Is Adderall as Big a Problem as HGH, Steroids in Baseball?
Most were quick to scoff at MLB’s Congressional hearing on the Mitchell Report yesterday. I suppose it’s deservedly so: nothing ground-breaking sprung from it and Bud Selig, Donald Fehr and George Mitchell seemed to answer the questions with aplomb. But as the New York Times points out today, one question opened up a different can of worms: Amid discussion of steroids and human growth hormone, amid an atmosphere more tame than tempestuous, it was Representative John F. Tierney, a Massachusetts Democrat, who caught everyone’s attention when he asked why the number of major leaguers claiming therapeutic-use exemptions for attention deficit disorder had mushroomed to 103 this past season from 28 in 2006. To Mr. Tierney, the implication of the sharp increase was clear. Players were brazenly getting around the ban on amphetamines by making attention deficit disorder claims that allowed them to use stimulants like Ritalin and Adderall. Based on the 2007 numbers, Mr. Tierney said, the use of
