Congress listens to MLB, but less than satisfied

Congressional Hearings   Latest Coverage Roberts: Clemens same on or off mound Donovan: Hits coming soon for Pettitte Verducci: Clemens' rep takes beating Rocket, McNamee hold ground in hearing McCann: Clemens stands tall on the Hill Epstein: Hearing a day to 'misremember' Survey: Winners, losers from hearing Facial expert: Clemens looked nervous Rocket hearing the talk of spring training Deitsch: Live blog from Clemens hearing React: Your observations from hearing Depositions: Pettitte | Clemens | More Pettitte admits additional HGH use in '04 Jan. 15 Hearings Verducci: Mitchell was hearing's winner McCann: Tejada could be in major trouble Selig, Fehr grilled in Tuesday's hearing Who's Who: Congress and Baseball SI: Father puts his son on steroids, HGH Heyman: Clemens' ex-trainer speaks out SI Flashback: Inside the steroid sting SI Flashback: Rocket Science | 300 Wins SI Flashback: Confessions of an MVP The Report Download the complete Mitchell Report Clemens | Pettitte | Tejada | Bonds Gallery: Mitchell Report Confessions

MAILBAG Submit a comment or question for David. Your name: Your e-mail address: Your home town: Enter your question:

WASHINGTON -- Major League Baseball is toeing the foul line. Members of the congressional Committee on Oversight and Government Reform are still far from convinced that MLB can wage a successful, long-term war on performance-enhancing drugs, but the consensus among committee members following Tuesday's hearing was that they heard just enough so that legislative intervention will not be immediately forthcoming.

Several members warned, however, that if a lack of player cooperation continues to impede progress, Congress is still ready to take the issue out of baseball's hands and onto the Hill.

Both chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and ranking minority member Tom Davis, R-Va., said they were heartened by commissioner Bud Selig's willingness to swiftly embrace recommendations put forth in the Mitchell Report, such as his creation last week of an internal department of investigations that will be charged with investigating drug use, the removal of 24-hour notice before a random drug test and the negotiations in 2005 when the union and the league agreed to alter the drug policy even though it was between collective bargaining periods.

Waxman said he "was encouraged" by what he heard at the hearing, but will "reserve judgment on whether Congress needs to act." Davis summed up the feelings of many committee members when he said, "We put the ball back in Major League Baseball's court. We want to see how they react to this."

The most important reaction, and the one that Congress will have its widest eye on, will be from the players. Davis said he hopes the commissioner's office and the player's union can reach an agreement for keeping drug policies up-to-date between contract bargaining periods. "If we don't see [baseball officials] in Congress again, that's fine with me," he said. But other committee members felt that, after listening to union leader Donald Fehr's testimony, accord will be hard to come by.

Elijah Cummings, D-Md., co-founder of the Congressional Caucus on Drug Policy, said that "as I listened to Mr. Fehr, it sounds like there will be some significant resistance" from the players union with respect to incorporating all of former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell's recommendations.

Fehr suggested that, already, he is not perfectly comfortable with Selig's race to adopt the Mitchell recommendations. "Unfortunately, the situation has been muddied by the commissioner's unilateral implementation of some of the recommendations ... that affect our members," Fehr said.

Some committee members prodded Fehr to acknowledge that the need to remedy baseball's drug problem has transcended the need to protect his constituents, adding that he should be willing to open the collective bargaining agreement, which does not expire until December 2011, as needed to alter the drug policy. But Fehr insisted that labor negations in this country are by necessity "adversarial."

"The contract is the lifeblood of the union," he said, "so it's tough to suggest it be reopened." He also hedged on questions of whether blood samples should be stored for future testing and retroactive punishments, and on the creation of a fully independent authority to administer the drug program.

Throughout the hearing, Selig and Fehr pointed out that the most significant Mitchell Report findings are years old and that baseball's current drug program, which includes a lifetime ban after a third offense (with the possibility of applying for reinstatement after two years) and offseason urine testing, seems to have largely eliminated steroid use. Still, Selig, who referred to the "minority" of players who use banned substances, acknowledged the Mitchell Report's finding that the use of human growth hormone is on the rise, and that the scale of its infestation is unknown.

Both Fehr and Selig said they support the implementation of HGH testing when a scientifically valid and commercially viable test becomes available, but that no blood or urine test is now available. In actuality, a blood test for human growth hormone was used at the both the 2004 Olympics in Athens and the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, and is considered reliable by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. Still, the test is not in common worldwide use because of a production shortage of testing kits needed to perform the analysis. A German company is now producing more kits.

Some committee members were adamant that Selig and Fehr did not make a strong enough case to obviate the need for congressional legislation that would implement a drug-testing program with Olympic standards.

"I believe they [explained enough progress in the hearing] to make passing legislation difficult," says Mark Souder, R-Ind., the other co-founder of the Congressional Caucus on Drug Policy. "But it didn't satisfy me." Souder, who happens to be a big baseball fan, said he still supports legislation to fix baseball.

1 of 2