ATHLETES AND INTOXICANTS

The Portland Trail Blazers have raised an interesting issue for the city of
Portland and sports fans everywhere. When you're speeding down I-5 in a
bright yellow hummer smoking a blunt, people are going to notice you,
especially the police.

Are they supposed to just automatically know that the driver is a prominent
athletic star?

Even if they did, are prominent athletes above the law?

Are they allowed to drive under the influence?

Of course not.

Perhaps we are pointing our fingers at the wrong thing. It seems that every
problem has many solutions. However, one of them is usually better than the
rest. The trick to finding the best solution is asking the right question.

What we need to understand in the drug situation, that seems to plague
athletics, is how the problem is going to be realistically resolved.

First of all, we must separate the different kinds of drug use associated
with athletics. Performance enhancing drugs like steroids, ephedra and
creatine cannot be tolerated. This is simply because to maintain a fair
playing field, athletes must be held to some regulatory standards for
competition.

The issue here are those popular, more commonly used street drugs. These
include marijuana, cocaine and alcohol. Athletes cannot get by in their
profession doing many other drugs than these. Besides, these three are
probably the most popular illegal drugs out there, which is why they may
seem to be the most common athletic infractions.

Examples of athletes who use drugs can be found in any and every
professional sport.

Look at former Oregon State University football coach Dennis Erickson. He
had multiple bouts with alcohol abuse.

The Portland "Jail" Blazers are another good example. Although this one
should be elaborated to include an astounding number of professional
basketball players. I don't know the exact statistics, but there are a lot
of players in the NBA who use marijuana on a regular basis. Famous
Argentine soccer star Diego Maradona habitually used cocaine and ephedra
for most of his career.

It is unarguable that the fault lies with the athletes. They are the ones
snorting, toking and pounding. However, professional athletes don't care
about the rules. In a way they are above them. With the gargantuan salaries
that professional athletes are paid, simple fines are not really a concern.

Let's, once again, look towards Portland's own pro team. The current fine
in Oregon for possession of less than an ounce of marijuana is about $150.
To a professional athlete, this really isn't that big of a deal. Damon
Stoudamire and Rasheed Wallace will have no problems paying those fines.

An argument could be made that the league should punish these infractions
more than they do. Even then, who loses more money?

If the NBA suspended and fined every player testing positive for marijuana
right now, there would be no games. The drug is just too popular.

It seems that during the prohibition this country has found itself in, the
problem is the rules, not the people breaking them.

People always say, if you can't beat them join them. That is not a very
good solution to any problem. However, if they just won't stop, and they're
really not causing all that much trouble anyway, why fight it?

In the end, it is the players, and players only, who can stop this
behavior. Anyone who knows anything about drug abuse knows that no one can
make a user quit. They have to want to stop. It's fairly obvious however,
that these athletes don't care about that.

They know they're not being good role models and they don't really care.

Whose fault is that?

Of course, it's the athlete's fault.

Although, perhaps they do at least know what they're doing.

As role models, what are these pro athletes trying to say?

Maybe they think they are making a political statement that the rules need
some rethinking.

We all know the meathead jock stereotype. Back in school the hardest
partyers were often athletes. These guys could party and then sweat it all
out the next day.

Well those habits sure aren't going to just disappear when these people
turn pro. They're going to keep on going, even more enabled now by high
salaries. Perhaps it's time we as a society look at the battles we are
fighting and analyze which ones are worthwhile and which ones are a flat
out waste of time.