Drug revelations a grim situation for baseball

NEW YORK -- So much for the idea that baseball's drug problem would go away when Barry Bonds does, or that the tougher steroid-testing program adopted by Major League Baseball under intense pressure from Congress would clean up the game.

Both of those naive assumptions were shattered by the news yesterday that Jason Grimsley -- a journeyman pitcher, not a monster slugger -- told federal investigators that he was using human growth hormone, a performance-enhancing substance for which baseball does not test. Neither does any other professional sport.

And in a development that should throw fear into an untold number of players who also are using drugs, Grimsley allegedly named other players who were users. Those names were blacked out on a federal affidavit connected with a search of his Arizona home Tuesday but are not likely to stay secret for long, given the way testimony to the grand jury investigating BALCO (Bay Area Laboratory Cooperative) was leaked for public consumption.

Grimsley painted a picture of a drug culture in baseball that went beyond the use of steroids and HGH. He said that ``boatloads" of players used amphetamines, according to the affidavit, often mixing them in coffee marked ``leaded" and ``unleaded," and said that in many cases, ``Latin players" were the suppliers. He also said players for California teams could easily buy drugs in Mexico and sell them to players located elsewhere.

``The absence of testing for HGH in the MLB policy is a huge loophole," Representative Henry Waxman of California, the ranking Democrat on the Congressional reform committee that investigated steroid use in sports, said in a statement. ``If the allegations in the Grimsley affidavit are true, players are still using this performance-enhancing drug. Unfortunately, until this loophole is closed, questions will remain about MLB players' use of performance-enhancing drugs."

Grimsley, who has played for seven teams since 1989, including the Yankees, and was once traded for Sox pitcher Curt Schilling, was released by the Arizona Diamondbacks yesterday. His release came the day after 13 investigators, armed with a warrant, searched his home in Scottsdale, Ariz., for ``any and all records showing contact or relationship with any and all amateur or professional athletes, athletic coaches or athletic trainers" regarding the use or purchase of illicit drugs, according to the affidavit. He is being investigated on allegations of illegal possession of drugs, illegal distribution of drugs, and money laundering of the profits.

Grimsley, 38, asked for his release, according to Diamondbacks general manager Josh Byrnes, who previously was the top assistant to Red Sox GM Theo Epstein. Grimsley, who previously was best known as the player who confessed to sneaking through a clubhouse vent to retrieve a bat confiscated by umpires that belonged to Indians teammate Albert Belle, was 1-2 with a 4.88 earned run average in 19 games for Arizona.

``I'm just shocked by it and saddened by it," said Yankees manager Joe Torre, who managed Grimsley when he was with the Yankees in 1999 and 2000, years in which the Yankees won the World Series. ``I know Jason Grimsley from being a part of this ball club, but I guess Major League Baseball, they're doing their investigating, getting to the bottom of it. You need to find out where the bottom is right now. It's just something that is unfortunate."

Grimsley, according to the affidavit, cooperated with investigators after they came to his home in April, hours after he allegedly received two kits of human growth hormone. He turned over those kits, the affidavit said, and then spent a couple of hours away from his home, talking to investigators.

The lead investigator was IRS agent Jeff Novitsky, a central figure in the BALCO scandal that allegedly connected Bonds and other prominent athletes, including baseball players Jason Giambi and Gary Sheffield of the Yankees, and track star Marion Jones, with the use of illegal performance-enhancing substances.

``Major League Baseball now has the strongest steroid testing program in professional sports," said Rob Manfred, baseball's chief labor negotiator, in a statement released yesterday. ``Human growth hormone, however, is a problem for all sports because there is no universally accepted and validated test -- either blood or urine."

Baseball commissioner Bud Selig declined to comment, citing the criminal investigation, except to encourage players, owners, and union officials to cooperate with the probes. In March, Selig appointed former senator George Mitchell to look into past steroid use by players.

But the Grimsley revelations serve as a grim reminder that as presently constituted, baseball's drug testing does not -- and at this time cannot -- go far enough to satisfy what Selig has described as a ``zero tolerance" for performance-enhancing substances.

It also offers vivid evidence that regardless of how much the heat has been turned up on the players, there are some who are apparently willing to break the law and ruin their reputations with the continued use of substances.

Amalie Benjamin and wire services contributed to this report.