Thursday, May 13, 2010

Final: Essay

My debate on steroids and athletes over this project has brought me across many different articles and information that has educated me alot on the subject. The best thing I got out of my project was my book Gym Candy, by Carl Deuker. It was good to relate to the book because it was on football and all the pressure that comes with the sport to be the best. My second favorite would be going to the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame. Mostly because right when I got there I became best friends with Herb Mcbride which is an elderly man from Trussville who was hooking me up with all sorts of brochures and even introduced me to a Olympic gold medalist winner. All the research was interesting and I'm glad I picked this subject.

The part I wish I did differently would be researching more on up to date athletes using steroids. For example, recently the 2009 NFL rookie of the year Brian Cushing, was caught using anabolic steroids and I didn't get to write about him. Also I didn't talk about the baseball players that were in the trials on using steroids.

I learned many things by looking at all the facts, stories, and videos; they all lead to one thing. Using steroids and being an athlete is a bad thing. They will boost your performance no doubt but the risk and shame of being a "cheater" is way too high. All athletes should stay to the all natural route and be on the safe side.

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Visit to Alabama Sports Hall of Fame


I visited the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame to see if athletes that used steroids were in it. I found out quickly that athletes who used steroids were not in it at all. At least that people know of, no athletes in it ever used them. However on my visit I took in some knowledge about sports and how they were played back in the day. I got to the museum and started walking around looking at different spots with different athletes. It was interesting to see how many people were from Alabama that did so much in sports. I met a guy named Herb Mcbride and he started talking to me about the different things they had and said he lived in Trussville too. He even said he was Donovan's neighbor which I thought was kind of ironic since Donovan's in the same class I'm there for. I toured the place and read many articles and looked at the different exhibits they had. I looked at many different athletes such as: Pat Sullivan and Bo Jackson, Heisman trophy winners for Auburn in 1971 and 1985, Willie May's and Hank Aaron which are legendary African American baseball players, Joe Louis, a.k.a. the Brown Bomber who stole the boxing heavyweight belt from Jim Braddock, and finally Barry Krauss who was linebacker for Alabama rom '76-'79 and 6th overall pick in the NFL draft then was MVP of his Miami Dolphins team. I got to hear Jennifer Chandler, a Olypic diving gold medalist, speak to a group about not giving up on your dreams and placing high goals in life. I left with a stack of brochures and even a book of all the hall of famers that ole Herb hooked me up with.

The visit was great, it gave me insight to how they choose the hall of famers and how people that worked at the hall of fame thought of athletes who used steroids. One manager said, "Everyone in here that we know of didn't take steroids because they weren't an issue back then". He said steroids and athletes could be a problem in the near future because of the generation being inducted in the next few years that were accesible to steroids. Although nobody that did steroids was in the hall of fame, that just opened up thoughts of if you want true success and to be able to pride yourself in your acheivements nobody should even think about doing steroids or performance enhancing drugs because they will strip them all away.