Following Winter Recess, Congress will hold steroid hearings.

hockeybeat · Nov 17, 2007

I saw this on Dave Meltzer's Wrestlingobserver.com site.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee, headed by Representative (Bobby) Rush, will hold hearings on performance enhancing drugs in sports when it comes back from the winter recess. The wrestling hearings will be part of more hearings that will cover baseball and other sports, but the two main sports will be baseball and pro wrestling. Vince needs to "thank" Barry Bonds for this one because that indictment spurred Rush on, who had in the past been concerned, but not concerned enough to call hearings, on wrestling.
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Mr. Rush's biography: http://energycommerce.house.gov/Subcommittees/ctcp.shtml

Why, I do declare that Messrs. Selig and Fehr may be a tad uncomfortable sitting at the same table as Vince McMahon and Barry Bonds.

Fenian_Bastard · Nov 17, 2007

What's left out of Congressman Rush's bio is that he was once a high-ranking member of the Chicago Black Panthers and that it was only dumb luck that he wasn't murdered in his bed the day Fred Hampton was.
In other words, Rep. Rush has a loooonnnnnnggg career as a gen-u-wine bad-ass.

BYH · Nov 17, 2007

And football keeps on skating. Amazing what good PR will do for you.

three_bags_full · Nov 17, 2007

Doesn't everything in Washington happen during recess?

hockeybeat · Nov 17, 2007

BYH said:

And football keeps on skating. Amazing what good PR will do for you.
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I absolutely agree with you. The NFL needs to be brought into the hearing to discuss its testing program and how it may need to improve.

Dave Meltzer has repeatedly said that if professional athletes dropped dead at the same rate as professional wrestlers, there would have been Congressional and media investigations.

The following is a Frank Deford piece from NPR:

Wrestler Deaths Should Be Warning to Other Sports

Morning Edition, August 22, 2007 Â·

Imagine, if you will, that in the last decade, 186 men who had played major league baseball died before they were 50 years old. Imagine that in that same time, 435 men who had played in the NFL likewise died before they were 50.

If this were so, Congress would probably have dropped discussing everything short of terrorism to investigate. Cable television would talk of nothing else. The sports would be decried from the pulpits.

Of course, nothing like this has happened. However, if you extrapolate the number of deaths of under-50 professional wrestlers to baseball and football, that is the equivalent mortality score: 186 major league baseball players, 435 NFL players. Dave Meltzer, the distinguished journalist who has covered professional wrestling for 30 years, has carefully tabulated the death toll in his sport, and he comes up with a total of 65 wrestlers who have, since 1997, died before their 50th birthday.

But who cares? Who does anything about it?

Oh, occasionally, as earlier this summer when the wrestler Chris Benoit killed his wife and son and then committed suicide, the death is so horrific that there is a momentary flurry of interest. But then it is quickly on to the next week's example of American ghoulishness. Who knows that in the seven weeks since the Benoit family massacre, three more wrestlers have died — two at age 44, one at 38. Drugs seem to have played a part in all three deaths.

The main reason for such indifference is that professional wrestling isn't considered a sport and is barely legislated. But, of course, unlike such other popular cable entertainments as poker and hot-dog eating, wrestling is a sport. No, not legitimate in the competitive sense, but it is certainly legitimate athletic exercise. It's grueling, all the more so that the wrestlers are subjected to an arduous travel schedule.

Meltzer, the editor of Wrestling Observer Newsletter, says that performance-enhancing drugs entered the sport as early as the 1960s. By the 1980s, steroids were a staple — especially as Vince McMahon, the brilliant promoter who headed up the World Wrestling Federation, realized that blown-up action humanoids sold tickets and drove up ratings.

But, says Meltzer, "Even if there had been no Vince McMahon, there would have been a steroid problem in wrestling." Steroid muscles sell wrestling as silicone breasts sell other popular divertissements.

Meltzer, I believe, is the most accomplished reporter in sport journalism. It's incidental that his sport is not a fashionable one. It's Meltzer's comprehensive knowledge that makes his death tally so accurate and so awful — especially as it shows that the vast preponderance of wrestlers who have died either lost their lives outright to drug overdose or died of heart attack, liver or kidney failure, clearly brought on by drug abuse.

There are, I believe, two things we must take away here. First, attention must be paid to the horrors of professional wrestling by somebody other than Dave Meltzer. And second, those who tend to think performance-enhancing drugs in sports like baseball and football really aren't a big deal ought to be forewarned. It can happen here.
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I think it's vitally important that all sports and professional wrestling have their drug testing programs thoroughly examined. Are there flaws in the testing? The WWE's policy is laughable. It's almost an open invitation for Vince McMahon's bloated ballooned band to turn their bodies into walking GNC stores.

steveu · Nov 17, 2007

BYH said:

And football keeps on skating. Amazing what good PR will do for you.
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Wasn't it David Boston who had GHB in his system and USA TODAY had one graf on it on its scoreboard page?

If it had been David Eckstein, it'd have been splashed across page one.

hockeybeat · Nov 17, 2007

steveu said:

BYH said:

And football keeps on skating. Amazing what good PR will do for you.
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Wasn't it David Boston who had GHB in his system and USA TODAY had one graf on it on its scoreboard page?

If it had been David Eckstein, it'd have been splashed across page one.
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There was a pretty eye-opening piece on Boston a couple years ago, about his training regimen and the amount of supplements he was using. He physically exploded, topping out at 280. He bragged about how strong he was and how good he thought he looked.

What I don't remember is if the NFL investigated him for steroid abuse.

Baron Scicluna · Nov 17, 2007

Several thoughts:

1. I wish that Congress would spend more time worrying about kids going to bed hungry and our health care crisis than millionaire athletes sticking themselves with needles.

2. Having said that, watching Vince McMahon testifying before Congress is bound to be priceless.

3. I'm in full agreement with Deford. Meltzer is terrific in his reporting. His full story after the Montreal Screwjob in 1997 is a must-read for wrestling fans.

Armchair_QB · Nov 18, 2007

This is a massive waste tax money.

spnited · Nov 18, 2007

Why doesn't Congress do something about the Americans being killed in a useless war in Iraq or the large number of Americans living in poverty or our pathetic education system or our lack of concern about out of control health care costs or 1,000 more important issues than a bunch of rich asshole athletes using steroids?
When did we become such a totally fucked up country?

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