May 29, 2002 (The Washington Post Company) - Ken Caminiti said he used steroids in 1996 when he won the National League's most valuable player award, becoming the first high-profile major league player to admit openly that he took the drugs.
Caminiti told Sports Illustrated that at least 50 percent of major league players use steroids. It was a candid interview in this week's issue on a long-suspected problem that the game's players and owners have skirted for years.
"It's no secret what's going on in baseball," Caminiti, who retired last year after a 15-year career, told the magazine. "At least half the guys are using steroids."
Unlike the NFL, NBA, NCAA and the Olympic movement, baseball does no drug testing of its players. Rumors of rampant steroid use have arisen in recent years as home runs have soared and records have been shattered, but until now no big-name player has freely acknowledged using steroids, which have been illegal in the United States since 1990.
"Steroids are incredibly prominent in the game, I don't think there's any question about that," Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Curt Schilling said this season before a game in Miami. "The fact of the matter is it has enhanced numbers into the stratosphere. . . . Is it a problem? It depends on what you consider a problem. It certainly has tainted records, there's no doubt about that."
When asked about the percentage of players using, Schilling said, "I would say it's 50 percent and the 50 percent who haven't used it have considered it."
Commissioner Bud Selig told Sports Illustrated: "It's a problem we can and must deal with now. . . . I'm very worried about this."
Anabolic steroids raise the level of testosterone in the body, which causes an increase in muscle mass that can help players train harder and hit and throw with more power. But possible side effects are heart and liver damage, elevated cholesterol levels, strokes, aggressiveness and genitalia dysfunction.
Players say the fact that baseball offers guaranteed contracts -- the NFL does not -- provides incentive for players to ignore health risks and attempt to cash in.
"A player can go from making $750,000 to -- after getting bigger and stronger [with steroids] -- making 7, 8, 9 or $10 million a year," Schilling said. "Is the risk worth the reward?"
Said fellow Diamondback Craig Counsell this season in Miami: "If you can get an advantage somewhere, even if it involves crossing an ethical line, people will do it. Home runs are money. That's a fact."
Texas Rangers pitcher Kenny Rogers told Sports Illustrated: "Basically, steroids can jump you a level or two. The average player can become a star and the star player can become a superstar. And the superstar? Forget it. He can do things we've never seen before."
Grace, Counsell and Schilling countered Caminiti's claim that steroids were freely discussed in major league clubhouses. They said they believe players who use steroids are usually embarrassed and try to hide their use. Some players speculate that human growth hormone, which is illegal but undetectable by drug tests, is also a popular drug among baseball players. Human growth hormone is believed to promote strength and growth.
Skyrocketing home-run records, combined with the fact that baseball does no testing, means even players who claim they don't use steroids are powerless to prove their innocence. San Francisco Giants star Barry Bonds, who broke the single-season home run record last year by hitting 73, has put on some 40 pounds of muscle since the early 1990s. He says he has gained the muscle honestly, by working harder than he ever has in his career.
"To me, in baseball it really doesn't matter what you do," Bonds, 37, said this year. "You still have to hit that baseball. If you're incapable of hitting it, it doesn't matter what you take. You have to have eye-hand coordination to be able to produce. I think [steroid use] is really irrelevant to the game of baseball."
The issue of drug use in baseball made headlines when Mark McGwire admitted to using the legal steroid androstenedione in 1998, the year he eclipsed Roger Maris's 37-year-old home run record by hitting 70 home runs. Unlike Caminiti, McGwire was forced into the admission after a reporter noticed a vial of the drug in his locker.
Androstenedione was, and remains, available over the counter because it was not commercially popular when steroids were banned in the United States and therefore escaped mention in the legislation. Other steroids, such as dianabol and nandrolone, were specifically mentioned and thus are illegal.
Later, andro was categorized as a food supplement in the United States because it can be shown to come from a natural source -- tree bark -- but it nonetheless is an anabolic steroid and is banned by the NFL, NCAA, NBA and International Olympic Committee.
Steroids were believed to be the drug of choice in the NFL and Olympic movement in the late 1960s and early 1970s, as players discovered their power but lacked information about the potential side effects. Before Lyle Alzado died from brain cancer at age 43, he blamed his sickness on the steroids he used while playing for the Oakland Raiders in the 1970s and '80s. Recent trials in Germany provided evidence of systematic steroid use among East German athletes who dominated Olympic sports in the 1970s and early '80s.
The baseball players' union historically has resisted drug testing. Diamondbacks first baseman Mark Grace said recently, however, he believed many players were fed up with the inflated numbers they attributed to steroids and would be willing to approve testing in the next round of collective bargaining.
