George Karl has gone through quite the controversial holiday season this year. He has made various shocking comments about former players such as Carmelo Anthony, J.R. Smith, and Kenyon Martin in his upcoming book Furious George. The ex-Denver Nuggets and Sacramento Kings coach also shared his candid views on the troubled DeMarcus Cousins and the rest of his tenure in Sacramento. However, he did not stop there as today Dan Feldman of NBCSports.com published another excerpt from Karl’s upcoming book, this time the quote about performance-enhancing drugs in the NBA:
“We’ve got a more thorough drug-testing program than the NFL or MLB, which we always brag about. But we’ve still got a drug issue, though a different one than thirty years ago. And this one bothers me more than the dumbasses who got in trouble with recreational drugs.
I’m talking about performance-enhancing drugs—like steroids, human growth hormone, and so on. It’s obvious some of our players are doping. How are some guys getting older—yet thinner and fitter? How are they recovering from injuries so fast? Why the hell are they going to Germany in the off-season? I doubt it’s for the sauerkraut.
More likely it’s for the newest, hard-to-detect blood boosters and PEDs they have in Europe. Unfortunately, drug testing always seems to be a couple steps behind drug hiding. Lance Armstrong never failed a drug test. I think we want the best athletes to succeed, not the biggest, richest cheaters employing the best scientists. But I don’t know what to do about it.”
Karl is addressing the issue where many sports fans and executives today don’t believe steroid and PEDs are as relevant in a game like basketball as opposed to other major sports such as baseball and football. Karl claims that this state of mind is a commonly held misconception. Karl played in the league for 5 years and coached in the NBA for upwards of 20 years so he is certainly entitled to his opinion.
Surely, this quote would have caught the attention of league executives across the association and even Adam Silver’s. The NBA has undoubtedly had less performance enhancing suspensions than either the NFL or the NBA has but just because the issue isn’t exposed to the public, doesn’t mean that it’s nonexistent.
Karl’s quote certainly does beg the question, though, how are so many NBA players staying in peak shape in their mid to late thirties and recovering from injuries at incredible rates? Just recently we saw Memphis Grizzlies guard Mike Conley return from a serious injury much sooner than first anticipated. I want to be clear: I’m not saying Conley has any relation to this whatsoever, but it certainly is a fair example of numerous other incidents as well.
George Karl has no true substance to back up any of his claims, but perhaps being so familiar with the NBA, Karl does have some insight that plenty of others may not. PED use in the NBA is certainly an interesting issue, and one that we should all keep a close eye on.
