to understand here is that our players really wanted this out of the

sport. The teams wanted it out of the sport. We wanted it out of

the sport. But even more than that, you have to have some leadership, too. You have to take some tough positions that might not be

popular at the time, but in the long run they will work out what

is better for not only our players, but for the people that look up

to our players as role models and as leaders. We have to do what

is right.

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. My final—not a question—since my red

light is on, you have done a good job to this point, but I hope you

stay ahead of the curve and address these issues because there

seems to be a lot more to do, especially as it relates to drugs. It’s

illegal, and it’s cheating.

Mr. UPSHAW. I want to say as a final point is that I think our

history will show that we will do what is necessary to get cheaters

out of the game.

Mr. RUPPERSBERGER. Thank you.

Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Waxman.

Mr. WAXMAN. I know the hearing is about to come to an end. I

want to thank our witnesses not just for their testimony, but for

their commitment to deal with this issue of steroids among athletes.

But there is still one thing that puzzles me, and that is the fact

that there are a lot of people who are very credible in sports who

will tell me privately that they think there is a high amount of

steroid use in football. Yet when I look at the testing results, it

doesn’t appear that is the case. So it is still nagging at me. We can

continue the conversation after the hearing is over to try to still

think through why that is, whether they are wrong, or whether we

are not getting all the information. But I have no doubt about your

good faith in trying to deal with the problem.

Mr. Chairman, I want to put in the record, the hearing record

today, a letter from the parents of Efrain Marrero. Mr. Marrero

was a 20-year-old college football player from Vacaville, CA. He

was a caring son from a close family. In an effort to improve his

play, Efrain turned to steroids. He felt he had to do this to get better and felt it was OK because he saw his role models, professional

athletes, doing the same thing.

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Tragically it appears that Mr. Marrero’s steroid use resulted in

serious psychological harm that led to his suicide. His parents have

since become active in efforts to eliminate steroid use by high

school, college and professional athletes. I want them to know how

much we appreciate their work. I know they were at our first hearing, and I thank them for their contribution to this hearing, and

I would like to put their letter into the record.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Without objection.

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mr. WAXMAN. Again, thank you, gentlemen, for your testimony.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. What steps would an NFL coach or athletic trainer take if they suspect a player is taking steroids? Do

they automatically go to a test, or what happens if there is a suspicion?

Mr. UPSHAW. Obviously you would have to look at the body itself.

You would have to do it and observe what you see. As I said, when

I was playing with a player that was taking steroids, it was very

obvious. You could see it.

We do have provisions for reasonable cause testing within the

program which would be referred to our medical people to make

the determination. The coach cannot make that determination.

Mr. TAGLIABUE. I would think a coach would talk to the owner,

and the owner would call me or Mr. Henderson or Mr. Upshaw and

ask us to proceed.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Thank you very much. You have been

very thorough.

Mr. Payne just came in. He is not a member of the committee,

but I ask unanimous consent he be allowed to ask a couple of questions. He will wrap it up, and we will let you go. You have been

very good with your time today. We appreciate the delays you have

had to encounter because of our voting schedule.

Mr. Payne.

Mr. PAYNE. Thank you very much. I certainly appreciate the opportunity to participate. I will be very brief.

I am just here because of my concern in general about athletics,

the positive part that athletics play in our country, and, of course,

then the negative part where so many young people who strive to

be the stars.

Let me certainly commend the NFL in general and Commissioner Tagliabue for some of the programs that you have put in

place over the years. We met years ago on the whole drug question,

a decade ago. When we met one on one about trying to deal with

the substance abuse of players. And now, of course, this is another

aspect of it with steroids.

But I would just like to say that it is important that the leadership of our sports leagues, whether it is professional or college or

high school, really try to instill in our young people the right

course; the fact that, discouraging, of course, as I know you gentlemen there do, the use of related substances and steroids and other

kinds of drug-related substances. I think we really have to work

harder at attempting to get the message out.

I just want to say as a former high school coach, of course, in

those days these were not problems, but I think if we work together, we could really do a job.

Also, some of the issues of age of young people going into professional sports, that is another issue I think that we need to take a

look at, because if we are going to continue to use younger and

younger people in professional sports, they will be doing things to

bring their bodies up to where they feel it should be 3 or 4 years

from now.

I would like to continue to work with you on those issues. I have

raised the issues with the NBA on the age of youngsters performing in professional sports, but I just wanted to say that I think that

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we need to work together. If there is a problem, we need to acknowledge it is a problem and work toward eradicating it.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman TOM DAVIS. Mr. Payne, thank you for joining us.

Again, I want to thank this panel. It has been very illuminating.

We may have one or two other questions we will get to you in a

written format. If you could get back to us on that.

Thank you so much. The hearing is adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 4 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]

[The prepared statements of Hon. Jon C. Porter and Hon. Patrick

T. McHenry, and additional information submitted for the hearing

record follow:]

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