Enterprise story- Legacy of Steroids

Greg Twarozek

Enterprise Story

                                                The Legacy of Steroids

            Have you ever noticed the amount of pharmaceutical commercials there are on TV? The spots tout the near miraculous benefits of the drug until the very end. That’s when a voice comes out of nowhere and starts listing the bad side effects of that drug. If you listen to all of the possible side effects, they usually out-number the positives the drug has. Same is true with steroids. Yes, they improve athletic performance, but the negative effects are numerous and can be life - altering.

            Steroids are like a disease in the human body. They can change your physical stature in an instant. They have physical and mental effects. David Long, who is a teacher at the Charter School for Applied Technologies, explained his thoughts on the drug and how dangerous it really is. “The health risks are huge; physically they improve your body’s necessary skills in the short term. However, the long term effects are shown to only have negative results.”

Long added that with the “pressure to perform now” on so many athletes, he believes many of them are becoming addicted to the drug. “I believe if an athlete feels their skills are not meeting their expectations they would consider steroid use.”

            Steroids can adversely affect numerous organs. The “Why Steroids Are Bad for You” article written on WebMD.com explains what steroids can do to muscle growth and how deadly the side effects can be. Daniel J. DeNoon, a writer for the site explains similar physical problems men have had with the drug. DeNoon stated that men can suffer from acne, baldness, increased tendon ruptures, heart failure and liver disease. DeNoon said that women can be affected as well by growing excessive facial and body hair, reduced breast size, and deepened voices. Brendan Stone, a former soccer and lacrosse player from Canisius High School, gave his views on what the drug does to the mind. “Permanent muscle damage and psychological changes is what makes steroids dangerous. The mood swings have led some athletes to commit suicide.”

Drugabuse.gov is a website that looks at steroids and how they affect all systems in the body, such as the cardiovascular and hormonal systems. The website explains anabolic steroid abuse and its many disadvantages.  The site explained how steroid abuse disrupts the normal production of the hormones in the human body. Some of the changes are reversible, but most are irreversible. Steroids can stop bones from growing at a normal rate, and blood vessels can be clotted which leads to an abnormal heart rate.

The site thoroughly examined how our cardiovascular system reacts, noting that steroids lead to increased blood pressure. Tumors can grow inside of the liver as well when steroids are abused. The site showed that people who take steroids may not be affected at a young age, but that eventually life-threatening consequences may occur. Chris Burzynski, a physical education teacher at the Charter School, believes they can greatly affect your system. “The drug affects the organ that filters wastes, the kidneys.”

Nick Zulia, a senior baseball player for St. Joseph’s Collegiate Institute, shed some light on the issue. He explained what body part he thinks the drug affects more than any other. “I think steroids damage the brain the most. It has been said that steroid abuse can lead to mood swings and various other psychiatric problems,” Zulia said. You often hear people refer to the term “roid rage” when talking about the effects of it. That can be a pretty scary atmosphere,” Zulia stated. Steroids don’t just affect people’s bodies, the impact they have had on professional sports today has been profound. He believes that steroids can “destroy” a professional sport.

If we know how damaging steroids can be, then why would a professional athlete considering using them? Chris Burzynski, a gym teacher from the Charter School, gave one possible explanation “It depends on what they’re looking for, if they feel they need it for their personal goals, yes they would use it for that reason. However, some of them use it to gain an edge on the competition.” Long added that athletes use them to “meet certain standards.” “I think professional athletes use steroids primarily to reach their life long goals.”

            Performance enhancers are used frequently, so should they ever be legal in sports? How would the view of sports change if they were legal? “If steroids became legal, it would damage the view of professional sports. There is something that is special about sports in America,” Nick Zulia said. “It is founded off the hard work of many athletes who dedicated their life to their respective sport, using steroids to steer away from hard work damages the meaning of a professional sport.”

Brendan Stone, an alumnus of Canisius High School, believes the public trust would be shattered if steroids were legal. “If they were legal, the integrity of sports would be ruined. If everyone can cheat their way to greatness, then there is nothing great about being great.”

            When looking at all the variables it is clear steroids are here to stay. Dozens of professional athletes have seen their careers skyrocket and plummet due to the drug. Whether we like it or not, steroids are changing professional sports.

           

           

           

            

High School Baseball- CSAT versus Medina

Greg Twarozek

Event driven assignment                                            

                                                            CSAT versus Medina

                        A no- hitter is seen as a special feat.  Usually it is something that doesn’t happen every day. Like a perfect game it is a goal that seems almost impossible to reach. That doesn’t mean a team cannot come close to doing it. A no hitter can be something great for one team and for the other team it may be the worst thing in the world. The CSAT Varsity baseball team was close to being the victim of it on Wednesday afternoon.

