“Sports writers” are now accusing athletes of NOT using anabolic steroids when their performance(s) decline. John Steigerwald writes in the Oberserver-Reporter that lack of steroids and performance-enhancing drugs is the reason for a decline in output by a professional hockey player.
Alexander Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals has disappointed fans over the past year because he has failed to score the expected 50 goals per year. He only scored 32 goals during the 2010-2011 season and is on track for only 28 this season.
John Steigerwald thinks this is obvious proof that Ovechkin is NOT using anabolic steroids anymore.
Of course, the real accusation is that Ovechkin must have used steroids when he averaged 55 goals per year during the previous five seasons.
What proof does Steigerwald have?
Steigerwald suggests that Ovechkin was receiving steroids from the same doctor that treated golfer Tiger Woods. This was clearly a reference to Anthony Galea, the Canadian doctor who pleaded guilty to illegally smuggling human growth hormone into the United States.
The problem is that there has been no evidence to support any link between Ovechkin and Galea. While Galea treated 23 professional athletes, he had been linked to only two National Hockey League players. It was said that two of the pro athletes were from Washington D.C. but those were thought to have been National Football League players with the Washington Redskins.
Steigerwald also tried to use George Laraque’s autobiography “The Story of the NHL’s Unlikeliest Tough Guy” to back up his suspicions of steroid use by Ovechkin.
Laraque had written that a good way to identify steroid users in the NHL was to look at performance declines and weight losses that corresponded to the Winter Olympics every four years. Since the Olympics adopt the much stricter WADA anti-doping rules, players are more likely to discontinue steroid use around the Olympics to avoid any possibility of testing positive.
This wasn’t the case for Ovechkin at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics according to Ryan Lambert at Puck Daddy. Steigerwald apparently failed to realize that Ovechkin’s performance not only didn’t drop off around the Olympics but actually improved dramatically.
Steigerwald is rarely taken seriously especially after he blamed a San Francisco Giants for being brutally beaten into a coma when he attended a Los Angeles Dodgers.
Photo credit: Wikipedia
Source:
Steigerwald, J. (December 4, 2011). Ovechkin’s decline because of PEDs? Retrieved from http://www.observer-reporter.com/or/steigerwald11/12-04-2011-Steigerwald
Lambert, R. (December 5, 2011). What We Learned: Squashing an Alex Ovechkin steroid accusation. Retrieved from http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/blog/puck_daddy/post/What-We-Learned-Squashing-an-Alex-Ovechkin-ster
