Iriki Suspended for 50 Games

Come on - no really - the upstanding, always professional, "clean" Japanese player! Must be some sort of MLB conspiracy to bring down the Asian guy. Yeah, right!

Ha, ha, looks like boys will be boys no matter the breed, creed, or diamond on which they perform.

If you can't beat 'em Iriki-san, join 'em.

Yes, wow - that's not good. But he's not the first one to suffer this fate. Just last week five other minor league players were supended for the same thing:

• Karl Gelinas (LA Angels of Anaheim) 50 games
• Jorge Reyes (New York Mets) 50 games
• Angel Rocha (Arizona Diamondbacks) 100 games
• Yonathan Sivira (St. Louis Cardinals) 50 games
• Matthew Varner (San Diego Padres) 50 games

Source: MLB press release.

Read that article, too, and would have like more details as well. Although it's bad what happened, at least he's not the first to test positive, nor will he be the last. And with the whole Delmon Young incident, I'm sure this will be overlooked.

Shocker! But he did it to himself.

What a scandal this should be. I can't wait to see if the Japanese media jump all over him or try to ignore it.

The question of this being part of a witch hunt was brought up on this thread, but this seems a more appropriate place for it.

When I saw the list of players suspended, "witch hunt" was actually my first thought. I'm not questioning whether or not there are witches, but rather whether or not Iriki and the others were given due process (other than "if he drowns he wasn't a witch" justice). None of the reports so far give any details about the tests, or if Iriki (or others) has (have) confirmed or denied use of controlled substances. Have steps been taken to prevent another "poppy seed bagle" incident? There isn't yet enough information to make any comment.

The fact is, we may never know more, because this type of info is usually kept confidential. What I wonder if he was "juiced" while with the Fighters and Giants, or if he felt he needed it for the States.

The truth always stings when a player held in esteem is found to be human. What has the list of players got to do with a witch hunt? The magnitude? Steroid use is widespread. This list seems short!

Steroid use is out of hand in MLB. It is hand wringing like yours by the MLB powers that be and the players union that has kept no-nonsense testing and sure punishment out of the game until now. Hence, the problem continued unabated. With the strength of the players union and continued impotence of the owners on this issue, I would not worry about due process. Enforcement is still limp.

If you test positive, you get a 50 day suspension. End of story. There were no poppy seeds in these guys' bagels, nor have I ever seen a naldonone bagel at the bagel shop.

Has there been anything written about Iriki's positive test in Japanese language newspapers?

Yes. The following day (April 30, 2006) Nikkan Sports had an article about 1/6th of the top of page 4.

After stating that the test was administered after Iriki's outing on the 28th, it quoted Iriki's agent stating that Iriki had no memory of taking anything illegal and doesn't understand why the test came out positive. The article goes on to state that there is a big anti-doping crack down going on in the Major Leagues, and the number of restricted substances are going up, as are the penalties, to send a strong statement even to first time offenders.

The article then turns to the most obvious problem, lack of information resulting in unknowingly taking a controlled substance. It points out that most of the first offenders when the new policy went into effect were players who don't speak English from Central and South America. (Please don't argue this point - I'm not making it, I'm just translating the article.) The article further points out that out of 10 players charged with breaking the anti-doping policy, 3 of them were from the Mets' organization, suggesting that team management is lax, not seeing to it that their players understand the policy.

Team mate Kazuo Matsui said, "(The tests) have gotten really unforgiving, so any suppliment will likely show up."

Iriki has posted on his web site that he's very sorry that this happened and that it was his own fault for not being careful enough and actively getting enough information (on what he was taking).

The New York Post article mentioned above was then referenced.

Nikkan Sports then got reaction from the Fighters. Hillman-kantoku said that he hadn't heard about it, so he couldn't make any comment. Takada-GM said that he'd never heard of Iriki taking anything while he was with the Fighters. He further stated that he didn't know if the infraction was intentional or not, and that it would be difficult for a ball club to know when handing out punishment (when this is to be done in Japan).

I guess you can always count on Nikkan Sports to offer an interesting perspective.

I came across this article in last year's Seattle Times. Though I chuckled when it talked about 8 of the 32 minor leaguers testing positive last year for steroids came from the beloved Mariner's organization (shall I then make assumptions on Mariner's management?), I did find an interesting snippet halfway down that may explain Iriki-san and others' problem. It seems that some makers of Creatine, a legal body building product sold in all health food stores, is sometimes tainted with naldolone. Hence, a player could test positive and not know how it happened.

