Who will be MMA’s A-Rod?
By Curtis Clontz on Feb 10, 2009
The biggest sports story of the week will undoubtedly be the fact that Yankee slugger Alex Rodriguez took steroids from 2001-2003 (1 of which he won the league MVP). This may not be a MMA story per say, but it does prove that anyone could be taking or have taken in their careers. Like many of the Yankee players, A-Rod doesn’t deny the issue and now has to worry abut a tarnished career and the chance that he may not make into the hall of fame.
When you look around the MMA world there are tons of athletes that look the part of a steroids user. Houston Alexander, Mark Coleman, and Brock Lesnar all look like they take steroids (not accusing). It comes with having that type of body frame. They look more like bodybuilders than pro fighters.
A-Rod was primed to be the premier power hitter of our time. He was supposed to be the “clean” guy to one day overtake the tainted records of Barry Bonds. This made me start to wonder. What is going to happen when the first true MMA superstar pops for some sort of performance enhancing drugs? Now I know that several key MMA figures have popped but I am talking about a GSP, Anderson Silva, or Fedor. Someone that would send shock waves throughout the sport from top to bottom.
It is only a matter of time before one of the most sought after, or possible worlds best fighters suffer the consequences of taking these extra special supplements. Call them the PF Flyers of supps. As the sport continues to grow so will the need to win. Hopefully in the near future children and young athletes will begin to turn to Jits, Muay Thai, and MMA as the sport of play instead of the traditional baseball, basketball, or soccer. Some of these young athletes will have the feeling that they need something special to get that edge.
Among high school kids steroid use is already an issue. It is not as popular as underage drinking or recreational drugs, but it is there. Many high school seniors take recruiting trips to major colleges and are told that they need to gain 20+ pounds of weight and drop tenths of seconds from their 40 time. Wrestlers across the country, especially the mid-west, deal with similar pressure. Colleges want the biggest, fastest, and strongest athletes to mold into NCAA contenders. One way they are achieving these goals are performance enhancing drugs. Although they are illegal, they seem to find their way in many locker room bags around the nation.
Steroids is one of the issues I love to ask pro fighters about. In almost every interview I have done, I have received some sort of positive feedback. Not once has a fighter told me that there is a rampant problem in the sport. There is one fighter I would love to ask about this topic and that is Roy Nelson. He is one that believes ‘roid use is rampant among the sport we love. A-Rod is the GSP of the MLB. He is considered one of the best in the world. If the UFC and other organizations don’t lock down on steroid testing then this will be (if it isn’t already) a huge issue. Leaving the testing in the hands of the athletic commissions will only do so much. If Dana White isn’t careful he could be viewed similarly to former MLB commissioner Bud Selig. Selig is often criticized for turning away and somewhat allowing steroid use. I propose an internal testing process by the UFC. One where every fighter has a quarterly test, along with 2 random tests a year (separate from the athletic commissions, and completely a surprise). The testers would need to be completely anonymous, and external to the sport of MMA. If you think money is an issue, take a look at how many PPVs the UFC sells a year and the highest paid fighter… They have money. This will become a problem if the UFC and other organizations don’t nip it right now. It is only a matter of time before one of their top dogs get bitten by the rampant steroid bug.
Filed Under: MMA • MMA in Media • Opinion
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Whoa, whoa . . . wait a second. This is just my opinion.
For the most part, America is using and abusing Advil, painkillers, stress relief drugs, our last President used cocaine, current President smokes cigarettes, there’s Viagra, we drink alcohol and we still get behind the wheel of a motorized vehicle, we’re happy on E, crack kills, creating out own Meth labs, OxyContin, Vicodin, drugs to subdue ADHD, not to mention that many celebrated entertainers publicly admit to abusing drugs and alcohol and some succomb to death from overdose . . . and so on.
Sports Illustrated* has the gall to say A-Rod is smarter than Barry Bonds for coming clean. WOW. Whatever. I understand that A-Rod publicly apologized but if he had a chance, would he do it all over again. I say yes, just like many professional athletes and high school and collegiate athletes.
“Colleges want the biggest, fastest, and strongest athletes to mold into NCAA contenders”
You used the correct word, to mold into contenders. They shape and fashion the young athletes into studs. And how do they accomplish that? Is anyone surprised that WWE superstars are linked with all kinds of drugs year after year?
Let’s just say that if it is A. Silva, GSP, Fedor, or any other guy then I will not be surprised.
I wonder what Rush Limbaugh has to say about A-Rod?
*The title of the Sports Illustrated article “A-Rod proves clutch again in crisis” . . . source: http://tinyurl.com/c3chpf
Vee,
I agree 100%. In the world we live in alcoholism and drug addiction is almost glorified by actors and rock stars.
I hope the top tier guys in MMA are not using but it would not surprise me one bit now.
What surprises me about steroid use is that guys in sports that require technical skills take it thinking that it will improve their game. It might to a degree in terms of strength and the ability to recover from training hard, but I don’t think the benefits are that spectacular, especially in MMA where fighting is more than just strength and big muscles. For a bodybuilder it works since they are not functional athletes and simply need big muscles. But MMA fighters take a big risk getting suspended from something that in my view is only minimally beneficial and having the added psychological benefit since they see this as a super drug. I could be wrong but I think it is impossible to really know how something like this benefits a fighter since there are so many factors to MMA, and steroids and other enhancers can only add so much. Then again, athletes will do anything for an advantage whether real or perceived.
The biggest advantage I see is the ability to recover and increase training. If a fighter can train more frequent and at a highler level, they SHOULD perform better.
Roids don’t make you hit a baseball, just gives you the tools to hit it a bit farther…
David Ortiz has said that he does not care what people think, it takes a tremendous amount of skill to hit the ball the way Barry Bonds does.
In boxing who knows, what I do know is that a banned steroid stanozolol was found in Fernando Vargas after his losing effort against Oscar De La Hoya. Oscar put a serious hurting on Vargas.
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Another note about drugs. Some pain killers enable you to compete while experiencing less pain, so in essence they enhance your performance. The evidence in inconclusive but some of those drugs may damage your internal organs. NBA player Alzono Mourning discovered this the hard way.
IT WOULD BE INTERESTING THAT ALL THE MMA FIGHTERS BE TESTED FOR ILEGAL SUBSTANCES USED, LETS HOPE EVERYONE GETS OUT CLEAN, FOR THE FUTURE OF THE SPORT, IM A BIG FAN MMA, AND LETS HOPE THESE SPORT DOES NOT GET A BLACK IMAGE LIKE OTHER SPORTS