                        Baseball is a game that can be played in perfect harmony. Some days you have it and some days you don’t. Then there are days where one team is clicking on all cylinders and the other team looks as if they didn’t want to be there. The conference game on Wednesday afternoon between the Medina Mustangs and CSAT Eagles held that to be true. It was a game that started off on the right foot for the Eagles but after the first inning it all went downhill. CSAT struggled mightily in their nine to one loss to Medina on Wednesday.

            For the Eagles it was a very rough day on offense and a forgetful one at that. The Eagles had one hit and only three baserunners for the entire game. Medina’s pitching completely shut them down for seven innings. CSAT scored one run in the first on two walks and an error and they held the lead for an instant. Then after the inning was over CSAT could not solve the riddle that was Matt Reimer, a senior and the starting pitcher for Medina. Reimer mowed down the Eagles inning by inning on his way to a complete game one hit, one run masterpiece.

After walking the first two batters of the game Reimer settled down into a grove that made him almost unhittable. The Eagles only had one baserunner after the first. Reimer’s no hit bid was broken up in the fifth inning by a CSAT single and after that it was all she wrote. Reimer had eight strikeouts and two walks. Reimer was one of the two Medina players with a multi - hit game. The other was eighth grader Isiah Rhim who had two hits in four at bats including a three run double in the seventh and final inning which put away the Eagles for good.

The Mustang bats put on an offensive show accounting for nine runs on seven hits. Medina had a big fourth inning scoring four runs on three hits. They later added to that total with two in the fifth and three in the seventh. Medina dominated the game with good pitching and timely hitting leaving the Eagles with their first loss of the year at home.

CSAT was coming off of a four to three win earlier this week on Monday versus Royalton Hartland in a game where they stormed back from a three to nothing deficit. Medina came into the game on a hot streak of their own beating Albion on Monday nine to one. With the loss the Charter School for Applied Technologies moved to one and one while Medina moved to four and two on the year. Medina will play Barker at home on Friday and CSAT will do the same versus Albion.

CSAT is coming off of a rough season last year but after talking with sophomore left fielder Zack Kiblin and senior Peter Grunzweig, the optimism for this year’s team is very high. Peter who is a first basemen and a pitcher, has played on the team for four years. He’s excited for the season as he believes the Eagles will accomplish a lot when it’s all said and done. “I think this team will be really good.” said Grunzweig. Kiblin said he is looking forward to his first year with the team and he believes they can be something special. “We have all the pieces, now it’s time to just win games.”

Peter and Zack are not just baseball players, both play basketball and Peter is currently on the soccer team. Zach started playing at a young age and he likes it more than basketball because in the end “baseball is just easier.” Peter and Zack have baseball in their blood and both intend to play at the next level. “I want to go as far as I can possibly go.” said Kiblin. Peter said he would “no doubt” try to play at the college level because baseball has always been his favorite sport. Peter has played his entire life and said “Baseball is the best sport I have ever played it’s by far the most fun. I started playing when I was little and it was because I had nothing else to do.”

           

           

            

Opinionated Piece

Greg Twarozek

Opinionated Piece

                                                Steroid Use in the MLB

            We all know what happened to Alex Rodriguez years ago. Does Barry Bonds ring a bell? It’s pretty hard to forget Mark McGwire. The Steroid Era would change Baseball forever. Major League Baseball is hyped up for all the wrong reasons.

            Baseball is a sport that has arguably produced some of the greatest superstars of all time. It is a sport that has captured some heroic feats and athletes all over the world have left their mark on the game. From Mark McGwire to Sammy Sosa and all the way to Barry Bonds in the late 2000’s, there were plenty of brand names that would make baseball into America’s pastime. Unfortunately, these players were just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the Steroid era. Players that were once perceived as role models, turned out to be cheaters whose legacies will forever be tarnished.

            The “Steroid Era continues to hang over the MLB” was an article written by Steve Keating that explains the era and how it impacted professional sports. He said it began back in the 1990’s and it continued into the early 2000’s. Keating says that 13 players were found as cheaters in the MLB, from past All-stars to MVP’s. The article which explains the era and the incidents of doping in the history of the MLB showed that no good deed goes unpunished. The MLB needs to do a better job with its own drug testing.  Keating said that if the process is fixed to rid athletes of doping, then suspensions will decrease and the respect for the game will only increase.

One of the things mentioned was Senator George Mitchell and how he was brought in to do a report on the athletes like Rodriquez, and Barry Bonds. The investigation led to a 20 month, 409 page document known as the “Mitchell Report” which identified 89 players, including Roger Clemens as steroid users. Selig said it was “a call to action” and he vowed to clean up baseball but years later more doping scandals occurred. Keating stated names in the article like Manny Ramirez who was found guilty in 2011, but retired before he got suspended and current players like Ryan Braun and Melky Cabrera were each suspended 50 games as a result of the Biogenesis investigation. The era pushed athletes to the brink and it was an issue that had to be dealt with. Near the end of Keating’s article MLB Commissioner Bud Selig said “Major League Baseball is proud of the enormous progress we have made and we look forward to working with players to make the penalties for violations of the Drug Program even more stringent and a stronger deterrent.”

