Braun tests postitive for PEDs

[Steve9347]

Also, I'm sure he doesn't like you either.

LOL you fool he doesn't know who I am!

 

A baseball fan who continues to be surprised by PED abusers is a fool.

[iamshack]

LOL you fool he doesn't know who I am!

 

A baseball fan who continues to be surprised by PED abusers is a fool.

I may be a fool today, but you will always have a website entitled "Stevotown."

 

[GoSox05]

He should get suspended just for his awful t-shirts.

[ptatc]

First of all, I wasn't responding to you, so I didn't call you jaded.

 

Secondly, this is completely out of character for Braun.

 

I know you're livelihood is in the medical community but that doesn't mean that something funny didn't go on here.

 

I am not assuming anyone did anything to make Braun look one way or the other. I'm saying everything anyone has ever said about the guy contradicts this test.

 

You're telling me I'm jaded because I believe in the man instead of a test where the chain of custody was botched?

 

Right.

Sorry, I though you were referring to everyone who think he took PEDs as jaded.

 

I've never met or really paid attention to Braun so I cannot comment on his character. He doesn't look or seem the type but science is science and in things like this it is rarely wrong.

 

The only way realiistic way he didn't take take something that caused the sample to test positive is that someone tampered with it. This is would be the "something funny going on." Which is possible. However for this to happen you have to assume that someone intentionally tampered with the sample. Nothing has been reported about a problem with the actual test.

So you either think the sample was tampered with, making him innocent or you think the sample was his and he took the substance. It could very well be that he took something that he didn't know would be classified as a PED, I doubt it with the levels at which he tested but it could happen. All I'm saying is that the proponderence of evidence shows he tested positive for a banned substance. If I was him I would say all the same things he is now. He got lucky and got away with it.

Edited February 24, 2012 by ptatc

[Magnus]

It wouldn't happen, but if it did, I wouldn't be surprised because I really have zero faith in professional sports players anymore.

 

I agree with this. I have absolutely no trust in athletes today. As long as they are not caught, no problem, but I wouldn't be surprised IF anyone in Sox was caught with PED's. I don't think it will happen but it also wouldn't surprise me!

[IlliniKrush]

Apparently there will be a lot more coming out on this, if sources are to be believed. I'll wait to see what else is coming out that will apparently move to clear his name.

[Quin]

Huh? I can get Wade, I guess.

 

 

 

Barry Bonds.

 

ESPN tells them to love a person, they ask how much.

[StrangeSox]

Of course there's a profile. It's "professional baseball player, majors or minors"

[southsider2k5]

Who the f*** cares? How does this matter? The dude is a lying cheater and I'm glad he got caught and a shadow has been cast over his entire career. I will never be shocked and never act surprised and certainly never say that someone doesn't "fit the profile" of a PED abuser.

 

That is because there is no profile. That is because juicers come in all shapes, sizes, and colors.

 

Also, Ryan Braun is a douchebag and his t-shirts are lame.

 

Damn it, I agree with you.

 

[takes cold shower]

[Steve9347]

Damn it, I agree with you.

 

[takes cold shower]

Victory is mine!

[Texsox]

It wouldn't happen, but if it did, I wouldn't be surprised because I really have zero faith in professional sports players anymore.

 

And ain't it sad? Sportsmanship and fair play is so old fashioned, they have been replaced by cheating and taunting.

[iamshack]

And ain't it sad? Sportsmanship and fair play is so old fashioned, they have been replaced by cheating and taunting.

Oh nostalgia...

 

Athletes have been cheating at sports since sports began...you just didn't read/hear about it 24/7 like you do now...and the agenda of the media is also clearly different than it was 50 years ago.

[LittleHurt05]

He should get suspended just for his awful t-shirts.

 

This x1000.

[knightni]

Braun may have been exonerated on a technicality, but his test results still stand, in my opinion. There's no way that evaporation over a short period of time like 48 hours is enough to taint the result.

 

Testosterone levels don't increase THAT dramatically without assistance.

[southsider2k5]

Braun may have been exonerated on a technicality, but his test results still stand, in my opinion. There's no way that evaporation over a short period of time like 48 hours is enough to taint the result.

 

Testosterone levels don't increase THAT dramatically without assistance.

 

And Bingo #2.

[Balta1701]

Passan

And they argued that because the FedEx store was closed and the test collector took the sample home and put it in his refrigerator until Monday – the standard-operating procedure in every major doping program across the world but one not spelled out distinctly among Selig’s 18,175 words – that the sample did not follow the proper chain of custody and thus was invalid.

