Performance Enhancing Drugs Helpful Or Detrimental

Ashveen Sharma PSE4U1-01 Essay Rough Draft November 28, 2014 Performance-Enhancing Drugs: Helpful or Detrimental? â€Å"Drugs and Baseball - how has this impacted MLB† Barry Bonds, the man who broke Hank Aaron’s home run record in 2007 should be hailed as one of the greatest sluggers to ever swing a bat. So why isn’t he? With a career plagued with controversy over the use of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs (PED’s), Bonds’ historic records will be debated and held in controversy forever. The numbers Bonds put up during his career should earn him a first class seat headed to the Hall of Fame; however, even without an actual conviction, Barry Bonds’ link with PED’s will likely prevent his induction into the baseball Hall of Fame†¦show more content†¦Because performance-enhancing drugs are dangerous, create unfair advantages, and harm the spirit of competition, more frequent testing along with harsher penalties must be implemented in all levels of organized baseball. PED’s cover a wide variety of substances used by athletes, with a few specific drugs used primarily in the sport of baseball. Since the 1980s, baseball players have taken these substances, which were originally intended for other purposes, and abused them into a way to gain an edge on the competition. Human Growth Hormones (HGH) is one of these substances. HGH is naturally produced in the pituitary gland, used to stimulate the growth of bone, muscle and cartilage in growing children. Around the age of twenty, HGH production tends to decline. During the early 1980’s, scientists discovered that giving HGH to elderly men could increase muscle mass, lower body fat, and decrease bone loss (Interlandi). Baseball players thought that they could use this HGH as a catalyst to improve their body to increase performance; however, no scientific evidence actually confirms thisassumption. The human body still produces plenty of HGH between the ages of 20-40 to support muscle and bone growth (Interlandi). While the results in older men show HGH has a positive impact