Drugs: Hurt Players and Sports

Drugs: Hurt Players and Sports

Brett Favre, Diego Maradona, and Darryl Strawberry are all big name sport stars. They all play different sports, but all have the same problem: they tested positive for using illegal drugs. Cocaine, anabolic steroids, and painkillers are just a sample of drugs found in sports. Cocaine is described this way, "It makes you feel like you can do anything, and for athletes who long to be in control all the time, that's a strong temptation" (Coffey 1). Anabolic-androgenic steroids are synthetic forms of hormones that produce muscle faster (Rozin 176). Over fifty percent of the players in the National Football League are weekend or recreational users of cocaine (Burwell 1) . Forty-four Olympians have been caught with steroid use since 1972 (Corelli 28). Through Favre's painkillers, Strawberry's and Maradona's cocaine, one can see that drugs hurt the athletes as well as the sport.

First Brett Favre, who was the Most Valuable Player in the National Football League last season, entered a drug abuse center for his addiction to Vicodin, a very strong painkiller (Plummer 129 ).

Footballer Diego Armando Maradona.

Eric Torrey, Jason Martinez, and Cocaine

Darryl Strawberry

Favre had problems because of Vicodin. Favre suffered a seizure in February while in surgery to repair a broken bone. The seizure resulted from the abuse of the painkiller (Howard 1). Favre states, "I went to Topeka, because the pills had gotten the best of me"

Smoak 2

( qtd. in Plummer 129). Favre's daughter Brittany asked his wife Deanna, "Is he going to die?" (qtd. in Plummer 129). He not only scared himself but his family as well. Favre not has to submit up to ten urine tests a month. His losses were internal as well. "It is kind of embarrassing," says Favre; "I will do whatever it takes" (qtd. in Plummer 133). He spent several weeks...