MLB's credibility at stake/Senators urge baseball owners, players to

WASHINGTON - Some U.S. Senators had a message Tuesday for Major League Baseball: Drug test.

What was once mostly rumor and innuendo has become public statements by several former baseball players that there is widespread use of steroids by players.

And while senators said they cannot compel owners and players to reach a collective bargaining agreement on drug testing, they urged them to do so.

"We must send a clear message that the use of all performance- enhancing drugs, including steroids, is wrong," Sen. John McCain, R- Ariz., said at a hearing of the subcommittee on consumer affairs. "Failure to act on this problem jeopardizes the credibility of our national pastime and the health or our citizens."

The NBA, NFL and the Olympics all have drug testing programs and all ban androstenedione. That's the drug Mark McGuire acknowledged using in 1999 - the year he hit 73 home runs.

Jerry Colangelo, owner of the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Phoenix Suns, told the subcommittee that drug testing works in the NBA and he wants to see it in baseball.

"Our fans are being affected," Colangelo said. "They're questioning the athletes themselves. I would hope that the players' association recognizes that this is not an if or a maybe. This is something that must be done."

Donald Fehr, executive director of the Major League Players Association, said he didn't intend to bargain a player's contract in public. But he did say that this issue would undoubtedly be thoroughly discussed with players as he today begins making the rounds to discuss the upcoming contract talks.

Fehr said the players association "has believed that one should not, absent compelling safety considerations, invade the privacy of an individual without a substantial reason."

The Senate panel invited current and former baseball players to the hearing but none appeared.

Besides the tug of war over whether baseball will get a drug testing program, the subcommittee focused on over-the-counter dietary supplements, some of which are called precursors to steroids.

These supplements, especially androstenedione, help the body create testosterone and helps athletics bulk up and be stronger.

Lawmakers said something must be done to stop young athletes from taking them.

"Like it or not, professional athletes serve as role models," McCain said. "That's more important than whether a group of highly paid athletes are using anabolic steroids."

Here there was widespread agreement among the players association, Major League Baseball and Frank Shorter, a former Olympic gold medalist who chairs the board of the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, headquartered in the Springs.

"The solution to the steroid precursor problem is to follow the lead of other nations and regulate steroid precursors as steroids," Shorter said.

He urged Congress to modify the Controlled Substances Act to include the precursors.

Shorter told the senators that 12-year-olds can go into a health food store and purchase these precursors and there is nothing on the label of the supplements to explain what they are taking.

Those who manufacture and market these supplements say they plan to implement an industry-wide standard that would ward of use of the steroid precursors by anyone under 18.

"We will mount a campaign to reach out to various athletic governing bodies to enlist their aid," said John Cardellina, vice president of the Council for Responsible Nutrition, a supplement trade association. "We anticipate our members will label the product, not for use for people under the age of 18."

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