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NFLPA: 'Talks continue' on HGH front
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INDIANAPOLIS
The NFL season concludes Sunday just as it began — without a testing program for human growth hormone.
While the NFL Players Association isn’t ready to allow its players to undergo a version of the blood test for HGH used internationally for eight years, the union was prepared Thursday with a slide featuring the cover of former World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) chief Dick Pound’s book when a reporter asked about the stalled talks.
“The conversations continue as we work toward a plan that provides a test that maintains the integrity of the sport but also protects and serves fundamental due process rights,” NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith said. “Those talks continue. As we said before, we are going to ensure that due process is not thrown away at the expense of just having the test.”
NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said at his Friday news conference that he’s had discussions with the NFLPA as recently as two weeks ago.
“We’ve made some progress,” Goodell said. “I’m hoping we will be able to implement it immediately.”
The NFL and the union agreed to begin testing for HGH — long thought to be one of the more abused performance-enhancing drugs by elite athletes — in the new collective bargaining agreement last summer. But the union has blocked its implementation, primarily because it believes the population study conducted by WADA might not be applicable to pro football players.
“With all due respect to the folks at WADA who have told us the standard to which our players will be measured are none of our business and shouldn’t concern us, how could it not be our business,” Smith said. “It seems to me if we are able to get to a system that is fully transparent, that is the best answer. . . . . No one will bully us into a test.”
Goodell said he is “not hearing any dispute (of the test’s efficacy) from the scientists around the world and the fact that this test is valid.”
Messages left at WADA were not returned.
In November, the NFLPA offered to conduct its own population study, which it believes would more accurately gauge the normal HGH levels in the body of an NFL player. Synthetic HGH can increase lean muscle mass and aid in recovery from strenuous workouts. The use of the injectable drug can only be detected via blood test, unlike steroids, which are typically flagged through urine.
Smith would only say “negotiations are ongoing” when asked after the news conference about the status of such a study.
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