King Kaufman's Sports Daily

Huge steroid bust. So that's how big the sports drug problem is? No, it's bigger. Plus: Babydol and Lasorda? He denies it.

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Feb. 28, 2007 | What's that you were saying about this being the post-steroids era?

The Albany Times Union reported Tuesday night that a yearlong New York state grand jury investigation into illegal online drug sales has uncovered evidence that performance-enhancing drugs have been prescribed over the Internet to professional and college athletes and high school coaches, among others.

A federal task force in the case raided the Sunshine Pharmacy in Orlando, Fla., Tuesday, arresting its married owners, both pharmacists, along with a third pharmacist and the marketing director. The paper, in a story written by Brendan J. Lyons, reported that more than two dozen arrests are expected in the next few days in New York, Florida, Texas and Alabama.

Two owners of a Mobile, Ala., lab have also been indicted in a related case. The Times Union, citing sources with knowledge of the investigation, identified Los Angeles Angels outfielder Gary Matthews Jr., former heavyweight boxing champion Evander Holyfield and retired baseball player Jose Canseco -- a steroids advocate and admitted user -- as customers.

So this is the latest in what's becoming a regular series of events in the sports-and-drugs realm that makes us all sit back and go, "Whoa, so that's how big the problem is." Until the next one, when we learn it's even bigger.

The series dates back to the late Ken Caminiti's confession to Sports Illustrated in 2002 that his 1996 MVP season was fueled by steroids, and his estimate in the same article that at least half of all major leaguers use steroids. He later scaled back that estimate.

Since then we've had the BALCO revelations, Canseco's book -- in which he estimated that 85 percent of all major leaguers were dirty -- and sundry doping scandals in bicycle racing and the Olympics.

We've had the positive tests of various marginal baseball players, starting with Alex Sanchez, which showed us that the steroid problem wasn't limited to the muscular superstars on the home-run leader board. Dirty tests for journeyman pitchers, starting with Agustin Montero, also proved this point.

We've had Rafael Palmeiro's positive test, which showed us that, oh yeah, the big sluggers too. We've had the raid on pitcher Jason Grimsley's house, which resulted in an affidavit in which he talked about the prevalence in baseball of human growth hormone, for which Major League Baseball does not test.

And now this. Times Union reporter Lyons writes that the inquiry took investigators "deep inside a maze of shadowy pharmacies and Web sites that have reaped millions of dollars in profit by allegedly exploiting federal and state prescription laws, according to court records."

Next page: Six seconds to find steroids online. If you type slow. Plus: Lasorda and Babydol?