Why Golf Needs to Test

[Bag Chatter]

by shoe295

<p><img width="135" height="69" align="right" alt="" src="http://www.golfwrx.com/BagChatter/wp-content/uploads/drugometer.jpg" /><strong>Barry Bonds is being booed across America as he chases Hank Aaron's home run record as Commissioner Bud Selig trys to stradle a very wide, very pointed fence(which explains the elevated pitch to his voice); the Tour de France appears to be comprised solely of pharmaceutically enhanced participants;  Shawne Merriman makes the NFL All Pro squad despite a four game suspension for violating the league steroid policy; the NBA has Tom Donaghy dragged into the light from a very dark, fearsome hole.  I went searching for integrity and this is what I found.</strong></p>
<p>Not compelling enough for you?  I know golf has nothing comparable, if we ignore Colin Montgomery and the washed out lie, yet. Golf is a game based on the integrity of it's players but how long will that integrity go unchallenged in an era that makes a mockery of that virtue. With the promise of big rewards how long before someone is willing to take big risks?  What are the options available today to allow golf to maintain the integrity of the game and it's players?</p>
<p>Do nothing.  Believe that the only drugs used in professional golf are of the recreational variety. These guys are above all that, besides there are no performance enhancing drugs that actually work for golf.  If you subscribe to this I would advise you to discuss pharmacology with a pharmacist.  There are numerous substances available today that can advantageously affect golf performance.  Just because you don't talk about the elephant in the living room doesn't mean there is no elephant in the living room.  To believe that someone on the cusp of getting, or losing, his card hasn't chemically assisted pursuit of that goal denies the elephant.</p>
<p>But testing is a violation of my rights as an individual.  Not so much, when what we're discussing is a work place that has as its core value integrity.  Does anyone truly wish to see Tiger Woods chase Jack Nicklaus's major championship record surrounded in controversy similar to Mr. Bonds?  Even the hint of drugs, anywhere in the game, brings into question every players achievements, clean or dirty.  It's a shroud worn by all if there is no method in place to exonerate the many.  It's the right all players to have their workplace proven to be drug free.  By not making the drugs themselves illegal to use in competition, professional golf condones their use.  If the substances are banned do we expect the users to call a penalty on themselves?  In the eye of the public would that remove all question of the presence of drugs in golf?  Testing is the only way to insure compliance and maintain the integrity of the game in a visibly public manner.  If a player doesn't want to be tested because it violates his rights so be it, he would need to find somewhere else to practice his craft.  By choosing to play the game for a living you agree to play by the rules, all of them.</p>
<p>I like golf for a variety of reasons, one of which being it represents an outpost of values lacking in professional sports, and a large part of the world around me, today.  While I take no pleasure in the necessity that requires drug testing in workplaces everywhere I understand the need to do so in a firm quantifiable way.  To do anything else is unacceptably foolish.</p>

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