LONDON, Ontario -- The president of the World Anti-Doping Agency said he suspects as many as a third of the NHL's 700 players may take some form of performance-enhancing substances.

 

 

"I spoke with Gary (NHL commissioner Gary Bettman) and he said, 'We don't have the problem in hockey,'" Dick Pound told the London Free Press on Thursday in an interview for a story to be published Friday. "I told him he does. You wouldn't be far wrong if you said a third."

 

Asked if he meant performing-enhancing drugs, the Montreal lawyer replied, "Yes."

 

NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly took exception to Pound's comments.

 

"I would respectfully suggest that Mr. Pound's comments have absolutely no basis in fact," Daly told the Canadian Press. "I find it troubling, to say the least, that he would find it necessary to comment on something he has absolutely no knowledge of.

 

Dick Pound claims a third of NHL players use performance-enhancers. (Getty Images) "Perhaps Mr. Pound would be better served to limit his comments to topics as to which he has knowledge, instead of speculating on matters as to which he has none."

 

Ted Saskin, executive director of the NHL Players' Association, also bristled at Pound's comments.

 

"Dick Pound's comments are incredibly irresponsible and have no basis in fact," Saskin told The Canadian Press. "He has no knowledge of our sport and our players and frankly has no business making such comments."

 

The NHL introduced random tests for performance-enhancing drugs in its new collective bargaining agreement. Players are subject to a minimum of two tests a year without warning. A first-time offender gets a 20-game suspension, a second offense calls for a 60-game suspension, and a third offense results in a lifetime ban.

 

"The NHL has reached a deal with their players that looks as though they found an early copy of the baseball policy on the floor somewhere," Pound said Thursday after addressing students at the University of Western Ontario's law school.

 

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Anyone else find, other than the fact its a very ridiculous claim, the name of the Anti-Doping president to be almost porn star funny?

HAHAHAHAHA i'm with you man. I couldn't even read the article I was laughing so hard at his name.

 

Dick Pound!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HAHAHAHA :lol :lol :lol :lol :lol :lol

but what if there were some truth behind it?

 

 

is there any drug testing policy in hockey?

but what if there were some truth behind it?

 

 

is there any drug testing policy in hockey?

No. And it would not make any sense since steroids don't improve anything in hockey. Not even power on your shot. Besides, not very many hockey guys are huge guys. Unless they are Zdeno Chara or Chris Wells, that is.

 

 

Now I wouldn't be suprised if there were some, just not the one third that this guy is proclaiming there is.

The NHL will be testing for them soon, first offense is a 20 game suspension. The logistics of NHL testing though are far different and more complicated than any of the other leagues, here's a good article:

 

N.H.L. Commissioner Gary Bettman was asked recently about his views on the legislation currently working its way through Congress that deals with drug testing in professional sports.

 

"Nobody's ever suggested that we have a steroid problem," Bettman said Nov. 10 during an impromptu news conference in Glendale, Ariz. "Having said that, I get the notion that the public wants to know that the sport is clean and I fully support that.

 

"And if that means we have to test our players to prove that they're clean, we're going to do it - which is why we and the players' association in the collective bargaining agreement have agreed on a performance-enhancing random testing program with severe punishments."

 

Those punishments, Bettman said, would be a 20-game suspension for a first offense, a 60-game suspension for a second and a lifetime ban for a third, with no possibility of reinstatement for at least two years. N.H.L. teams play 82 regular-season games.

 

"Congress seems to want to do more," Bettman said. "My only concern is that they want to do one size fits all. And that doesn't quite work for us. Not because we don't want to comply. But if it's a U.S.-centric program, where it involves U.S. labs and U.S. doctors only, and you have to test all of your players in the U.S. during the off-season, that's a little hard for us."

 

He pointed out that six franchises played mostly in Canada and that the players were treated by Canadian physicians. Also, almost a third of all N.H.L. players probably leave North America in the off-season. Bettman said he had no problem with compliance to a "realistically harsh program" of drug testing as long as it was tailored to each sport. Hockey, he reiterated, is "a sport that doesn't have a history of this type of drug abuse."

 

Dr. Charles Yesalis, a Penn State professor and steroid expert who testified before Congress twice last spring, disagreed.

 

"No, you don't need to tailor it for each sport to be effective," Yesalis said Friday in a telephone interview. "The United States didn't do it for the Olympic sports. So I don't agree with his premise, although that's been the mantra for pro sports."

 

Yesalis also took issue with Bettman's assertion that hockey must be clean because nobody has ever asserted the N.H.L. has a steroid problem.

 

"There are problems with all of the sports," Yesalis said. "If you're telling me that the players, coaches and general managers are more ethical than for example in football, baseball and the Olympic sports - sports that have all been seen to be full of drugs - I don't think so. Feed that one to someone else."

 

Yesalis lobbied for independent third-party testing for all sports by the United States Anti-Doping Agency, whose chief executive is Terry Madden.

 

"If these guys in the N.F.L., M.L.B., N.H.L., N.B.A. and all these acronyms are really sincere in attempting to limit drug use in sport or in their league, outsourcing is really popular in American interest today," Yesalis said.

 

"Why don't they turn over the whole dang thing to Terry Madden at U.S.A.D.A. if they don't have anything to hide? If they don't want to do that, I start to think, 'Well, what do you have to hide?' "

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/20/sports/h...c6XMF/hbKaAqyjA

but what if there were some truth behind it?

 

 

is there any drug testing policy in hockey?

No. And it would not make any sense since steroids don't improve anything in hockey. Not even power on your shot. Besides, not very many hockey guys are huge guys. Unless they are Zdeno Chara or Chris Wells, that is.

 

 

Now I wouldn't be suprised if there were some, just not the one third that this guy is proclaiming there is.

 

 

 

I wouldn't go that far to say 'roids wouldn't help anything in hockey.

 

They might not help many things, but they sure would help with recovery time (as they do in baseball).

 

That said, I doubt many players in hockey take steroids. Amphetamines, maybe, but not steroids.

Midway through the season, there isn't a single NHL player out there on the ice that isn't playing through pain, so I could really see many turning to steroids or other drugs to help them recover. Hockey is probably the most taxing sport out there, football may be a little more brutal, but there are so few games, you've got an entire week to recover between games, and the season is incredibly short, the NHL regular season is a grind on top of the toughest playoff's in pro sports.

"Hi is Mr. Pound there... first name Dick"

If there's no testing, then guys are roiding. The one-third estimate is suprisingly low, if you ask me.