Author Topic: The league is packed with talent right now and I think it might be due to HGH  (Read 23486 times)

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Offline fairweatherfan

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The Olympics actually has real testing, and I can't think of a basketball player, NBA or otherwise, who's failed one of those tests. 

A side note about Olympic testing.

Grant Hill said in the '96 Olympic nobody wanted to be the leading scorer, because it was the leading scorer who got tested, and getting tested was a pain in the butt.  So I don't know how much Olympic testing has changed in the 16 years since, but it could be not that many basketball players are getting tested, especially if they're only testing one player per team, and maybe even just on teams that won a medal or even just the gold.

I think everyone gets tested at some point, it's just the lead scorer who gets spot-tested after than the game.

Important to note the leading scorer in every game gets tested, not the leading scorer overall.  That's a lot of guys over the years without a whiff of shady results.  If they're using PEDs, they're either ahead of the much stricter Olympic curve, or they're not taking them around the Games.

EDIT:  Pretty sure the Olympics stores samples too, so they can retroactively test them if they develop a better test later.
« Last Edit: October 09, 2012, 05:23:17 PM by fairweatherfan »

Offline bdm860

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The Olympics actually has real testing, and I can't think of a basketball player, NBA or otherwise, who's failed one of those tests. 

A side note about Olympic testing.

Grant Hill said in the '96 Olympic nobody wanted to be the leading scorer, because it was the leading scorer who got tested, and getting tested was a pain in the butt.  So I don't know how much Olympic testing has changed in the 16 years since, but it could be not that many basketball players are getting tested, especially if they're only testing one player per team, and maybe even just on teams that won a medal or even just the gold.

I think everyone gets tested at some point, it's just the lead scorer who gets spot-tested after than game.

Important to note the leading scorer in every game gets tested, not the leading scorer overall.  That's a lot of guys over the years without a whiff of shady results.  If they're using PEDs, they're either ahead of the much stricter Olympic curve, or they're not taking them around the Games.

EDIT:  Pretty sure the Olympics stores samples too, so they can retroactively test them if they develop a better test later.

Ah, that would make sense.

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Offline Eja117

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One thing that sticks out to me is these miracle type recoveries. Like when Jerry Rice came back from ACL surgery to play in the same season at the age of like 33. Does that happen in the general population? If it's happening in the general population then maybe it's medical advances. But if only pro athletes are doing it then that is a red flag to me.

Offline saltlover

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The Olympics actually has real testing, and I can't think of a basketball player, NBA or otherwise, who's failed one of those tests. 

A side note about Olympic testing.

Grant Hill said in the '96 Olympic nobody wanted to be the leading scorer, because it was the leading scorer who got tested, and getting tested was a pain in the butt.  So I don't know how much Olympic testing has changed in the 16 years since, but it could be not that many basketball players are getting tested, especially if they're only testing one player per team, and maybe even just on teams that won a medal or even just the gold.

I think everyone gets tested at some point, it's just the lead scorer who gets spot-tested after than game.

Important to note the leading scorer in every game gets tested, not the leading scorer overall.  That's a lot of guys over the years without a whiff of shady results.  If they're using PEDs, they're either ahead of the much stricter Olympic curve, or they're not taking them around the Games.

EDIT:  Pretty sure the Olympics stores samples too, so they can retroactively test them if they develop a better test later.

Ah, that would make sense.

Furthermore, FIBA tests at Olympic qualifying tournaments, as well as World Championships.  100 players were tested at the 2010 worlds, and zero came back positive.  If players who are in those tournaments are doping, they would need to be on a regimen that avoids both whatever in-season testing their league requires, as well as the international tournaments.

Again, I'd be shocked if there was no one using PED's, because the reward is certainly there, but at the same time it should be noted that those players who have experienced real testing have always come up clean (except for Orien Greene, who got caught using someone else's pee to avoid what was probably pot testing while playing in the Netherlands.)

Offline Eja117

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Nobody getting caught wouldn't shock me though. It makes me wonder if there are other things that don't get caught. I think we as fans are always a generation behind. I thought that deer horn thing was pretty weird for example

Offline saltlover

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Nobody getting caught wouldn't shock me though. It makes me wonder if there are other things that don't get caught. I think we as fans are always a generation behind. I thought that deer horn thing was pretty weird for example

It would shock me if no one got caught who was using.  Dick Pound likes to yell and scream a lot, but he's been very aggressive as the head of WADA for over a decade, and absolutely loves catching dopers.  I'm sure NBA players who come into his purview have a target on their backs.

Offline Jon

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I've suspected LeBron and Dwight to be HGH users for years. 

I still think there's a pretty good chance that I'm right about it. 

The only problem with testing it in the NBA, is that particularly with younger players, what exactly should be the level of Human Grown Hormone in players that are a) still growing (still possible with younger players) and b) are unusually tall people who may have wacky hormonal stuff going on anyway.  I mean even someone like Paul Pierce is still considered to be very tall as far as the average human goes, and he's only 6-7.   




Offline TitleMaster

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Ppl, there's no true test for HGH, if the person using it isn't a fool.

When a person gets an HGH injection, the substance is rapidly absorbed, resulting in a release of Insulin Growth Factors(IGFs), which affects tissue growth/re-generation.
One does not need continuous injections to make IGFs routinely available; two HGHs shot a week is fine, and then in the following day, the HGH residue is gone from the blood stream and it's not seen in the urine test anyways.

