Garciaparra distrusts test

FORT MYERS, Fla. -- Here's what Nomar Garciaparra plans to do when Major League Baseball makes a surprise visit to test him for illegal steroids.

"The day I'm getting tested, I'm going to call my doctor and say, `Guess what, you're going to test me, too, and we're going to send my results [to MLB] just to make sure,' " he said yesterday as the steroid controversy roiled. "I have to have a backup in case something happens. Maybe I'll even get blood taken out because it's more accurate than urine."

Garciaparra has a fundamental problem with baseball's attempt to rid the game of illegal steroids.

"I don't trust testing," he said. "I don't know where [the sample] is going or who's doing [the testing], or what they are looking for. Testing is just not the answer."

A foolproof testing program would be one thing.

"People don't realize that testing isn't infallible," he said. "What are you going to do when you get a false positive? What are they going to do when a guy is getting accused and then realize, `Oh, well, oops, we messed up'? Are they going to go back and try to restore the guy's name and reputation or are they just going to accept the fact that the guy's reputation and name are ruined?"

As far as Garciaparra knows, no one has accused him of using illegal steroids except in jest. And the only products he has ingested to build his body, he said, are legal.

"Your typical weight gainers and Creatine," he said.

But he has been appalled at the way the story involving steroids and other illegal substances in professional sports and the Olympics has unfolded. The latest twist was a news report, citing federal investigators, alleging Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi, and Gary Sheffield, among other players (none with the Sox), received illegal steroids and human growth hormone from Bonds's personal trainer. No charges have been lodged against the players, and no evidence that they used the products has been publicly reported.

"You've got guys right now whose reputations are getting ruined," Garciaparra said. "What if they find out they never did take it? The guys who are accusing them, are they going to turn their heads, or are they going to say, `Well, we have to make sure every day that we tell the people we messed up'?"

MLB, under a provision of the 2002 collective bargaining agreement, had permission as of Tuesday to begin making random visits to the 30 teams for mandatory testing. The program was launched after threshold tests during two announced visits to each team last spring showed between 5 percent and 7 percent of players used illegal steroids.

The tests are supposed to be confidential, just as information presented to the grand jury in the steroid case involving Bonds's trainer was supposed to be secret.

"Now, all of a sudden, we have names," Garciaparra said. "I don't know where the anonymity is. When you see that, how are we supposed to trust anybody with anything like that? How am I supposed to go in there now and agree to a drug test when you tell me one thing and it's not true?"

Pointing fingers based on news reports is dangerous, he said.

"You see too many guys' faces tattooed up there on TV," he said. "How many times have we seen guys in the NFL or the Olympics, and it says, `Failed substance abuse program,' and the first thing you think of is cocaine, marijuana, steroids, or something? Then they find out he took Advil before the event and forgot to say that. Nobody puts his face up there again and says, `Oops, we messed up.' "

Garciaparra transformed himself from lanky to broad-shouldered and large-muscled in the winter after his first full pro season with the Sox. He accomplished the makeover, he said, with legal nutrition products and an unrelenting training program.

"I decided to work out and change because I was exhausted by the end of my 142-game season in the minor leagues," he said. "I was like, `If I want to play in the big leagues, that's 162 games and the postseason.' I said, `I've got to do something so I can last. I've got to build myself stronger and build a good base.' "

He took some ribbing when he returned the next spring.

"It was like, `What did you do?' " he said. "But it was more in jest than anything. I actually took it as flattering because that means I worked hard and it paid off."

He noticed the results quickly on the field. Balls he hit that previously reached the warning track struck the wall or cleared it. And he has maintained a similar offseason program every winter since, achieving his most muscle-bound physique in the winter of 2001, when he appeared shirtless on the cover of Sports Illustrated.

Garciaparra said he purposely tried to make himself bigger that offseason (and was the brunt of a few more jokes). But he has since lost some of the bulk, believing he has gained agility and maintained his strength.

In any case, he awaits the steroid testers. And he wishes there were an effective alternative. "There's just not a simple solution," he said. "I don't have an answer. There definitely has to be something to keep people from doing [illegal steroids]. I don't think it's right that people take them. But I think there has to be a lot more done researching all this stuff before they say, `OK, here's the answer: Just test everybody.' "