Tiger Woods: What’s The Real Problem with the PGA Tour Drug Testing Program?
By Sam Adams
There is still a great deal of social media buzz about the question “Did Tiger Woods fail a drug test or not?” and whether or not the PGA Tour covered it up. But is the question of Tiger’s violation of the PED ban the real problem? I don’t think so.
A report last Friday that Tiger Woods had been suspended for testing positive to a PGA TOUR drug test set off a buzz of speculations, accusations and denials. The whole thing began with accusation by Dan Olsen, who had a brief, undistinguished, career on the Tour where here never made a cut and finished with a scoring average 77.5.
The accusation was made during a live interview on a radio show in Lansing, Michigan.
Ty Votaw, Executive Vice President of the PGA Tour responded by releasing a statement Monday, saying, “Regarding the allegations made by Dan Olsen concerning Tiger Woods, there is no truth whatsoever to his claims and the PGA Tour categorically denies them.”
Since that interview Olsen admitted in an interview on ESPN on Monday that it was all “just his opinion” and didn’t actually have any facts to back it up.
In spite of that the question lingers out there.
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The problem is with the tour’s lack of complete transparency in its drug program. The PGA Tour began testing for PEDs in 2008, and steadfastly refuses to disclose player conduct violations or suspensions.
Dr. Charles Yesalis, the Penn State professor who literally wrote the book on steroids, has observed, “If you’d want to keep control of the testing, so that if a star tested positive, you could cover it up and deal with it internally, you want to pick specific drugs that apply to your sport. There are loopholes, but what we’re talking about is the perception, not the actual ethics or morals of what is happening.
That appears to be the guideline the tour used in drafting it’s drug testing policy.
We all remember when Dustin Johnson’s announced that he was taking time off from the tour to work on personal problems. This was followed shortly by rumors that the PGA Tour actually suspended Johnson for six months for failing three drug tests. Johnston maintained publicly than he missed time for a back injury (the tour refuted the published reports by maintaining Johnson was not been suspended).
Then we have the Vijay Singh’s legal dispute when the tour suspended him for admitting that he tried deer-antler spray which is a substance outside the Tour’s testing protocol.
The Tour also suspended two players in all this time and they suspended both for a year.
Why is the Tour so secretive? Could it be that the Tour is more dedicated to preserving players’ marketing value than preserving fair play and protecting the health of its members?
It’s just hard to fathom how Doug Barron could get suspended for a year and Dustin Johnson could get “double secret” probation.
The terms “fair” and “punishment” are hard to define when everything is done in secret.
Nobody really believes that the tour will adopt an Olympic-level drug testing program and openness, but it is going to be interesting to see what happens at the Olympics in 2016 when the tour players are tested just like the runners and swimmers.
Unfortunately for Tiger Woods and Dustin Johnson, just having the tour deny they failed a drug test isn’t enough. Without testing transparency, Tour denial doesn’t mean much.