Sunday, May 23, 2010

Sports stars and recreational drugs


Thirty-five years ago Bernie Carbo nailed the greatest pinch-hit home run in Red Sox history - bringing three men home in game six to keep them alive against the Cincinnati Reds in the 1975 World Series. This week he divulged the secret of his success

'"I probably smoked two joints, drank about three or four beers, got to the ballpark, took some speed, took a pain pill, drank a cup of coffee, chewed some tobacco, had a cigarette, and got up to the plate and hit.''
That's an apt quote in these days of prohibitionist attack dogs destroying all the intelligent cool sports stars because of recreational drug residues found in their bodies -- an entirely different matter from using drugs to cheat. All this chemical testing is the most extreme invasion of privacy, because inside one's own body is the most private place. Why don't privacy laws cover it?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I couldn't agree more. And I wait for the day when one of these champions stands up for themselves and reminds everyone else that it is none of our business. I also wait for the day when public figures and sports stars refuse to publicly apologise for their private actions.

The Editor said...

Unfortunately they have to play the game in order to get their career back on track. They are economically blackmailed into a sham repentance.

A similar effect can be seen in the courts when some toe-rag is on trial for some nasty act and they plead that they had been using drugs at the time in an attempt to mitigate their sentence. But while intoxication can influence one's judgement, it doesn't turn people evil. In vino veritas.