IF he's right and "Fridge storage by the collector" is a common procedure for most other testing programs, then even if it's not in MLB's program, then the people who are pretending that somehow we should still pretend he's "clean" have even less to stand on.

 

Sources from MLB and the union told Yahoo! Sports the chain-of-custody section of the joint-drug agreement is likely to be rewritten to ensure that a defense similar to Braun’s would have no legs. Because even some inside baseball who should be on Braun’s side – players, agents and other officials – see his prevailing as a Pyrrhic victory.

 

The chain of custody – how the sample is taken and handled to the point of delivery to the testing laboratory in Montreal – is imperative to the sanctity of any program. Casting chain-of-custody doubt is often an athlete’s best chance at absolution. Braun hired the right people. They convinced Das that even though the collector had stored the samples “in a cool and secure location,” as the program advises, it was not sufficient to maintaining chain of custody.

 

“This stuff happens around the world all the time,” said Travis Tygart, the CEO of the United States Anti-Doping Association. “They’re collected at people’s homes after the UPS or FedEx or DHL is closed. The DCO (doping-control officer) keeps it with them. These are well-trained people whose job it is to maintain it.”

 

[ Related: League ‘vehemently disagrees’ with arbitrator’s ruling in Ryan Braun case ]

 

According to baseball’s rules – or at least Das’ interpretation of them – protocol in other sports did not matter to baseball. Nor did the security seals on Braun’s two tamper-resistant samples remaining in place and the collection agent testifying at the arbitration hearing that the samples had remained untouched. Ultimately, what mattered were a FedEx store’s hours and how if one in Milwaukee was open on the Saturday night after Game 1 of the NL Division Series, Braun may have arrived at spring training Friday staring at a suspension.

 

“This,” one baseball official said, “is like a criminal getting off because he wasn’t read his Miranda rights.”

 

That’s an understandable comparison, though it neglects an important aspect of the Braun case: Had his lawyers not chosen to use the chain-of-custody argument, they could have implemented another defense – perhaps one that was similarly effective. MLB and the union agreed to this particular process because players deserve fair trials within the rules. Braun received his, and because the rules were not explicit enough, he prevailed.

[Soxbadger]

These articles are such sour grapes.

 

Hearings are like sports, you either win or you lose. MLB lost, Braun is innocent. You can vehemently disagree that the Cardinals are the World Series Champs because you believe the Rangers were better, but the Cardinals are the Champs.

[Balta1701]

These articles are such sour grapes.

 

Hearings are like sports, you either win or you lose. MLB lost, Braun is innocent. You can vehemently disagree that the Cardinals are the World Series Champs because you believe the Rangers were better, but the Cardinals are the Champs.

No he isn't.

 

Even in a court of law, people aren't found "innocent". They're found "Not guilty".

 

Braun is not suspended, and that is the correct move. That does not by any stretch of the imagination mean he is innocent or clean.

[Texsox]

Oh nostalgia...

 

Athletes have been cheating at sports since sports began...you just didn't read/hear about it 24/7 like you do now...and the agenda of the media is also clearly different than it was 50 years ago.

 

Steroids jumped to cheating where the umpires and officials had zero chance of catching them. Huge difference IMHO

[southsider2k5]

These articles are such sour grapes.

 

Hearings are like sports, you either win or you lose. MLB lost, Braun is innocent. You can vehemently disagree that the Cardinals are the World Series Champs because you believe the Rangers were better, but the Cardinals are the Champs.

 

Innocent my ass. They had two separate samples that both tested positive. No one even argued they weren't his samples.

[Rowand44]

These articles are such sour grapes.

 

Hearings are like sports, you either win or you lose. MLB lost, Braun is innocent. You can vehemently disagree that the Cardinals are the World Series Champs because you believe the Rangers were better, but the Cardinals are the Champs.

Ummm...what?

[Jordan4life_2007]

Badger and his lame ass lawyer bulls*** again.

[Soxbadger]

I actually dont care, so whether you want to believe Braun is innocent or guilty, it really doenst matter a thing to me. And that will be the end of me posting in this thread.

[iamshack]

What really is innocent anymore, honestly? People are going to believe what they want to believe, and that's everyone's right. But that should come with a realization that all the opinions we've formed, and many, many journalists and media members about sports professionals, politicians, famous people in general, etc., in the past, were based on a different standard and a different agenda in how the public was informed.

