Lawmakers demand stringent drug testing

? Sen. John McCain told the baseball players’ association Wednesday that Congress will step in unless the union agrees to toughen the sport’s steroid-testing rules.

The Senate Commerce Committee chairman challenged union head Donald Fehr to accept a far more stringent drug-testing policy, such as the NFL’s. Fehr said he couldn’t agree to changes in the collective bargaining agreement.

“Your failure to commit to addressing this issue straight on and immediately will motivate this committee to search for legislative remedies,” warned McCain, an Arizona Republican. “I don’t know what they are. But I can tell you, and the players you represent, the status quo is not acceptable. And we will have to act in some way unless the major league players’ union acts in the affirmative and rapid fashion.”

Home runs have been hit at a record pace in the past decade, and players have gotten larger and stronger. Former MVPs Jose Canseco and Ken Caminiti have said the use of steroids was widespread.

In his State of the Union address, President Bush appealed to sports leagues and athletes to end the use of performance-enhancing drugs. Today, the White House is expected to endorse legislation criminalizing the use of certain performance-enhancing drugs that currently are available without prescriptions.

The San Francisco Chronicle, quoting information it said was provided to federal investigators, reported last week that steroids were given to Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi and Gary Sheffield. All three have denied using steroids.

That report came out of a grand jury investigation of the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative in San Francisco. Last month, two company executives, along with Bonds’ personal trainer and a track coach, were charged with illegally supplying steroids to athletes.

The suspicion that some of the game’s greats are using steroids has loomed over spring training, prompting McCain to schedule a hearing and invite Fehr, baseball commissioner Bud Selig, NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue and NFL players’ union chief Gene Upshaw.

Baseball’s labor contract, agreed to in 2002, called for anonymous drug tests last year. Five to 7 percent of those tests came back positive for steroids, a level which triggered testing with penalties this year. But the program has been criticized because players are tested only twice each season — both tests are given within a period of a week — and the penalties are far weaker than those in Olympic sports.

“I believe that the program that we instituted has had some effect,” Fehr said.

McCain disagreed, saying baseball has a “legitimacy problem” because of questions about steroid use and the public’s perception that cheaters don’t get caught by the testing program. Under baseball’s policy, a player doesn’t face a one-year suspension until failing five tests. The NFL has a year-round random testing program for players and imposes immediate suspensions on those who test positive.

Selig said baseball owners want stronger testing.

“I realize that we have work to do,” Selig said. “We need more frequent and year-round testing of players. We need immediate penalties for those caught using illegal substances.”

Selig said he hopes to make the sport’s policy for players with minor-league contracts apply to those with major league contracts: a year-round testing plan, with an immediate 15-game suspension for a first violation.

McCain pointed to Tagliabue and Upshaw as an example of the kind of collaboration he wants baseball to adopt. Tagliabue and Upshaw agreed that a strong policy is in the best interests of the NFL and its players.

Fehr said that baseball players made a “concession” when they agreed to testing. The union opposes random testing on grounds it invades players’ privacy, he said.

Selig said baseball supports legislation that would ban over-the-counter sales of androstenedione and the newly detected steroid THG.