Chad Polevoy Ms. McCrary Core 412 April 18, 2012 Steroids in Baseball: Ethical?

In the nineties, there was a great boom in the power hitters in Major League Baseball. Players were erupting for fifty homerun, sixty homerun and even seventy homerun years. The person with the most homeruns ever is Barry Bonds with 762 in his career. Hank Aaron is still though known as the greatest home run hitter ever. As it looks now, Barry Bonds may never get into Cooperstown, and there will certainly always be an asterisk next to his record for homeruns. The Steroid Era of baseball has ended up casting a shadow over an entire generation of ball players, such as Mark McGuire, Sammy Sosa, Rafael Palmiero and lots of other great players. The use of the drugs was not illegal in baseball when they started using them, but the hall of fame and media have certainly condemned them for their actions. Now, PEDs such as anabolic steroids and human growth hormone are banned both by the law and the MLB so the question is, is using performance enhancing drugs un ethical in professional baseball? Before we dive into the baseball side of steroids, I want to go over the effects of steroids on the body, as well as the benefits that steroids provide. First, on the negative side, steroid use has many side effects that can effect the user. Some of the side effects are more cosmetic, like getting acne, developing gynecomastia, which is the scientific name for man boobs, and balding. Some of the more dangerous side effects cant be seen from the outside sometimes; They include such things as an enlarged prostate, liver malfunction, high blood pressure and cholesterol, as well as serious mood swings and aggression. Some of the positive effects of steroid use include faster

muscle recovery, heightened reflexes and as Jose Canseco said, it gives you a mental edge. For everyday people, this may not seem like a hard decision, but when you have a million dollar contract on the line, it becomes a harder choice. Jose Canseco was the one to really break the water on reporting mass steroid use. With his book Juiced, he admitted to the world that many of the successful players of the past generation were steroid users. His book reveals many personal stories and not only information about steroids and the game, but how he loved them and believed that they were what made it possible for him to compete at the highest level (Meyers, 2006). Partying and steroids did not mix, it showed that players needed to be dedicated to the game to use steroids effectively and devote all of their time to working out and training. Jason Giambi was a perfect example. You could see the retention of liquids his skin and see the water under there as it indented and then filled in. (Meyers, 2006). Baseball players were going to become more and more athletic fast and strong, there was a long while where if you didnt jump onto the PED bus, your spot on your team was going to be in jeopardy. There is more to steroid use in sports then just the increase in skills and power. Your body takes a serious toll during while using steroids, and even though there have been no deaths attributed directly to steroids, Ken Caminiti, a past MLB MVP and admitted steroid user, died of a heart attack at the age of 41. Baseball is not the only sport that has juiced up athletes either. Wrestling, such as the WWE and professional cycling both have had problems and deaths involving PEDs; in an article titled Performance Enhancing Drugs in Baseball, Paul Staudohar reports, According to medical examiners, several deaths since 1997 in pro wrestling were attributed to steroid abuse. As many as 25 mysterious deaths in competitive cycling, mostly from heart failure, appear to have been caused by performance-enhancing drugs (Staudohar, 2005).

Baseball players have been using steroids for longer than it has been reported as a major problem. Jose Canseco, a great player in his time, and someone who was at one point the highest paid player in all of baseball, actually attributed most of his success to PEDs. He went from the normal sized 180 pound first basemen to a 205 pound muscle man. When he made the weight gain, is also when he was promoted to the major leagues. Canseco wrote in his book, Steroids were the key to it all. . . . Steroids not only give you a lot of physical strength and stamina, they also give you a mental edge (Solberg & Ringer, 2011). The players clearly loved the added benefits that steroids provided for them. Even though Utilitarianism does not look at individual rights, it states that you need to do whatever will improve the utility of the most amounts of people. Within the baseball community, there was overwhelming evidence that many different players had been using steroids and other PEDs. Canseco suggested that eighty five percent of players were users, while other players, such as admitted user of steroids Ken Caminiti, guessed the number was around fifty percent (Solberg & Ringer, 2011). It seemed that players were under the impression that if they could just play well enough to get that one great contract, then they would be set up for life. With the homerun numbers up, the television ratings were improved, the fans were happier and the players were getting paid more and more. Along with the boom in home runs, attendance skyrocketed, salaries soared and in the 10 years following the strike, 14 teams would move into new ballparks(Kakutoni, 2005). Mangers would not bench or report these players because they were winning games for them. The steroids helped the players, which in essence made the game more popular, more watchable and more marketable. A great counter argument to steroids improving the game and utility of the masses is what about old fashioned defensive baseball where

