Barry Bonds: Performance Enhancing Drugs

Anabolic Steroids are taken by athletes to increase muscle mass while decreasing fat rapidly and efficiently. They can push the physiological limits of the muscle, making it bigger, faster and stronger than it can get naturally. Steroids achieve this affect on the body by enhancing the natural process of muscle building. The use of steroids has had a negative impact on the lives and careers of many athletes, causing suspensions, bans, and even the loss of medals and other awards and records earned in international events. A few of the high profile athletes whose lives and careers by their anabolic steroid use include: Barry Bonds, Lyle Alzada, Jose Canseco, Ben Johnson, Chris Benoit, Roger Clemens, Marion Jones, Alex Rodriguez and Lance Armstrong.

Steroids have a long-term, negative effect on the human body. These effects range from cardiovascular problems to mental and psychological issues such as rage and anger problems. Steroid use has been linked to increased alcohol consumption, marijuana use, cigarette smoking, and narcotic use (Buckman, Farris & Yusko, 2013). Many athletes may not be aware of the lasting effects steroids can have because all they are worried about is their performance, not their health.

Background: Although people have been using steroids over 50 years, it wasn't until we started seeing headlines about athletes using steroids that it started receiving attention.

Since Major League Baseball all-star Ken Caminiti openly admitted to Sports Illustrated to have used steroids during his career, steroid use as a muscle and performance enhancer has been uncovered and become a big issue Major League Baseball is wrestling with. The “ongoing and delicate subject, baseball’s dirty, little secret that is no secret anymore,” is a huge and growing problem (Curry B20). Now that light has been shed on the issue, critics are beginning to realize the magnitude of this problem and do not like it. Steroids are a cheating virus that is spreading quickly. Users cheat other players, themselves, the fans, and the game itself. Action must be taken to rid Major League Baseball of this virus

Furthermore, steroids are terrible for the sports world in general. Athletes who abuse steroids cheat the game and themselves. “The use of performance-enhancing drugs by professional athletes, or doping, has been acknowledged as a problem since at least the 1960s” (Performance Enhancing Drugs In Sports Fast Facts). Many superstar athletes had their reputation completely ruined because of being caught of cheating the game they play. Steroids are ruining professionals sports the more and more athletes decide to abuse performance-enhancing

In Major League baseball this off-season, there has been a lot of controversy about steroids. The commissioner of MLB, Bud Selig, has banned steroid usage from the game. Everyone this off-season was shocked when Canseco wrote a book called “Juiced,” in which he told when he

Before steroids Barry Bonds was a lock for the Hall of Fame, now it is believed he will not even get in because he cheated. “Bonds gulped as many as 20 pills at a time and was so deeply reliant on his regimen that he ordered Anderson to start "cycles" -- a prescribed period of steroid use lasting about three weeks -- even when he was not due to begin one”(Williams). Some extreme fans are calling for an asterisk next to his statistics in the record books. Barry still played after the news came out, and the harassment got so bad, that Barry eventually retired. When he went to opposing stadiums fans would hold up signs with an asterisk mark, or they would throw toy syringes at him while he was in the field. Chants of “who’s you’re dealer?” also surfaced at opposing ball parks. The fans took harassment to the next level on Barry Bonds.

Then two years later, he resembled an NFL linebacker. He played in an era that many sports writers have labeled “The Steroid Era” and with his sudden jump in production and size is a great piece of evidence that should be held against him. His statistics over a three year span had increased at such an amazing rate, one of the fastest rates in Major League history. Over the years of 1996 thorough 1999, Barry Bonds averaged 35 home runs per year (Elias). But in 2000, Bonds hit 49 home runs, then came out the next year and hit a record setting 73 home runs in a season, which is a great indicator that he used performance enhancing drugs over this specific time (Elias). The evidence that has been found and recorded on the topic of Bonds and performance enhancing drugs is plentiful, and all of this information should be used against him in a movement to convict him of robbing the game of baseball and hurting the structure of the game so many Americans love and enjoy.

Ben Johnson was one of the first superstar athletes to be caught using steroids and was stripped of his 100m gold medal at the 1988 Olympics. He was eventually banned for life in 1993 for testing positive again (Richardson 2010). Performance enhancing drugs have become widely used since the 1970’s and have only increased in the numbers of athletes using the drugs to up their endurance and perform to their greatest potential. Professionals such as Barry Bonds, Jose Canseco, and Hulk Hogan have all been humiliated and are now seen as cheaters after being caught using steroids. It is too late to stop these sports fuelled on drugs because of the large number of athletes using, so why not consider drug use as a

When taking steroids, or other types of PED’s they end up become unhealthy. They become unhealthy because PED’s grow the muscle tissue, but not the tendons, consequently making them more prone to tearing. Also, the body might experience bad acne, infections such as HIV, inhibited growth problems, and heart and circulatory problems. Steroids also display a lack of sportsmanship. When an athlete takes steroids they’re ultimately trying to get a competitive edge over other opponents, which nevertheless, gets rid of the whole competitive part of

For as long as sports have been around, countless numbers of athletes have been driven towards being the best, and doing whatever it takes to become successful. As sports become more competitive, many athletes strive to find a way to improve their strengths and abilities. One possible solution to the problem, is with the help of performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs), also known as steroids. Steroids first came to flourishing in Major League Baseball (MLB) in the 1970s, when Tom House a former pitcher in (MLB) openly recognizing that there were multiple players per team experimenting with steroids and human growth hormones. During the 1900s steroids quickly became much more excessive and widespread, according to Juicin’ in The Majors: A History of steroids in baseball written by Joshua Z. Lavine February, 2013. “ By the 1990s, steroids had become an epidemic….Rick Helling, a pitcher for the Texas Rangers and a player representative, stood up at the winter meeting of the Executive Board of the Major League Baseball Players Association and reported this problem…” Despite the pitchers cry and plea for awareness of the problem, he was ignored. Eventually the statistical evidence on the issue had come full force and much too strong to ignore. During the 1990s-2001 multiple players had hit sixty or

Abstract:  With the increase of competition has also come the need to become bigger and stronger than the opponent.  The use of steroids among athletes has caused the focus of the game to change.  No longer does an athlete want to win by doing their best, but they want to become bigger and have an advantage over the opponent.  Ultimately, all athletes feel that they need to use performance-enhancing drugs to compete at the same level. Despite all of the warnings and information on performance-enhancing drugs, athletes continue to use them and overlook the potential health risks associated with steroids.

The sport that has gotten the most attention on the subject of steroids is Major League Baseball. Due to the suspected prevalence of them from the late 80’s up until the present day, the so-called baseball purists now question all the records and achievements

Along with the physical problems there are also mental 54reactions associated with the usage of steroids. This drug becomes very addictive and damaging to the mind. It causes violent episodes which an athlete can claim a legal insanity defense to it. They get so wrapped up psychologically that the negative effects doesn't matter to them. Research has also discovered that steroids cause psychotic side effects sometimes referred to as "roid mania". Along with these are wild aggressive, combative behavior, depression, listlessness and delusions during and after performance. Even though the

After doing research on the use of steroids and their effects I have came to the conclusion that steroids is only bad thing if it is abused. Just like any other drug. A lot of people don't know what to do with the good things in life. While all the negative effects of steroids are told to us we are ignoring how steroids can actually help us. Especially in Athletes. Many people believe that athletes that “juice” are cheating. In reality they are not cheating because they are doing just what they think will help them improve and make them the best at what they love to do. There is always room for im-provement and creating all those negative side effects such as irritable and dangerous behavior is right and okay for athletes to