PEDs: Is Justice Blind?
-530x317.jpg)
When all else fails, accuse your opponent of doping. It could be a trend. It could be a movement. It could be contagious. The old-timey notion of being a “good loser” has become as quaint and meaningless as darning socks or churning butter.
Drugs are a part of life, just as they’re a part of sports. Look in any medicine cabinet, look in any stash box, and you’ll find all the evidence you need. The list of dopers and doping in professional sports is as long as it’s shameful and distinguished. That Floyd Mayweather Jr. would accuse Manny Pacquiao of juicing is reasonable under the circumstances, if not altogether fair. Manny’s physical growth and superiority is something at which to marvel. Unless, of course, one thinks he’s juicing, which means it’s time for the torches and pitchforks.
The idea of Manny taking an Olympic-style drug test is a fine idea that would be even finer if this was the Olympics. But pro boxing is not the Olympics. Pro boxing has a life of its own—an insular, singular life—and its rules and regulations, however many and imprecise, don’t call for the testing Mayweather recommends.
The latest fighter to use the [drug] abuse excuse is the until-recently undefeated Andre Berto. Six weeks after he lost a 12-round decision to Victor Ortiz, Berto took to Twitter to level his J’accuse. Rather than accept his loss like a man, another useless idea from Memory Lane, Berto wrote, “There is a reason why Ortiz had so much energy, a reason he could take my heavy shots and keep ticking. And there is a reason why he came into the ring [at] 165 pounds.
“I know people close to him and his camp, and I know exactly [what] he was taking,” Berto tweeted. “It wasn’t Flintstone vitamins! But it is what it is. I should [have] beat him anyway, but it wasn’t me that night. Ortiz wasn’t him either.”
The response to Berto’s claim ran the gamut from A to B (Absurd to Bullshit). Berto tried putting a smiley face on his frown-inducing allegation when he tweeted, “Wow, why does everyone’s mind go straight to PEDs? Calm down everyone. I was just talking about Ortiz eating his spinach like Popeye.”
Berto is personable, he’s well liked, and he has a compelling back-story. But many have viewed him as an HBO property, a protected fighter from the start. If Berto wants to be taken seriously, in and out of the ring, he should lay off Twitter and get back in the gym.
