way too many unknowledgeable wrote:
Logan's implied message is worth hearing. Either we engage in a full court press to limit PED's, or we do virtually nothing at all. Any middle ground is far too susceptible to manipulation. Although there have been significant strides made in term of doping, given the geographic and enforcement variances, we are in a slippery middle ground now, which creates nothing but frustration.
The sport has already suffered. Most all of the women's world records are drug induced jokes. I am trying to remember when I last took world class performances seriously. My guess is sometime in the mid-70s'.
+1
I think Doug Logan is pretty much on the ball, and people calling him out of touch or stupid are simply in denial about the current state of professional athletics in general.
First things first. In any business that involves money, people will find ways to make more of it regardless of the legality. From wall street to track and field, manipulation and legal navigation of the rules will be used to advance one's fiscal standing, and in the case of sports entertainment, physically. The more exorbitant the amount of money, the more people will cut corners.
The point being, please stop expecting athletes to be Eric Liddell from Chariots of Fire. The day and age of gentleman athletes died when owners of teams, heads of athletic unions, and league presidents starting capitalizing off the entertainment value the athletes provided.
At the professional level, it's sports entertainment, and to think of it as something other than a business is simply denying the fact that athletes are contract employees. They are expendable, depreciating assets in a system where time isn't on their side, injury is most likely a career ending issue, and the rest of their peers will use any means necessary to get ahead. Integrity doesn't improve athletic achievement, put more seats in the stands, or sell more tickets.
At some time in every pro athletes life, they recognize that there are ways of getting to the level they desire. When their talent is maxed, and they can't do anything else, there are still ways to improve, and if that's the difference between hitting 2 of 10 and being in single A or hitting 3 of 10 and being in the Majors with a 3 million dollar salary who wouldn't take it... and if you say you wouldn't, then you have a completely unrealistic understanding of the state of sports entertainment today.
It's bullshit. I know. And I completely wish that people could find a reasonable set of rules and ethics that every player abide by. A set bar... but to think that the current state of USADA and WADA or any other drug testing agency is capable of making a level playing field is laughable.
So while I hate to say that I've given up thinking there are clean athletes getting screwed, I mean it. And it isn't necessarily that I don't think there are clean athletes, because there are, I just don't care anymore. I can't watch a baseball game, football game, track meet, hockey game, basketball game (etc..) and constantly be angered that half of the players are cheating... the entertainment value of said game or meet becomes void.
Instead, I've chosen to accept that I'd rather see people even the playing field and continue to progress the sport, with PED's or not.
I don't care if Satchel Paige could have struck out Ryan Braun or if the 1985 Celtics could have competed with current heat. I don't care if Jim Ryun would have beat Hitchem Elgoruge (sp?)... it doesn't matter. All that matters is that when I watch athletes in their current era, that I believe they all have the same edge. That's what I think Doug Logan meant.