A few days before the official word came out, the reports were that Jacksonville lineman Marcus Stroud would be suspended for steroids. Coach Jack Del Rio wasn’t going to talk about that, but he did allow that Stroud had been good for the team.

“There aren’t many guys that are 310 pounds and can run the way he can run and make plays sideline to sideline,” Del Rio said.

No there aren’t, and there aren’t many guys who can steal 30 bases and hit 450-foot home runs off curveballs that are down and away. And there aren’t many women who can run the 100 meters under 11 seconds and long jump 24 feet.

There’s a reason for that. Not everyone is juiced.

It may seem like that at times, but my guess is that there must be some clean players in sports. I can offer only anecdotal evidence, such as David Wells or John Daly, but it seems the cocktail of choice isn’t always HGH or stanozolol.

Certainly, Dodger fans will tell you they would never have a reason to suspect Juan Pierre of anything.

But if coaches and teams had their way there wouldn’t be any center fielders who couldn’t throw the ball back to the mound. There wouldn’t be any pitchers who couldn’t hit at least 90 on the radar gun, and there wouldn’t be any linebackers who couldn’t run the 40 under 4.5 seconds and then tackle someone with just one arm.

Because they’re all enablers for the most part. And that’s the big reason why baseball and football can’t rid their sports of cheats no matter how hard the leagues might try.

Marion Jones lies about using steroids, her gold medals are stripped and a prison cell looms. Sprinter Kelli White is caught using steroids and never runs competitively again.

Floyd Landis is stripped of his Tour de France title and will limit his bike riding to going to the store.

Contrast that to what happened when Paul Byrd admitted before Game 7 of the AL championship series that he had used HGH – an admission that came only after the San Francisco Chronicle reported he spent nearly $25,000 on the drug and syringes over a period of years.

Byrd’s punishment came Tuesday when the Cleveland Indians agreed to pay him $7.5 million to pitch for them next year.

“It was a decision we are very comfortable with,” said Indians general manger Mark Shapiro, who made sure to note Byrd’s contribution as a club leader and his involvement in the community.

The message from that, apparently, is that if your teammates like you and you visit a children’s hospital a few times you can take anything you want and still be generously rewarded for it. Too bad that doesn’t work anymore in track and field because Jones could have saved herself years of lying and a stretch in the pen.

Byrd, who claimed the HGH was properly prescribed and used to treat “very low” hormone readings, promised to tell all after the LCS was over. He hasn’t yet, maybe because it’s kind of hard to explain why a dentist would write one of the prescriptions, as the Chronicle reported.

Four-game suspensions mean nothing in the NFL. Baseball’s testing is filled with holes, and HGH use appears to be rampant in both sports.

You can’t simply blame the players since they know they don’t have all that much to lose.

They know their coaches and teams will always have their backs.