Source: NFL doesn't have rampant THG problem

By Don Banks, SI.com

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A source close to the situation said Monday he believes the four Oakland Raiders players who have been notified that they tested positive for the new designer steroid tetrahydrogestrinone (THG) do not represent the tip of the iceberg in terms of widespread usage of the drug in the NFL.

League spokesman Greg Aeillo declined to comment regarding reports of the four Raiders who failed tests for THG, or whether or not the NFL expects any other positive tests resulting from the screening it has done of existing urine samples.

But a source with knowledge of the situation said it is believed that the only four known violators based on tests conducted so far by the NFL are the players identified Sunday in a CBS Sportsline.com report. Less clear is how much usage might turn up now that the league is testing all newly collected urine samples for THG.

What the NFL has refused to disclose is whether the pool of previously collected samples that have been tested for THG goes beyond the 10 players who have been subpoenaed by a federal grand jury in the investigation of Victor Conte and his Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (or BALCO) of Burlingame, Calif. -- which is suspected of manufacturing THG.

That begs the question of whether the NFL is searching league-wide for signs of THG usage, or merely testing players who inspire a degree of probable cause? There is reason to believe, according to sources close to the situation, that BALCO's clients did not extend across the NFL map, but instead were comprised of a tight circle of players located mostly in the San Francisco bay area -- which would explain the league's concentration in terms of its testing for THG.

The Raiders players who received notice of a positive test are linebacker Bill Romanowski, center Barret Robbins and defensive tackles Dana Stubblefield and Chris Cooper, all of whom were among the 10 players subpoenaed in the BALCO investigation. It is believed that the league tested existing urine samples from each of those 10 players, with only the four testing positive for THG.

Players who were subpoenaed but are believed to have tested clean are Oakland's Tyrone Wheatley and Chris Hetherington, former Raider Josh Taves, Atlanta's Artie Ulmer, New England's Larry Izzo and Kansas City's Johnnie Morton.

While the four Raiders players could receive four-game suspensions at some point for testing positive for THG, in violation of the league's substance abuse policy, none of them, sources close to the situation said, have yet to receive any notice from the league dealing with possible disciplinary action.

Before any suspensions can be handed out, the samples must first undergo re-testing, scheduled for Wednesday, and then the NFL Players Association has the right to file an appeal of the findings.

But whether suspensions will be handed down to the four Raiders even if a second test is positive remains undecided. The players' union continues to debate the league's management council on the issue of testing existing urine samples that were collected before THG was first identified this summer as a steroid that could be tested for.

Gene Upshaw, the NFLPA's executive director, met for lunch with management council chairman Harold Henderson on Monday, and the two are expected to continue to try and work out a compromised stance on the policy of retro-testing. One could be announced as soon as late this week.

On Sunday, Upshaw told the New York Times: "What we have to decide is how we're going to go backwards. They [the NFL] have taken the position that they have the right to go backward. Our position is that they do not.''

The NFL has considered THG a banned anabolic steroid since last month. The union supports testing for it, but murkier is the issue of how far back to test for it among existing urine samples.