Then, during the remaining 4-5 days, a persons needs to simply ingest some 4-5 grams of Amino Acids like Ornithine and Arginine on an empty stomach, to keep the pulsatile  secretion of growth hormone going, to maintain a steady-state amount of re-generation during the week.

Thus, if the blood syringe drug test isn't scheduled around the time of injection, it's virtually undetectable. Thus, combining a simple vitamin regimen, with two weekly HGH injections, could make for a flawless recuperation system.

On the other hand, normal PEDs, like anabolic steroids, leaves a signature for a long time. Those are easy to spot and easy to get busted for whereas HGH is a natural substance, found in the pituitary gland and thus, getting busted takes a series of entrapment schemes.

Offline D Dub

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I bet some players are on hgh and don't even realize it...

Also think more guys are worried about getting caught with weed.

Offline Celtics18

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I think that anything that is legal for the general public should be legal for pro athletes.  If there's a legal and safe drug or hormone that can help players to play longer and recover from injury faster, I have no problem with it being used.

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PG: G. Hill/D. Schroder
SG: C. Lee/B. Hield/T. Luwawu
SF:  Giannis/J. Lamb/M. Kuzminskas
PF:  E. Ilyasova/J. Jerebko/R. Christmas
C:    N. Vucevic/K. Olynyk/E. Davis/C. Jefferson

Offline perks-a-beast

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I think almost everyone here can agree that there is some PED usage in the NBA. No one can say for sure the extent of it but let's just hope no reports start coming out because lets face it, the league is already screwed up enough.

Offline indeedproceed

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This seemed relevant:

The cold tub is as alarming as hell, but it has magical restorative properties, which we needed. We had been training so hard we could hardly dribble or lift our arms above our heads.

Leading the recovery session was Corey Stenstrup, a former MLB strength coach with education in nutritional science and exercise biochemistry who seemed to know everything about the workings of the human body. He ran precisely orchestrated workout sessions: only weights but those that served basketball purposes; not just agility, but the kind we'd use in plays we were learning on the court; balance that makes for better jumping, running and pivoting; learning to be strong even while fully extended, for instance when rebounding or blocking a shot. And on and on. It was no wonder his facility was busy with the finest football, tennis and basketball players in the world.

That day on the pool deck, with an evening scrimmage approaching and shot bodies, all minds were attuned to the idea of exercise recovery.

And performance enhancing drugs came up.

One after another, we threw out theories about how of course those didn’t work in basketball. Anabolics would make you too bulky, right? Human growth hormone isn't really all that, is it? Would testosterone make a difference?

We had been told, for years, that steroids wouldn't help in basketball. We covered the sport, knew and liked players, and believed the sport generally to be clean. What's more, to suggest that basketball was dirty, or that there were drug cheats in the sport, was to come pretty close to accusing Stenstrup, a guy NBA players turn to for high-end workout advice, of knowing about it, or worse.

The simple thing would have been for Stenstrup to go along with our theories. We wanted him to reassure us. Our beloved sport, his beloved clientele, all clean and determined to stay that way.

Bless him, though, that Corey Stenstrup. He's a straight shooter.

His words, with just a hint of annoyance at our ignorance, cut the air -- and the (crap)

"Guys," he announced, "all that stuff helps."

Instantly, I felt like an idiot for having ever thought otherwise.


The warm, snuggly conviction that basketball was a magical part of sports that would be forever above that mess, that was all over. We were plunging into a cold reality.

Literally. Here we were in line, desperate to freeze ourselves in a tub, just to inspire a tiny amount of cellular movement that would make us a little fresher for that night's session.

Meanwhile, that cellular activity, that recovery, could be coerced much more forcefully with pharmaceuticals. Similarly, the weights we'd been lifting -- we could lift more. The running could be done faster. PEDs are known to help in running, jumping, lifting and recovering. Some say human growth hormone can even help your eyesight. It's hard to find elements of basketball training where they wouldn't have the potential to make better players.

Looking back on the conversation years later, Stenstrup sees the irony. He is for rigorous testing and not only advises his clients against all PEDs but also about all medicines, artificial sweeteners, colors, preservatives and even nonorganic or cooked food.

But that day, even Stenstrup was surprised at our naivete. How had we been fooled? And if Stenstrup knew all that stuff worked, who else knew? Why wouldn’t players know?

Stenstrup did not tell us that the NBA was full of dopers, or anything like it. But he sure dumped cold water on the whole "wouldn't help in the NBA" theory.

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Offline Eja117

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So. Tim Duncan. He's 36. Kinda amazing what he's doing, isn't it?

Offline Chris

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So. Tim Duncan. He's 36. Kinda amazing what he's doing, isn't it?

It is.  Although, he is also a guy who uses his skills more than athleticism at this point.

But your point is well taken.  I agree that HGH (or whatever the drug of choice) is extending careers that used to be over much earlier.  But I also think the lack of fundamentals has counteracted that a lot, which is why I don't really agree that the league has more talent than it has in the past. 

Offline LarBrd33

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I don't know.  It's possible it's just advances in treatment and training.  I heard it said that if a guy like LeBron or Dwight took HGH... it was probably in high school.

Kinda off topic and totally not relevant... but is everyone aware that Anabolic steroids are a key part of treatment for HIV patients?  Technically speaking, Magic Johnson was probably the first confirmed steroid user in the NBA... during his short-lived 1995 comeback as "Buff" Johnson where he played power forward:



I'm just sayin...  OBVIOUSLY nobody cares, but it's true, right?