As with all nutritional supplements, even the legal ones are many times tainted with steroids, as manufactures don't clean the machines many times before manufacturing the nuritional supplements.

As pointed out in the Seattle Times article, players need to take way more caution with taking nutritional supplements, as who knows what is in these things? It could be anything, it's just not worth the hassle. Though, I won't comment on Iriki's situation because, at the moment, there is little information on it all.

Interesting that the person who ridiculed the idea of a poppy seed bagle came up with evidence to support the theory. (Not as a naldolone bagle, but as an analogy.)

With the bagle story, a job applicant lost the job due to a drug test turning up positive when the person didn't take any illegal drugs, but traced the problem back to a perfectly legal bagle eaten that morning.

With the above mentioned Seattle Times article, the same thing is happening. Players who take a legal suppliment may test positive for naldolone without knowingly taking it. What recourse do such players have?

Once it becomes common knowledge that these suppliments are tainted with controlled substances, I expect the suppliment makers will see to it that their manufacturing techniques eliminate this problem. If they don't, ball players are going to stop taking them all altogether, for fear of being penalized for it.

One message I read on Iriki's web site was that a guy in Hawaii had bragged to one fan that he supplies Iriki with all of his suppliment needs. Along with K. Matsui's comment about suppliments, it's pretty safe to say that Iriki is (has been) taking some. And according to Iriki's comments, they were legal suppliments to the best of his knowledge.

Thanks for the article. Assuming that Iriki was a victim of a naldolone tainted legal suppliment (not proven yet), the poppy seed bagle theory appears to be very close.

Well, courtesy really runs both ways. You can address me as Kranepool-san, as opposed to "the person" if you wish to take advantage of the bye I gave you on the poppy seed bagel. A nice urban legend, it is.

But Westbay-san, do you really think all these guys are simply taking laced health food supplements? Don't you think that with all the testing and the risks, these guys would be a bit more careful about what they put in their bodies and from whom? Lastly, do you really believe it is plausible that a fine upstanding, risk-adverse Japanese fellow would throw caution to the wind and innocently take some Creatine that some guy "provides" to him. That's as lame as Sheffield's matter of fact answer that he didn't know his knee creme was laced with steroids.

I wasn't ridiculing the old mythical poppy seed bagel story, but you are either in denial, in a minesmellslikepetunias state of mind, or terribly naive to believe testing positive is all a big misunderstanding. Or, is it just impossible for you to fathom that a Japanese player is just like anyone else?

Do I believe all of these guys are taking laced health food supplies? No. Probably not. But I do think that there are some who are getting caught like this because they simply don't know about the risks.

Of the three choices of state of mind presented, I think I'll go with #3, "terriby naive." I'd rather believe the best in people until they prove to be otherwise. I believed in Davidson-umpire on that first missed call (in the WBC), that it was just a terrible mistake, but the mistakes continued, and he eventually lost my trust.

I don't believe that Iriki is innocent because he is Japanese. I believe that he may be innocent because I have no reason to believe otherwise. The same goes with the list of other suspended minor leaguers (excluding the second offender) from what ever country they're from.

I'm with Westbaystars-san on this one.

Ed, the poppy seed phenomenon is true and certainly not an urban legend. There have been a number of well documented cases in which police officers and prison guards have been suspended for failing drug tests, only to be reinstated after further investigation.

And in 1997 a women in Florida was awarded $859,000 by a court after she successfully sued a prospective employer for withdrawing a lucrative job offer on the basis of a failed drug test caused by ingestion of a poppy seed-covered bagel.

There's more information on this here [Snopes.com - Urban Ledgends Reference Pages].

There are many legal substances that cause false positives in drug tests, including certain vitamin supplements, cough suppressants, nasal sprays, pain relievers, and even tonic water. Significantly for athletes, there are certain non-steroidal anti inflammatories prescribed for sports injuries that can cause them to fail drug tests.

There's information on this here [Drug Tests Falst Positives].

Ed, I think it's important not to rush into judgment and presume that all these guys testing positives have done something wrong. The MLB drug testing regime is still in its infancy, and obviously not all players realize that they've got to be careful about absolutely everything they ingest - even common everyday products that the average person wouldn't need to worry about. Basically I'd like to see a little more flexibility on the part of the MLB in this initial phase, with some sort of appeals process (as in other sports). But of course these 50-game suspensions will certainly concentrate the players' minds on this issue. And fast.