 

If you want to say Braun was guilty, that's just fine...but also realize that others were guilty in the past as well, and were protected by the media and others, and that has directly helped formed our opinions of them. So while Braun is a bad guy in many of your eyes, Hank Aaron was popping amphetamines, and President Kennedy was a womanizer, Elvis was a drug addict, Michael Jordan a gambler, Gaylord Perry and Whitey Ford were scuffers, and on and on...

 

 

[G&T]

The collector released a statement (USA Today). I'm very interested to read the decision to see what the panel was thinking here.

 

On February 24th, Ryan Braun stated during his press conference that "there were a lot of things that we learned about the collector, about the collection process, about the way that the entire thing worked that made us very concerned and very suspicious about what could have actually happened." Shortly thereafter, someone who had intimate knowledge of the facts of this case released my name to the media. I am issuing this statement to set the record straight.

 

I am a 1983 graduate of the University of Wisconsin and have received Master Degrees from the University of North Carolina and Loyola University of Chicago. My full-time job is the director of rehabilitation services at a health care facility. In the past, I have worked as a teacher and an athletic trainer, including performing volunteer work with Olympic athletes. I am a member of both the National Athletic Trainers' Association and the Wisconsin Athletic Trainers' Association.

 

I have been a drug collector for Comprehensive Drug Testing since 2005 and have been performing collections for Major League Baseball's Joint Drug Prevention and Treatment Program since that time. I have performed over 600 collections for MLB and also have performed collections for other professional sports leagues. I have performed post-season collections for MLB in four separate seasons involving five different clubs.

 

On October 1, 2011, I collected samples from Mr. Braun and two other players. The CDT collection team for that day, in addition to me, included three chaperones and a CDT coordinator. One of the chaperones was my son, Anthony. Chaperones do not have any role in the actual collection process, but rather escort the player to the collection area.

 

I followed the same procedure in collecting Mr. Braun's sample as I did in the hundreds of other samples I collected under the Program. I sealed the bottles containing Mr. Braun's A and B samples with specially-numbered, tamper-resistant seals, and Mr. Braun signed a form certifying, among other things, that the specimens were capped and sealed in his presence and that the specimen identification numbers on the top of the form matched those on the seals. I placed the two bottles containing Mr. Braun's samples in a plastic bag and sealed the bag. I then placed the sealed bag in a standard cardboard Specimen Box which I also sealed with a tamper-resistant, correspondingly-numbered seal placed over the box opening. I then placed Mr. Braun's Specimen Box, and the Specimen Boxes containing the samples of the two other players, in a Federal Express Clinic Pack. None of the sealed Specimen Boxes identified the players. I completed my collections at Miller Park at approximately 5:00 p.m. Given the lateness of the hour that I completed my collections, there was no FedEx office located within 50 miles of Miller Park that would ship packages that day or Sunday. Therefore, the earliest that the specimens could be shipped was Monday, October 3. In that circumstance, CDT has instructed collectors since I began in 2005 that they should safeguard the samples in their homes until FedEx is able to immediately ship the sample to the laboratory, rather than having the samples sit for one day or more at a local FedEx office. The protocol has been in place since 2005 when I started with CDT and there have been other occasions when I have had to store samples in my home for at least one day, all without incident. The FedEx Clinic Pack containing Mr. Braun's samples never left my custody. Consistent with CDT's instructions, I brought the FedEx Clinic Pack containing the samples to my home. Immediately upon arriving home, I placed the FedEx Clinic Pack in a Rubbermaid container in my office which is located in my basement. My basement office is sufficiently cool to store urine samples. No one other than my wife was in my home during the period in which the samples were stored. The sealed Specimen Boxes were not removed from the FedEx Clinic Pack during the entire period in which they were in my home. On Monday, October 3, I delivered the FedEx Clinic Pack containing Mr. Braun's Specimen Box to a FedEx office for delivery to the laboratory on Tuesday, October 4. At no point did I tamper in any way with the samples. It is my understanding that the samples were received at the laboratory with all tamper-resistant seals intact.

 

This situation has caused great emotional distress for me and my family. I have worked hard my entire life, have performed my job duties with integrity and professionalism, and have done so with respect to this matter and all other collections in which I have participated. Neither I nor members of my family will make any further public comments on this matter. I request that members of the media, and baseball fans, whatever their views on this matter, respect our privacy. And I would like to sincerely thank my family and friends for their overwhelming support through this difficult time. Any future inquiries should be directed to my attorney Boyd Johnson of Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP.

Edited February 28, 2012 by G&T