Spoken like a true coward.

Hardly. Nobody is ever entirely objective, it's impossible.

Jeff Passan ‏ @JeffPassan Reply Retweet Favorite · Open
USADA CEO Travis Tygart tells Y! Sports of the Braun decision: "It's frankly unreal. And it's a kick in the gut to clean athletes."

MLB is going to get a whole lot of shit over this one.

So his sample basically was with the collector, unprotected, for an entire weekend? Probably sat in the guys trunk or something. Boneheaded move by the testing company. They should know the shipping schedules like the back of their hands.

From the tweet, it sounds like the sample was with the person responsible for shipping it, as opposed to being left at the testing facility. Sounds like the collector left work on Friday, took the sample with him, and was too lazy/thought FedEx was closed, so he just took it home with him. If the sample has been in a secure location that entire time, I bet Braun would have lost the appeal.

Colossal screw-up. Sounds like MLB needs a new testing company to perform these tests.

It sounds like whatever happened was just a slight enough loophole to get Braun off in the mind of the supposedly neutral arbitrator. I'm now reading that it's a loophole that MLB is trying to close soon.


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USADA CEO Travis Tygart says it's commonplace for collectors to keep samples refrigerated when taken late at night and on holidays, weekends

Jeff Passan ‏ @JeffPassan Reply Retweet Favorite · Open
Tygart: "This stuff happens around the world all the time. They're collected at people's homes after the UPS or FedEx or DHL is closed."


The collector may have not known MLB's procedure and simply just done what they usually do with other tests.

I don't understand why the test yielded a result that was so out of whack compared to others who tested positive. Isn't this an issue?

Except in this case, the sample is literally worth millions upon millions of dollars. I think it is safe that it probably should have been treated a bit more securely than it was.

And who collects samples at people's homes? Most employers who require such screenings make the candidate go into the facility to obtain the sample. Collecting a sample at someone's home as opposed to a sterile, professional facility seems a bit odd to me.

The fact that the sample was not secure the entire time, in combination with the odd result, may have lead to the arbitrator ruling the way he did.

Hopefully more facts will be forthcoming. I am interested to see what the exact chain of custody was for the sample, etc.

I'd like to know where you read/heard that because as far as I know nothing factual has come out about his actual testosterone level. That sounds like something the Braun camp might have put out to curry favor in the media/public.

In any case, that apparently wasn't an issue at all here.

You don't know shit mr. race baiter...


Ryan Braun's positive test for testosterone showed a level that was extremely elevated, and likely the highest that has been recorded in Major League Baseball, according to sources with knowledge of the NL MVP's test.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/201..._epstein/12/12
/ryan.braun.test/index.html

...and now a source close to the 2011 National League MVP has suggested to Teri Thompson of the New York Daily News that the results of the positive test were too high to be taken seriously. As in, they were at a dangerous level.

Here’s more from Thompson and the Daily News:

Ryan Braun’s original test for performance-enhancing drugs as the playoffs were winding down in October was “insanely high, the highest ever for anyone who has ever taken a test, twice the level of the highest test ever taken,” said a source familiar with the developing case in which Ryan was reported to have tested positive for an elevated level of testosterone caused by a synthetic substance, triggering a possible 50-game suspension.

The never-before-seen ratio, according to the source, is one of several “highly unusual circumstances.”

http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/20...with-the-case/

Braun’s positive test reportedly included “insanely high levels” of testosterone, by far the most ever detected in a player. He requested an independent drug test a few weeks after testing positive, which was clean, but it was not authorized nor recognized as exculpatory by MLB.


http://www.jsonline.com/sports/brewers/138857174.html

“According to one of the sources, the collector, after getting Braun’s sample, was supposed to take the sample to FedEx/Kinkos for shipping but thought it was closed because it was late on a Saturday. As has occurred in some other instances, the collector took the sample home and kept it refrigerated. Policy states that the sample is supposed to get to FedEx as soon as possible.”

Who said anything about race here?


So you're citing some vague description of an "insanely high" test from a "source close to the 2011 National League MVP" (or basically, the Braun camp as I said) without any real facts at all? LMAO

It's amazing what people will believe when they want to.

It probably contributed. If the result was a standard "guilty" reading about the same as other dirty urine, maybe Braun doesn't win. However, if you combine this issue, however minor it may seem, with one of, if not the highest test result ever known to have occurred, characterized as "insanely high", that may be enough for Diaz to throw it out.

Seems very odd. All the talk before was that his levels were so high that something must have been wrong. And then he gets off because of this? Will be interesting to see if more comes out.

I don't think anyone out there is disputing or not believing those stories. Its not like this couldn't be objectively refuted, either Braun had the highest known test result in the history of that test, or he didn't. The "what the hell are they saying, thats that true, that's BS" story would have leaked long ago.