[DesertCat]

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Stupid question/thought: If Byrd was prescribed HGH by his doctor, why in heaven's name was he buying it off the internet with a credit card and, presumably, inject himself? Does he not have health insurance? Shouldn't the team doctor's or trainers have been injecting him?

Like I said I don't really care, but I think Paul Byrd is full of [censored] with his explanation.

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a) Maybe because he didn't stay in town during the offseason, and needed to inject daily, and didn't want to trek to his doctors office every day. I once had a diabetic cat, and his team trainers/doctors weren't available to inject him every day so I had to do it. I hear there are also diabetic people who actually practice the strange art of self injection.

b) Maybe he was hiding it from the team, even though HGH wasn't a banned substance at the time, but he was worried about giving them too much information on his health in case they would trade or cut him.

c) Maybe he knew even though it was not a banned substance, it would look bad, and would soon be banned, so he didn't want people to know he was taking it.

d) Maybe he was just taking it because he believed it enhanced his performance and he hadn't yet worked out an elaborate story to cover that usage yet.

I don't really care if it's a, b, c, or d, or some combination of them. Just because a player believes HGH is going to help enhance his performance, why should we care if available medical evidence indicates it won't? Should we prevent players from taking any other sorts of placebos?