Stephen Schwartz, who is a professor in the sociology and natural sciences department at Buffalo State College said he is against steroid use and that it’s very dangerous. “While steroids are legal, if provided by a doctor they are too big of a risk in the game of baseball.” He said it’s when steroids are abused, that they become illegal. Schwartz said using these drugs is only setting a bad example for kids. “It’s all about the win at all costs mentality for some of these athletes, and a lot of the times, it’s the parent’s problem.” I asked Schwartz about the health risks of steroids and he said “Athletes use steroids to gain an edge they are willing to sacrifice their bodies, not realizing the consequences that lie ahead.”

Joel Reed, who is the athletic director for the Charter High School for Applied Technologies, said “Steroids bring out the worst in people.” He said steroid use starts in the lower levels of baseball like the minors and it leads up the major leagues. When asked if they should be legal, Reed said “No, because no kind of accomplishment would be genuine.” He later added that “You can’t choose a professional athlete as a role model anymore.” Steroids are a documented health risk, and when I asked him about the athlete’s decision to use them he said “Many athletes have a certain level of anxiety that makes them want to be better. None of them believe they will ever get caught, and as long as they have a successful career, they don’t care about the long term health effects.”

So take me out to the ballgame, buy me some peanuts and cracker jacks. Root, root, root for the home team, if they don’t win it’s a shame. The last line of one of our favorite songs has taken on a new meaning with the steroid controversy.

Personality profile

Greg Twarozek                                                                                               Personality Profile

                                                            “Mr. B”

            Chris Burzynski may seem like your average every day person, but in my eyes he is so much more. Burzynski, is 36 years old, married, has 2 dogs and teaches Physical Education and Health at the Charter School for Applied Technologies. “Mr. B” as he is addressed during the school day has taught 14 years, attended West Seneca East High School and then earned his degree at Canisius College. Burzynski spent much of his high school career playing 3 different sports, Hockey, Football and Lacrosse.

He accomplished numerous feats on the athletic field during his school days, including being an alternate for the Olympic Games as a power lifter and a weightlifting champion in Buffalo by becoming the first man to lift a 400 pound bar, which put him in the Buffalo Weightlifting Hall of Fame. He distinguished himself as a 4 time gold medalist in the Empire State games, “It’s something you watch on TV as a little kid and you dream of doing it someday,” Burzynski said on becoming a gold medalist. Even though his career in athletics is done, he still remains competitive in his free time while driving his race car.

            Chris’ most memorable sports moment though came in his sophomore year of high school.  He was on the Junior Varsity team for West Seneca East hockey and they were playing St. Francis in the Championship game. The game was tied 1-1 heading into overtime. Then minutes after the period started, Chris scored the game winning goal to help his team win the game 2-1 and the State Championship. He said it was really memorable because if he didn’t score that goal, “No one would have remembered us and everything we accomplished that year.”

            I asked him a few questions about the issue of steroids in sports and whether or not he has ever come into contact with anyone who has used them. He told me that he came in contact with those people but didn’t know them personally but the way they acted was clearly different than that of a normal person. “I saw some of the guys who were on them, they look pretty freakish.” said Burzynski. He told me that as a pro athlete, he can understand why the athletes do it, to increase their money intake but he said there is always the “risk vs reward” factor. His views on steroid use are pretty clear “When you see professional athletes using them, you can understand why drug use in sports is frowned upon.”

Burzynski stated that athletes using performance enhancing drugs should be suspended and punished because they are sending the wrong kind of signals to our younger generation. Chris said much controversy surrounds the use of PED’s with how many professional athletes get paid in the United States, that it’s an incentive to do steroids. “In our country, PED’s are illegal and do some people get away with it, yes they do, do they make tons of money, yes they do, are they going to stop doing it, probably not.” Chris ended by saying that many young athletes “don’t realize the consequences at the time” but eventually their careers may be destroyed due to PED use. “People do not take into account the long term effects that steroids can have on the body, so when people are caught for doping, they are not just cheating themselves but their ruining the sport in the process.”

            After speaking with Mr. Burzynski, I spoke with Doug Whitehead, who is not only a work colleague but a close personal friend to Mr. B.  He explained his relationship with him and what’s it been like working with him over the past few years. “I knew him before I started teaching here at CSAT and the one thing I love about him is that he’s got a lot of heart, really cares about the kids and what he does.” Doug has learned a lot during his time teaching at CSAT with Burzynski and when asked about what makes Burzynski a good teacher he was quick to point out that Mr. B is a very enthusiastic instructor who holds the kids to high standards. “Mr. B is very successful because of his organizational skills not just with teaching but with coaching as well.”