Yes, one can get a false positive if eating poppy seeds from a variety of opium poppy, not regular poppy. Opium poppies are also used for food. However, based on this snippet from jobsearchtech.about.com, it is pretty hard at present to use the old poppy seed excuse:

"The word is that poppy-seed ingestion can cause false positives for opiates a few hours later in urine tests, and it's true. But labs claim that hair analysis can distinguish between opiate abuse and poppy-seed ingestion, and the Feds are familiar with the urine trick. Consequently, the Feds upped the ng/ml detection level beyond that of "normal" poppy-seed ingestion, but still within the range of abuse. Normal ingestion is considered to be like two poppy-seed muffins in a day, tops. So, if you're a heavy abuser of opiates, you can scratch the excuse that you wolfed down a dozen poppy-seed muffins on the morning of drug testing. But you could say that pot gave you the munchies, and that's why you ate so many muffins. If you think that's a great idea, think twice before you fire up that next joint, snort that next line or pop that next pill!"

I believe in innocent until proven guilty. All Iriki-san or others who might be falsely accused are to provide is the supplement they are taking and have it tested. To my knowledge, no one has done that. Even iriki-san isn't fighting to clear his name. He is just going to serve his suspension rather than mess up the entire season.

Steroid abuse in MLB is so rampant that I am hard pressed to put up with the lame excuses and denials. Certainly there should be a mechanism to clear one's name if falsely accused. Is it telling that no one has stood up to fight the accusations with hard evidence?

- Basically I'd like to see a little more flexibility on the part of the MLB in this initial phase, with some sort of appeals process (as in other sports). But of course these 50-game suspensions will certainly concentrate the players' minds on this issue. And fast.

With Congress pulling for a tough stance and America's increased annoyance with steroid use in sports, any flexibility is unlikely to happen. The majority of people you poll or ask in this country are just plain fed up with the whole steroid situation, making any flexibility unlikely, as it would be seen as taking a blind eye to the problem.

As I mentioned above, it's quite frequent that supplements contain traces of steroids in them, as manufactures package and ship supplements numerous times on the same assembly line as steroids, many times not cleaning the steroids up, thus seeing postive tests for steroids. Players need to take a more cautious approach when using supplements as these things are too frequently laced with steroids due to inappopriate cleaning procedures and other things. The hassle just isn't worth it.

It's starting to get to the point where all nutritional supplements need to be banned from MLB, though with the MLBPA and union rep. Donald Fehr that will never happen. Players need to take a caution sign on what in the world they are taking and where this product came from and was distributed and packaged by.

There are some players who are testing positive because they flat out choose to take steroids knowing that what indeed they are taking is a steroid, and most importantly is illegal. Secondly, as we know with nutritional supplements, who knows what is in these things? Many times it is a result of deception with false advertising and minor quackery, and the fact that there is just plain too many nutritional supplements altogether, that it is just plain impossible for the FDA to mandate all of them due to time constraints.

Please read this article [Quack Watch] to see more on medical quackery.

In all, MLB should just altogether ban the use of nutritional supplements too, as who knows what is in them and as the FDA doesn't even check what these things do. There are just way too many supplements out there.

At the same time, steroid use needs to be eradicated from baseball altogether as it is starting to become a cancer on the game itself in the United States, helping it's decreased popularity as fans are just plain fed up with the whole steroid product. I agree, steroids need to be eradicated completely out of the game.

At this moment, I will restrain from commenting on the Iriki situation, as there are just too few facts on the subject right now. Until more facts are uncovered on this situation, I find it difficult to discuss anything concerning to the Iriki situation.

I sure hope I can use some of you guys as an attorney one day on a probable cause case. Are you serious?

Look, I played a couple of seasons in the NPB and still am in AAA over in the States, so I believe I speak of what I know on this subject. Not from some tabloid Japanese daily (yes, the same ones with the nude photos right next to the boxscore - not that I'm complaining) or the New York Post for that matter when they "think" they have an angle. Iriki (great guy) tested possitive for Nandrolone, and here is a hint - you do not get that anywhere else except a needle or a pill. You cannot accidently, incidently, confusingly, mistakenly, or by chance pick that up at a 7-Eleven or a GNC. He tested positive, probably chose to "make his mark" in the MLB, and decided to go all out. Sometimes athletes let their conquer-all attitude get sidetracked by illegal influences.