the best players also played the field and did the small things. Homeruns cant be everything, people who play small ball and defense should be rewarded just as much as the home run hitters. Sandy Alderson, the former general manager of the Oakland athletics is quoted saying, If youre not big and strong and not an offensive player, youre probably not going to play. Alderson was also vocal about his opinion that homeruns are, the best part of the game, and that he tailored his teams around that philosophy. Knowing that, being stronger and faster was not only important to be a star, it was becoming a requirement to just make the team you played for. An important part of Utilitarianism is the cost benefit analysis. For every single great player that uses steroids to boost their stats, or make twenty million a year instead of thirteen on their next contract, there are minor leaguers or players who were washed up that could use steroids to try to have a positive impact on their lives and the lives of their family members. The Solberg and Ringer article gives a great example of this. An aging, overweight backup player who muscled up and won a starting job for the rst time in his career. The player had a decent season and was awarded with a generous multiyear dear. Although his career was quickly cut short with injuries (likely as a result of steroid use), the contract probably set him up for life. A starters salary in the MLB these days is $3,305,393 according to CBSsports.com. When a player is rewarded with a multiyear contract that money can greatly help with expenses, such as childrens college tuition and other costly purchases that someone might make. Looking back to 1990 the average salary was only $578,000; a serious increase took place that made the game significantly more competitive. Especially when steroids were not banned by baseball, it is hard to see why a player wouldnt try to get ahead of the curve in the weight room and during training by using steroids. The extra money, you could make by doing steroids clearly outweighed the fact that it

was illegal and banned in other sports. This is a good example of why a strict utilitarian view on the issue would say it was ethical. From a Kantian stand point, I think the answer is much simpler to come by. Since Kant believed that you had to never use others a simply means, and that you also need to universalize the question to make sure it works without deviation in every situation. This immediately makes me think Kant would disagree with the concept of using steroids in any situation. Chris Benoit was a professional wrestler, who tragically killed himself, his wife and his child during a steroid rage. If that was ever a possible outcome to using steroids, then Im sure it would defeat any possible argument for using steroids in any situation. Under no circumstance would something that could lead to the potential murder of innocent on lookers be acceptable in a fair and just society Considering the second part of the categorical imperative, I can confidently speak for Kant that even though steroids are not a person, baseball players were still using them as means. There is no reason to use steroids other then to become a better baseball player if you are in that industry. A comparison between this, and what Sandel says on page 122 is proper here. He says that suicide is unethical because you are using yourself as means to end your own suffering. In the game of baseball, by using steroids, you are not only lying and breaking the rules, but you are also using yourself, and the steroids as means, not the end itself (Sandel, 2009). Kant would love to see baseball without any enhancement, on a level playing field, a lot like another theorist, Rawls. Rawlsian thinking takes away everything that makes you who you are, and then creates the laws from a neutral mind frame. Under the veil of ignorance, your race, social standing, health, wealth and other things are not considered anymore (Sandel, 2009). Instead, everyone is on a level playing field and nobody knows where they will end up after the veil is lifted. He emphasizes that a level playing field was important in life. So if there was this veil, what would be thought up?

