Special Report: Steroids: A look back
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Originally published Dec 13, 1983
No one has to convince Stan Jones of the potential lethal effects of anabolic steroids . He saw them kill a man once.
"His name was Jay Hitchins," said the Denver Broncos defensive line coach. "He used to hang around York Barbell in Pennsylvania. I don't know how much he was taking, but it was a lot, an awful lot. He developed liver problems and the next thing you know, he's dead. -
Originally published Dec 14, 1983
Boyd Epley is the strength coach at the University of Nebraska. He says the Cornhuskers prefer to build muscle the old-fashioned way. They eeeaaarrn it.
He cringes at the suggestion that anabolic steroids might have infiltrated his program. Maybe other places, Epley says, but not Nebraska. -
Originally published Dec 14, 1983
The question concerned steroids . Marion Campbell had no answers.
"I'm not that familiar with steroids ," the Eagles' head coach said. "I don't think I've been around them. I can't make any comment on steroids . " -
Originally published Dec 14, 1983
Nine years ago, Bob Paschall had a dream. That dream was to play professional football. So important was that dream that he would have done anything to see it become a reality. -
Originally published Dec 14, 1983
Ron Mix has a pretty good idea when anabolic steroids crept into professional football. The year was 1963. The place was San Diego. The team was the Chargers. -
Originally published Dec 15, 1983
Dr. Robert Kerr says he didn't find steroids , they found him. "I was a rugby player. I was in my second year of (medical) practice and would work out at a gym a number of times a week," Kerr said. "I was approached by friends at the gym who would show me a bottle of Dianabol or something else they had bought down in Mexico. They'd ask me if I had any idea how they should take it or how safe the stuff was. That's when I realized just how many people were taking anabolic drugs. " -
Originally published Dec 14, 1983
Last week, the National Football League sent a letter to all of its players concerning anabolic steroids . The letter was a fairly thorough condemnation of steroids . It questioned their usefulness and pointed out their potential danger and warned that any NFL player caught using them would face disciplinary action from the league.
Twenty-six years ago, in response to a Daily News investigation into steroids in pro football, NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle sent a letter to the league's players and club personnel warning them about steroids. At the time, the league had no official policy on steroids. "You should be aware that anabolic steroids are among the thousands of prescription drugs which can be obtained illegally but which must not be misused by players in the NFL," Rozelle wrote in the letter.
The reaction to the letter?
"People are going to take them," Denver Broncos defensive-line coach Stan Jones told the Daily News' Paul Domowitch. "I'm not going to stop them, the league's not going to stop them, nobody's going to stop them. If a guy thinks [steroids] are the answer, he's going to take them."
Twenty years ago, the NFL became the first pro sports league to suspend players for positive tests for performance-enhancing drugs. Over the last 4 years, 43 players have been suspended. This story details that issue and compares the NFL’s response and results to the current issues relating to PEDs facing Major League Baseball. We also, for the first time, polled Pro Football Hall of Fame selectors to ask how a positive test would impact their vote for a player.
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