Aaron: Increase PED Punishments

[Don Quixote]

Hank Aaron, at a benefit for his Chasing the Dream Foundation, suggested baseball increase the suspension for first-time offenders and ban second-time offenders.

http://www.foxsportswisconsin.com/08/29/12/Aaron-PED-punishments-not-enough/msn_landing.html?blockID=782611&feedID=5059

[Moose Milligan]

Kind of agree with him. Obviously players don't think the bans are severe enough, there have been numerous players busted this year. Players will continue to keep testing the system until the penalties are so rough that it won't be worth it. Clearly that's not the case right now.

[Hallas]

Kind of agree with him. Obviously players don't think the bans are severe enough, there have been numerous players busted this year. Players will continue to keep testing the system until the penalties are so rough that it won't be worth it. Clearly that's not the case right now.

I think it's a self-serving argument from a professed greenie abuser. Doesn't change the fact that he's right, but the source still bugs me.

[Can_of_corn]

Cough*1973*cough

Fine to ask for more severe punishments now when they didn't even test when you played Mr Aaron.

[byrdz]

Agreed, what they are doing isn't working quite obviously.

[Barnaby Graves]

I guess greenies aren't performance enhancers eh Hank?

[Moose Milligan]

I think it's a self-serving argument from a professed greenie abuser. Doesn't change the fact that he's right, but the source still bugs me.

True, he did use greenies.

Interesting article about greenies. Some think they weren't performance enhancers. http://itsaboutthemoney.net/archives/2011/01/11/%E2%80%98roids-and-greenies/

[sangar]

True, he did use greenies.

Interesting article about greenies. Some think they weren't performance enhancers. http://itsaboutthemoney.net/archives/2011/01/11/?roids-and-greenies/

There is plenty of evidence to suggest Mr. Aaron used more than greenies. He would be wise to leave well enough alone.

http://grg51.typepad.com/steroid_nation/2007/02/hammerin_hank_a.html

[DrungoHazewood]

I want to know if there is any evidence that more draconian punishments would do anything to alter players' behavior? And where do you go over the line and start handing out a bunch of lifetime bans for false positives and accidentally taking stuff? If people are taking stuff now it's beyond the ability of testing to detect, for the most part, so increasing penalties won't do much to stop that.

[allquixotic]

Physiologists, doctors and biologists need to be advancing the science so that we can:

• Make it more convenient for the players (e.g. without a blood test, or draw less blood, or no needles somehow) so it can be done more often
  
• Make it more accurate so that false positives are virtually impossible, so that punishments can be swift, just, and very decisive
  
• Make it more all-encompassing so that we can detect new techniques that we can't currently detect as easily, or at all
  

I think these scientific goals are far more important for the purity of the sport (and all sports that benefit from athletic strength and speed and muscle mass) than restrictions. However, I think that more severe sanctions can serve as a temporary but short-term-effective way of discouraging certain abusers. Having a policy of less tolerance before being banned would also prevent players from repeatedly breaking the rules yet continuing to play; once someone is caught, any inhuman stats they would have produced in the years following, after they figure out how to beat the system, would never be recorded, because their career will effectively end after they're caught the second time.And I really don't care WHO is advancing these proposals. I'm just evaluating the proposal on its own merit. While I don't think we can just say "if you're caught, you're banned" and forevermore pretend that PEDs don't affect baseball. That would be a mistake. The science has to advance, too, and in an ideal world the science would even be ahead of the game of the people who are concocting the PEDs. Unfortunately, it's a cat and mouse game, and it's similar to hacking in the digital world, where the bad guys are pretty much, by design, going to be one step ahead of the good guys.

[Barnaby Graves]

I want to know if there is any evidence that more draconian punishments would do anything to alter players' behavior? And where do you go over the line and start handing out a bunch of lifetime bans for false positives and accidentally taking stuff? If people are taking stuff now it's beyond the ability of testing to detect, for the most part, so increasing penalties won't do much to stop that.

I think it follows the same risk/reward principles as recreational drug use and trafficking.

What's the upside? A multimillion dollar contract. What's the downside? Well not much, since you might not have a career if you don't cheat anyway.