I read the other day on the Huffington Post that the scourge of drugs on baseball had claimed its third former major league baseball Most Valuable Player in a month when Miguel Tejada was suspended for 105 games after testing positive for an amphetamine. A person familiar with the situation told the Associated Press that Tejada tested positive for Adderall, a substance the 39-year-old has used to treat his Attention Deficit Disorder.
Major League Baseball’s medical staff grants therapeutic-use exemptions that allow players to use drugs such as Adderall to treat ADD. But the substance has become a popular performance-enhancer, accounting for 10 of the 11 positive stimulant tests in the major league program in the year ending with the 2012 World Series, according to the annual report of the Independent Program Administrator.
The report, which was released last November, said that medication for ADD accounted for 116 of 119 therapeutic-use exemptions granted by Major League Baseball.
There are 30 MLB teams with 25 players on each roster. According to the Attention Deficit Disorder Assn., 5 percent of the general population has ADD. By its own medical exemption practice, Major League Baseball would have us believe that three times that number, 15 percent, of its players need treatment for ADD.
Something isn’t right here. By its own numbers, Major League Baseball should know it. It should stop condoning the use of Adderall as an acceptable performance-enhancing drug.
Who would have thought playing major league baseball could be so detrimental to your health?
Now, according to MLB, we are to believe that some high school baseball players who had the reputation of just being jocks, may have actually been suffering from the early stages of ADD.
Mr. Laase may be contacted at GMLaase@aol.com
