There was the Dutch cyclist who blamed a failed a drug test on his father-in-law, who fed him pigeon pie purportedly made from doped-up racing pigeons.
Or the German runner who claimed his nandrolone positives came from someone surreptitiously injecting it into his toothpaste.
Or Fidel Castro, who insisted world-record high jumper Javier Sotomayor's positive test was the work of the Cuban-American mafia.
A U.S. sprinter blamed a steroid-laced cream rubbed on his legs by a vindictive masseuse. Another said it must have come from a male enhancement product he bought at a local convenience store. Tyler Hamilton, a Tour de France cyclist on Lance Armstrong's team, suggested his abnormal blood levels were from a "vanishing twin" who died in utero but contributed extra blood cells to him during fetal life.
"Athletes always say, 'It's not possible,' " Dick Pound, an International Olympic Committee member from Canada who has led the global anti-doping crusade, once famously said, "followed by, 'There must be some mistake in the sample,' followed by, 'I must have got it from the toilet seat' … or ambushed by a roving squad of Nazi frogmen and injected against their will."
Now … ringworm?
Give Fernando Tatis Jr. this much. At least he's creative.
"It turns out," Tatis said in a statement Friday after news broke of his 80-game suspension without pay by Major League Baseball, "that I inadvertently took a medication to treat ringworm that contained clostebol. I should have used the resources available to me in order to ensure that no banned substances were in what I took. I failed to do so. … I have no excuse for my error, and I would never do anything to cheat or disrespect the game I love."
Here's the thing: It's plausible.
But probable? That's for you to decide in the absence of more information.
Clostebol is an injectable, muscle-building anabolic agent developed by the East Germany doping machine in the 1960s. It's been on the World Anti-Doping Agency's banned list for years, known by bodybuilders as Megagrisevit Mono and available on the black market. It isn't as potent as some other steroids, but it also doesn't have the same side effects (acne, hair loss, breast enlargement) because it doesn't aromatize and convert to estrogen.
"If you want to build moderate amounts of lean muscle while burning fat and improving athletic performance," Muscle and Brawn website writes, "clostebol acetate is ideal. It mimics the effects of testosterone as it itself is based upon the hormone."
Test positive in the Olympic world, and you're facing a two-year ban.
But read the label on Trofodermin or other antibiotic ointments sold over the counter in Europe, South American and Central America, and you'll see clostebol acetate listed under active ingredients. The FDA doesn't permit it in similar OTC products sold here, but you can walk into a pharmacy in, say, Italy or Brazil and buy it without a prescription to treat skin abrasions or lesions.
Or, conceivably, a fungal infection like ringworm.
A growing number of athletes have tested positive for clostebol and claimed inadvertent use, a plausibility backed by a 2020 European study that concluded Trofodermin and similar creams could "generate adverse analytical findings in anti-doping controls."
In 2019, the international Court of Arbitration for Sport overturned a clostebol positive and two-year ban against a Canadian triathlete for the "reasonably possible" contention that she ate tainted meat, since it is legal in some countries for fattening cattle. Ointments with clostebol acetate also are used for certain gynecological conditions, and a 2004 Brazilian study found that athletes could test positive after having sex. A Brazilian long jumper served a two-year ban after claiming clostebol was part of a hair-removal procedure.
With Tatis, there are still more questions than answers.
"Somebody knows," says Victor Conte, the mastermind behind the BALCO doping empire that involved several prominent baseball players. "What bothers me in general are these dog-ate-my-homework type explanations without any supportive information."
Such as:
What levels of clostebol and types of metabolites were in his system? Large amounts would indicate doping; trace amounts could be remnants from a doping cycle (Major League Baseball didn't test players for 3½ months during the winter lockout) or unintentional ingestion.
What kind of test was used? Clostebol can be detected in a standard urine test, or with a more sophisticated, more expensive carbon isotope ratio that is triggered in MLB's anti-doping policy by chemical markers of illicit testosterone levels. Dee Gordon, the National League batting champ popped for clostebol in 2016, also reportedly got caught for testosterone use.
When and where was he tested? Tatis is believed to have rehabbed his broken wrist in the States, where over-the-counter ringworm ointments wouldn't contain clostebol. In defense of her son Friday, Tatis' mother posted an Instagram photo of a rash on his neck. Did she bring ointment purchased in the Dominican Republic when she visited him? Why not show a picture of that?
And why drop his appeal? MLB allows for an arbitrational panel to reduce an 80-game suspension to 30 if a player proves he "bears no significant fault or negligence."
Of course, a player with a 14-year, $340-million contract using an ointment where a banned substance is likely listed on the label might not elicit much sympathy. Drug testing programs operate on strict liability, meaning you're responsible for whatever enters your body. Make that kind of cash, you can (and should) hire someone who monitors everything you ingest given the enormous stakes.
What we have here, then, is either a cheat or an idiot. The latest baseball player from the Dominican Republic to avail himself of the performance-enhancing drugs that are readily available there. Or the latest player to run afoul of a flawed drug program and fail what Conte equates to an IQ test.
A doper or a dope, or maybe both.