He wasn't the first Nippon player to use (and yes, I'd probably break your heart with some of the guys still in the country who use if I disclosed) and won't be the last. No witch hunt, no racist "Asian" plot, just good old got popped in the act. I am sure Iriki-san has shrugged it off and will get guys out again. But this deflection thing you guys got working is a little eerie. Buck up and face the facts.

Look, all I'm saying is that it is possible for traces of legal substances to result in a false positive in a drug test. And that's a fact. It happens. And as Ed mentioned, with the poppy seed example, the authorities did indeed increase the ng/ml level to eliminate the possibility of false positives. In other words, they recognized that innocent people were being falsely accused and changed their testing regime accordingly.

What I'm not saying is that Iriki is innocent, or that there's some kind of nefarious racist plot, or that the majority of the guys caught didn't do anything wrong, or that drugs in baseball isn't a problem.

But you should know that in regard to Nandrolone, there have been studies that suggest that false positives can be caused by such factors as contaminated nutritional supplements, consumption of boar meat, and endogenous production of nandrolone, among others. The World Anti-Doping Agency is currently supporting a number of clinical studies to try and devise a testing regime that will eliminate or significantly reduce the chance of false positives, so there really won't be any excuses left for the athletes when they flunk the test.

Until that happens, then I can't see how you can deny the athlete the right to due process, which seems to be what some people are suggesting on this thread.

I think there has to be some kind of appeal process, where hard evidence can be presented in that particular individual's case that might explain the test results or a more innocent, understandable, and forgivable situation. Indeed, I think one of the articles aluded to this when Iriki-san opted not to challenge the findings. The right of appeal, the right to examine the evidence, and provide negating evidence in the particular circumstance is part of due process. If Iriki-san or Palmiero produced his jar of Creatinine from GNC and said "Here's where I bought it, this is what I took, look what its tainted with, and I didn't know it was tainted and I am sorry," I'd agree the case should be dismissed.

But no one has done that. They deny, evade, and delay rather than show hard evidence proving their innocence. Why? Because they probably can't.

Mijow-san, I don't think a general rebuttal of drug testing is the right or effective way of dealing with this problem. We've already heard some lame excuses from MLB players. This tainting of the game has to stop. If it takes the fear of Ty Cobb to do it, with some harsh, punative, and maybe not 100% foolproof measures, so be it. Sometimes one just has to admit that the player has been busted. Where there's smoke, there is fire.

- If Iriki-san or Palmiero produced his jar of Creatinine from GNC and said "Here's where I bought it, this is what I took, look what its tainted with, and I didn't know it was tainted and I am sorry," I'd agree the case should be dismissed.

But no one has done that...

Well if I were Iriki I probably wouldn't do that either. Partly due to culture, partly due to the lack of a meaningful appeals process to begin with. Maybe he didn't really know precisely what caused the problem. Maybe the jar had been used up (not that this would be accepted as evidence anyway - too easy to tamper with, don't you think?). There are a whole host of valid reasons for not being willing to appeal. If his agent/lawyer is any good, he'd probably say something like: "Listen there's no point arguing as the MLB is determined to make an example of you guys, so even if you took something by mistake, that's not going to help you - you've got 50 games no matter what the circumstances. You want to play in the majors? Then don't rock the boat, sit out the 50 games, and you'll get your chance."

According to Westbaystars-san in an earlier post, Iriki did apologize, saying he should have been more careful about what he took. Obviously this wasn't a case of a false positive. I never said it was, of course. But it could be a simple case of not having adequate information, a problem of language perhaps. Or Iriki could indeed be a rotten lying scoundrel. We just don't know. All we know is that he failed a drug test. I'm just trying to point out that there are many reasons why a person might fail a drug test, not all of them involving a clear intention to break the rules.

I'm with you 100% on the need to stamp out illegal substances, and certainly the MLB is moving in the right direction. But any system has to have flexibility.

What I find just a touch distasteful is the way people are jumping on Iriki and the others with what I perceive as a kind of unrestrained glee, and not being interested in whether there may be extenuating circumstances. And of all people, I thought our baseball-playing guest would be more concerned about having a proper system in place to hear the player's side of the story. After all, he could be the next one ensnared in the web.

But then, I suppose if he is caught nobody will believe him anyway.

My hat off to the Guest! BRAVO! Standing ovation! Thank you!

Good luck to you. May you have a long run in The Show.