Nationals Arm Race

Editor’s note: there are spoilers in this review, and if you have not seen the film they are surprising enough that you may want to skip this post and see the film first.

The 2nd installment in the return of the “30 for 30″ series aired on October 9th, 2012 and is titled “9.79*.”  Directed by Daniel Gordon (a decently acclaimed british documentarian), it tells the story of the 1988 100m Men’s final from the Seoul Olympic games.  As most sports fans would be able to tell from the title, the race was won by Ben Johnson in a then-world record time of 9.79, an astounding improvement upon the standing world record and a seminal event in the sports decade.

Soon after though, Johnson tested positive for the use of Steroids, was stripped of his medal and booted from the games, and the event was a shocking introduction to the world of doping and the use of performance enhancing drugs that has only exploded since.  Nowadays, we hear about Baseball players using steroids and the narrative is familiar.  The USADA just released its report by which it made the decision to charge and eventually ban Lance Armstrong and attempt to strip him of titles won 10+ years prior.  But in 1988, the only knowledge of doping that casual sports fans knew of was allegations of eastern bloc athletes (women mostly) who were astoundingly breaking records in Swimming, Track and Weight Lifting.

(Here’s an excellent review of the film, doing it much better than I: avclub.com)

As with before, I’ll break down talking about the Subject Matter and then the film-making.

Subject Matter: the film maker got all 8 participants in the 1988 100m final to appear on film and talk somewhat candidly about the state of the sport leading up to that race, the role of drugs, and the ethical dilemna they all faced.  Contrast this to prior 30 for 30 films about Allen Iverson and Michael Jordan which didn’t include any on-screen interviews from the subjects.  The fact that Johnson himself speaks at length and openly about the experience makes this a pretty compelling watch.  Even more-so based on points we’ll touch on later…

The film starts off with an anonymous quote, “If you don’t take it, you don’t make it.”  The implication is, if you’re a runner in the 1980s and you’re not taking drugs, then you’re not going to win.  At least one of the interviewees (Calvin Smith, he himself a banned doper who was awarded the Bronze medal upon Johnson’s disqualification) talked openly about this choice.  Runners train extremely hard to only have a shot at coming in 5th or 6th place in the face of other runners who were cheating, leading (much as we saw in the Cycling world) to an escalating arms race of doping to “re-level” the playing field.  It is an awful choice to make for an athlete; stay clean and never win, or cheat like everyone else and give yourself a shot at lucrative glory.  I don’t know what choice I’d make if forced to.

The film doesn’t outright “accuse” Carl Lewis of doping himself, but the implication is pretty clear and pretty stark.  One person talks about how taking HGH forces adults to get braces (since the substance causes the jaw bone to grow far after it typically stops growing in adults), and then a few minutes later shows Lewis in 1987 … wearing braces.  Lewis himself doesn’t do himself any favors, nor does his coach and head cheerleader Joe Douglas, who seemed all too eager to brag about the sundry things that went on, or about the money that was greasing the skids in the mid 1980s in the sport.  I was left after watching thinking that Lewis was just as dirty as the rest of the competition, just that he got “out-roided” in the final.

A very frank interview with the head of the testing lab from the 1984 Olympic Games also raised some eyebrows; he accused the powers-that-be of outright ignoring the results they were seeing, and he seemed to imply that the 1984 Olympic organizers ordered him to sweep positive tests under the table so as not to sully those politically-charged games.  He kept previous samples and re-tested them years onward and found rampant drug use in the 1984 games, but he decided to destroy the evidence rather than re-open yet another investigation into past results.  I slightly disagreed though with the premise of the lab director that testing is a simple either/or principle; as Malcolm Gladwell pointed out on a recent “BS Report” podcast, to conclude that an athelete has tested positive for certain markers (especially testosterone) is incredibly difficult, since your natural testosterone levels ebb and wane on a day to day basis, are affected by your moods and naturally degrade as you age.  They’re even affected by what you eat!  And, as we learned in the Ryan Braun debacle, testosterone levels in samples can quickly change if not properly stored (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, read my post on the topic from February 2012 and read Will Carroll’s amazon story about what *really* happened.  It is well worth the read.  Or just read this piece at the HardBallTimes to understand why I don’t believe Braun cheated at all).  So unfortunately drug testing is more of an art form than something that provides conclusive proof.  And that is troubling, since in order to justify its existence a drug testing lab needs to, you know, find people who cheated.

The most outrageous point of the documentary made came from Johnson, and was a shocker.  He accused a member of Lewis’ camp of spiking his post-race beer after the 1988 100M final with the same steroids he then tested positive for.  The accused person refused to be interviewed on film but provided an incredible quote when asked whether he spiked the drink; he said something along the lines of, “Maybe I did, and maybe I didn’t.”  What kind of answer is that??  Of course he’s not going to admit such a thing, but the lack of a powerful denial almost seems like proof in and among itself that this hanger-on of Lewis’ purposely spiked the drink.  The back-story of the bad blood between the runners and the massive competition for the fastest times in the season leading up to the Olympics, to go with the arrogance of Lewis and his coach makes the accusation of a spiked drink completely believable.

