Mark McGwire...NOOOOOO WAY!

Is anyone shocked by Mark McGwire's steroid confession? I didn't see it coming...NOT! Let's be honest it was no secret he was juiced, especially if you remember how he was physically built early in his career. Funny that McGwire's confession came after I posted a blog on steroids. Maybe Mark caught wind of my blog and figured he better fess up because he felt bad for being a poor role model to kids, lying to Major League Baseball and evading Congress.

I particularly liked how his statement to the press was that he used steroids for recovery, making it sound less like cheating. Anyone who understands the function of steroids knows what gets you huge faster is the fact that you repair tissue quicker than normal when on them (hence the term anabolic, which means to build up)! If you take steroids and don't lift weights or break the body down, you won't get big muscles. Steroids allows you to breakdown muscle tissue and build it back up very quickly, which is why bodybuilders use it to push through several intense workouts a day and recover like nothing ever happened. Obviously professional athletes have to deal with typically long seasons while playing at very high levels of competition. When performance means a paycheck, it doesn't surprise me that players turn to steroid use as a recovery aid in fear of looking weak or potentially losing their job. Guys have season ending injuries all the time, its just part of the game and a risk you take when you step on the competitive athletic field. Just because your willing to risk your life, your integrity and the integrity of the game to keep your ego in tact, doesn't mean you deserve a spot on the field.

Aside from the premature balding, acne, shrunken testicles, man boobs, possible mood swings, hardening of the arteries, increased risk of heart attack, stroke and eventual personal humilation, steroids sound like a good idea. Except that with sleep, proper protein intake and consumption of perfectly harmless amino acids like glutamine, you can recover and repair tissue rather effectively without the danger and side effects I listed above with steroid use. Perhaps the most dangerous side effect of steroid use is the further damaging of an already flailing and self-defeating ego. In an attempt to appear tougher, more manly and altogether more bitchen than anyone around them, steroid users often find themselves on the ugly end of a painful self-reflection after they must face the fact their career, their livlihood and their image was a complete and total farce. The only thing worse than lying to others is lying to yourself.