Performance enhancement: at what cost?

“When you burn the candles at both ends, you pay the price” – Randy the Ram in the movie “The Wrestler”

Once I happened to view a cartoon where a professional baseball player, asking a young kid with a baseball bat in his hand, if he was in it just for the fun of it. To him it was awesome that the kid has such motivation but somehow found it to be unbelievable.

Be it baseball, basket ball, wrestling, boxing, Olympics or any competitive sports, the moment someone turns ‘Professional’ from being an ‘Amateur’, we can assume that they are in the game not just for the fun of it anymore. And once they arrive on the national or international scene, we can guarantee that the fun part is long gone.

The incredible compensation that they enjoy (win or lose), the fame and the media attention that are poured on them, makes the ‘Professional’ devote all his time and energy in perfecting his game and himself. All that exhausting practice schedules, demanding workouts, strict diet regimens, and extensive travel take a heavy toll on their already fragile mental and physical balance.

As if this were not enough, to give them that little edge over the competition they cross the boundary. They take performance enhancement drugs, steroids and even untested ‘new to the market’ medical procedures that are potentially hazardous just to avoid detection. Now they are in gray or even the danger zones.

I have heard ardent or shall I say fanatical fans of such professional sports arguing in favor of athletes taking such potentially harmful drugs equating them to US army personnel in combat zones. They say, “You don’t go to war to get killed. You want to win the war and come back alive.”

You see the mentality here. The problem rests as much with us the audience, as with the corporate sponsorships that are out get the most bang for the buck. Keeping aside the legal, ethical or moral issues, my sympathy rests with the players themselves.

Are all the money and fame worth anything, if you end up with your head becoming swollen, your testicles shrunk and finally end up looking like a female when you are actually a male? While Barry’s case is before the court and all this accusations may turn out to be false, it is the agony that his entire personal life is laid naked for everyone’s intense scrutiny; that draws my attention.

Sometimes it is not just your own life. You may have to consider another life that you are about to bring in to this world. Remember Hulk Hogan’s arguments with his wife as to when they should have their next child because he wasn’t yet out of his ‘medication’.

I remember the time I saw competitive sports in action without any prop ups was when the greatest bout in boxing took place in Manila in 1975 between Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali. Since it was in 1975, I presume competitive sports weren’t yet introduced to drugs and the players have all but themselves in the ring to prove who the greatest fighter there is. The result was that we saw such a memorable fight.