For one, the level playing field would be brought up immediately, and that would mean you have to make it so everybody uses them, or nobody does. Then, you have to consider the importance of the overall health and wellness of the people participating in the event. Since steroid use has clearly been labeled as something that is detrimental to your health. If everybody was together in this mass meeting, would they allow somebody to cheat the system, and hurt themselves by using steroids? I would find that hard to believe. One of the main objections to Rawls line of thinking in the book is incentives, which also would be the biggest objection in baseball. Since the talented clearly benefit from using steroids, both on the playing field and fiscally, the incentive to use steroids becomes much greater. The second objection Sandel talks about is effort. Using steroids does not just make you better at baseball. You have to put in lots of hours lifting, practicing and gaining all of that muscle tone. Even though extra effort goes into the training, there is still not a chance that under the veil of ignorance we would accept steroid use, especially in baseball and competitive sports. In my opinion, there is no way to decide if steroids in baseball is ethical or not by using just one of these theories. In a perfect world, I really think that steroids will be completely outlawed from baseball. I think that Kants idea of universalizing your maxim is the most important thing to consider. Since using steroids, and cheating the system is not going to be considered okay in every situation, there is no way it can be allowed in baseball. Utilitarianisms cost-benefit analysis can be confusing when looking at the overall picture, because it is easy to be swayed by the fiscal and monetary gains to be made from using performance enhancing drugs. Leaving the actual money on the side, I think the cost benefit analysis will actually sway you away from using PEDs. The gain in baseball ability, will certainly not outweigh the potential infertility, man boobs, and health risks that come with steroids. Since it is all about maximizing utility for everybody, steroid use in

the end is a seriously selfish thing. The hurt that you might put on your family, like the tragedy with Chris Benoit, the risks certainly do not outweigh the positives (Hannity, Colmes, 2007). Lastly, I really think that the idea of a level playing field being crucial for ethical morality. Rawls idea of trying to level the playing field would deny players the ability to use anything the enhances performance, unless everybody used it. Since I cannot agree that everybody using steroids is a better solution then nobody using them, I tend to say that Steroids are not going to be considered ethical or just anytime soon. In my perfect world, steroids and baseball would never mix. Not only does it not follow the guidelines of the categorical imperative, but it really uses the player simply as means. Everyone would be on a level playing field, and nobody would have an advantage . Under the veil of ignorance, I think the people would vote that way, to ensure that you were protected from potential danger down the road. Kant is the only one who would have a clearly negative view on steroid use, There are some aspects of utilitarianism that I feel would allow steroid use to go on, like if you include monetary incentives into the decision. Since there are many different aspects of life that could be improved with the money that is gained from the steroid use might actually prove more beneficial to the people using them. Like I stated before, a player using steroids to cash in on a multi year multi million dollar contract might say that he would have been out of line to not give himself the best possible chance to succeed, he might be doing his family and the fans a disservice. An argument against the Rawls but a serious objection to the idea would be that the extra effort required would make the act ethical. If there was no extra effort involved it would be cut and dry un ethical. The extra effort put forth to working out and practice might actually make the case that since you put in more work, you deserve to be paid better. For struggling players, such drugs and supplements could mean the difference between obscurity in the minor leagues and big money in

the big leagues. For elite players, they could mean the difference between good, solid numbers and history-making records, the difference between celebrity and immortality (Kakutani, 2007). Even with the veil of ignorance, it is possible to think that this evidence presented might still be enough to make people break the rules to allow themselves to perform at the highest possible level. All of this still depends on human nature though, people naturally want to be the best, and I think that since there is such a strong case that steroids directly improve your performance, even though it is completely immoral, I do not know if the epidemic will ever stop completely.

Works Cited Hannity, S., & Colmes, A. (2007, June 29). Friend of Chris Benoit, former pro wrestler discuss Benoit tragedy. Fox News Kakutani, M. (2005, July 5). The taint baseball couldn't wish away . New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/05/books/05kaku.html?_r=1 Meyers, M. R. (2006). Juiced. MagillS Literary Annual 2006, 1-3. Sandel, M. (2009). Justice. New York: D&M Sarcastic. Solberg, J., & Ringer, R. (2011). Performance-enhancing drug use in baseball: The impact of culture. ETHICS & BEHAVIOR, 21(2), 91-102. Staudohar, P. D. (2005). Performance-enhancing drugs in baseball. Labor Law Journal, 56(2), 139-149. Von Burg, R., & Johnson, P. E. (2009). Yearning for a Past that Never Was: Baseball, Steroids, and the Anxiety of the American Dream. Critical Studies In Media Communication, 26(4), 351-371.