As noted by Deadspin and the Seattle Times former Mariner pitcher Rick Guttormson found himself pulling out his hair now that he sits out the first 20 game steroids-related suspension in the Japan's Pacific League. Heck, Taiwan is upset about this hair-raising event.
Although this may be a bald-faced lie, Guttormson says he uses the drug for balding:
A former Mariners minor league pitcher from Anacortes has become the first player in Japanese baseball history to flunk a drug test.
Rick Guttormson, who attended Anacortes High School and Edmonds Community College, was suspended for 20 days Friday after testing positive for a banned substance. His team, the Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks, was fined $63,000.
Japanese baseball officials said a postgame test July 13 showed Finasteride in Guttormson's system. Finasteride was in a hair-growing agent Guttormson, 30, had been taking for two years. It's banned because it can be used as a masking agent.
Finasteride is marketed as Proscar and Propecia. The drug is an anti-androgen, which prevents enzymatic (5-alpha reductase for you biochemists) conversion of testosterone to 5 DHT (dihydrotestosterone). The drug is used for prostate enlargement or for baldness. There has been much concern about the drug, which can cause impotence (that is slow down your fastball).
"This is extremely regrettable," Japanese baseball commissioner Yasuchika Negoro said. "We have been very nervous about the issue of doping and we'll need to step up our efforts."
The commissioner's office also fined the Pacific League club US$63,000.
Finasteride is banned by WADA (and the presumably the Japanese major league) because it can be used as a masking agent for an anabolic steroid. The drug interferes with the measurement of anabolic steroids. However, it itself can be detected. So what good is the drug?
The finasteride debate rose before in athletics who felt they got shafted:
Zach Lund, a member of the U.S. skeleton team at the 2006 Winter Olympics, was banned from competition after finasteride was detected in his anti-doping urine sample. Lund said he had no intention of providing a faulty urine sample when he took finasteride as a hair loss treatment. The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) agreed that Lund had not tried to cheat the WADA Code; nevertheless, Lund was banned from competition.
Montreal hockey goal tender Jose Theodore had been taking finasteride for eight years as a hair loss treatment-then found out about the "finasteride problem" when he tested positive for the substance in screening of athletes who hoped to compete in the 2006 Winter Olympics. Finasteride is a banned substance under the WADA Code, which is accepted by the International Olympic Committee. He had been taking finasteride with the knowledge and approval of team physician Dr. David Mulder. The positive test resulted in no disciplinary action because testing for finasteride is not included in the National Hockey League's anti-doping testing program.
Efforts are underway to develop a test that would selectively identify finasteride in a urine sample. Such a test could eliminate finasteride as a problem in anti-doping testing.
Guttormson might have grounds for an appeal. First taking an anti-androgen itself for baldness bites; then getting suspended as your career recedes . So it may be splitting hairs, but he should get a doctor to sign off on a TUE.
+1 Interesting theme
Posted by: frik | 08/15/2007 at 02:48