Can everybody in here stop using the word illegal? Regardless of how pissed off you are about what's happened with Irvin, the guy hasn't broken the law.
Say you work at a job with a no-tolerance alcohol policy, you have a few beers one night, get popped at a random test the next day and are suspended/fired. Now, what you did was irresponsible and you deserve the consequences from your employer - but you didn't break the damn law.
Look, I'm disappointed about Irvin too, but without knowing the details of when he tested positive and what exactly he tested positve for, I'm going to lay off the character assassination.
About a year ago, one of the 'Hawk players (some ST/Bench guy, I want to say David Voorba?) got busted for a PED, took his suspension, and then later did an interview on either KJR or 710am where he was very honest anfd forthright about the whole thing - including what mistakes he made and how the process works. I recommend everyone looks it up and gives a listen, because it sheds light on how complicated & confusing some of the rules are and the bureaucratic red tape involved. Ultimate responsibility for certainly falls on the players for what they are putting in their bodies - but there are many documented cases where guys are taking supplements that are approved by the League one year, then added to the banned list without players realizing it. There are documented cases of players taking approved supplements that wind up being contaminated and/or mislabeled. There are documented cases of players who have valid prescriptions but the paperwork for the exemption has been mishandled by their own Doctors or the League and they still have to take the fall for the test. And of course there are flaws in the testing process itself.
The funny thing is, the majority of guys we hear getting busted for PED's are the ones taking substances that most of us wouldn't have a problem with - GNC supplements, over-the-counter & prescription meds.
The guys doing the real cheating - the serious 'roids & HGH - are still flying under the radar, because that's the stuff that the tests have problems identifying.