From a film-making perspective, I thought the documentary was very well filmed, with excellent b-roll shots of Toronto (where Johnson is from) and other on-location spots.  You can slightly quibble with the “faked” footage, but most of the b-roll is used as supporting shots being played during quotes from the participants.  It was a little difficult to understand all the interviews, mostly because of the heavy West Indian accent of Johnson and his country-mates.  But that also may be because I was watching the film late at night and trying not to wake my wife .  I’d place this film somewhere in the middle-range of the pantheon of 30-for-30 films.  It was an interesting watch but i’d probably not bother to watch it again.

(editor’s note: I updated and clarified two points in this post on 2/29/12 at 14:00 after receiving feedback from Will Carroll; apologies for misrepresentation.  He does not work for Baseball Prospectus and Braun’s testosterone RATIOs were elevated, not his testosterone levels).

I suppose I have to put my 2 cents in on Ryan Braun.

Here’s what I think; I’m less concerned about the fact that Braun got off on a supposed technicality (though that opinion has now changed given the information discussed further down below) than I am about the breaches in the process.  He suffered a career-damaging leak during what was supposed to be a confidential process and to that I say, shame on whoever leaked the information and double shame on ESPN for their TMZ-style reporting on the matter.  You want to be so cavalier with a person’s life and credibility?  I say you should be 100% culpable to your divulgions and should face financial punishment when Braun inevitably sues you for your leaks (as he has said he will do).

My view on drug testing and these self-appointed anti-doping organizations is incredibly skeptical; much like the NCAA, they self-aggrandize and preach about how they’re trying to keep sports clean, but then don’t acknowledge the irreversable damage done to athletes reputations when false positives, confidential leaks, and mistakes in the process come about.  Braun’s test was supposedly 10 times higher than what had EVER been measured before in baseball testing, and he had tested clean dozens of times before; why isn’t anyone talking about these two points together and asking the question, “gee, maybe something was actually wrong in this case?”   Why is everyone focused on how Braun “beat the system” but not questioning why, as he’s pointed out, he didn’t change his performance, didn’t gain a pound, and tested clean dozens of times previously?  Testing organizations TRY to find people who are cheating because it validates their existences, and when questionable evidence or results arise, instead of looking at things dispassionately they will always take the viewpoint that best supports their corporate missions.

This is related to my problems with the ongoing witch hunts surrounding Lance Armstrong as well; you have banned and proven liars in Tyler Hamilton and Floyd Landis who conveniently claim that Armstrong has cheated, yet you have Armstrong’s body of literally hundreds and hundreds of clean tests with absolutely no evidence of any positive test, ever.  At some point I’ve just kinda said, “Enough.”  Come to me with incontrovertable proof of a positive test or stop talking.  Interviews and “he said, she said” evidence is just that; hearsay.

(Note that the collector has released a statement describing what he did that fateful night and it sounds like he did nothing out of the norm, but his admittance that he stored the samples “in his basement” as opposed to a refrigerator certainly gave me pause).

We’re also seeing ridiculous theories on why the appeal was successful.  Deadspin is reporting that the arbitrator purposely blew the appeal to keep getting work (if i’m reading the article right).  I’ve read a theory that somehow Selig engineered this because of his relationship with Milwaukee.  I guess in the absence of anything besides what we learned from MLB’s ridiculous statement (saying they were “incredibly disappointed” in the arbitration finding seems to be unneccesarily vindictive) and Braun’s attack on the process (which also seemed over-stated; I don’t think its “fatally flawed,” just poorly worded), we’re left to our own imagination.

---

Now, that rant being said, check out this link at Hardballtimes from writer Mat Kovach. Apparently, Braun’s lawyers decided to see what would happen to Braun’s urine if they repeated the exact same scenario that led to the positive test … and after replicating the 3-day storage conditions before the samples were FedEx’d they found that a different urine sample showed the same elevated testosterone ratio levels!  I think a LOT of the outrage over Braun would disappear if this fact was more widely known.  In fact, frankly if this IS the case i’m not sure why Braun’s camp isn’t leading with this fact.  The narrative behind this story would go from “he got off on a technicality” to being “he got off because his sample was tainted” in a hurry.

Other sources on this topic include this link at Chad Moriyama’s blog but apparently the person who really discovered this is Will Carroll.  Carroll has published a Kindle-reader story for 0.99 on Amazon and, well, its worth the 99 cent fee to buy and read (proceeds go to the Jimmy V fund).  You don’t need a Kindle reader; if you buy it right now you can read it via Kindle’s “cloud reader.”  For any of you who still have doubts on the case, you MUST read this story.

In fact, I’m still amazed that Carroll’s findings aren’t more well known.  The kindle article says that Carroll wrote it on behalf of si.com, so perhaps this is a future Sports Illustrated article (either in print or online or both).  I hope so; this story needs to have more traction.  To any the holier-than-thou baseball columnist or blogger stating that they “still think Braun is guilty,” I say simply, “read this article.”  To me its 100% incontrovertable proof that Braun’s sample was clean and that the conditions of its handling led to the positive test.

I just wish this was part of the narrative, instead of the tired “he beat the system” reporting that has dominated the story.

(Post-story update: Apparently Braun’s sample contained Synthetic Testosterone at advanced levels.  This particular fact puts a different spin on the entire defense of Braun above, honestly.   I’m less inclined now to defend the process and more at odds with the synthetic positive test.  That’s unfortunate.)