Romero Not in the Clear
By MATTHEW NADU
Updated 7:33 PM EST, Tue, Jan 6, 2009
There’s a foul smell in the Philadelphia air.
It’s not from the Delaware River. On the contrary, the smell is coming from across the river, from Mets territory.
Philadelphia star reliever J.C. Romero has been suspended for the first 50 games of the 2009 season and fined $1.25 million by Major League Baseball.
The whole situation smells of conspiracy.
Barely two months after the Phillies captured their first world championship since 1980, mainly in part to their lights out bullpen, the organization has been hit with the juicy suspension of one of its elite.
Romero has apparently tested positive for a banned substance he was taking during the 2008 championship season. The substance was not purchased from his native country Puerto Rico or Jose Canseco’s favorite juice bar. No, this substance was purchased over-the-counter from, yeah you guessed it, New Jersey.
Romero purchased the unnamed supplement from a GNC in Cherry Hill back on July 22.
"I still cannot see where I did something wrong," a dumbfounded Romero told ESPN.com. "There is nothing that should take away from the rings of my teammates. I didn't cheat. I tried to follow the rules."
The middle reliever even had the supplement checked out by his own personal nutritionist, receiving an O.K. from the Players Association to use it.
Romero seemed in the clear; no pun intended, to use the supplement that he said is a necessary boost during the “grind” of the season.
Romero finished the regular season 4-4 with a 2.75 ERA in 81 games.
Yet on Nov. 22 the Players Association sent a blooper over Romero’s head with this statement:
"We have previously told you there is no reason to believe a supplement bought at a U.S. based retail store could cause you to test positive under our Drug Program. That is no longer true. We have recently learned of three substances, which can be bought over the counter at stores in the United States that will cause you to test positive. These three supplements were purchased at a GNC and Vitamin Shoppe in the U.S."
Not even Brad Lidge can save Romero from this one.
According to Phillies.com, Romero will be the first player on the 25-man roster of the 30 Major League teams to be suspended under the auspices of the Joint Drug and Prevention Policy for testing positive during the 2008 season.
Reports say that Romero tested positive twice for use of the supplement on Aug. 26 and Sept. 19.
"I immediately stopped taking all supplements, although I had no idea it was the cause of the positive test," Romero told ESPN.com.
Why would he think the supplements were the cause? He received the go-ahead to use them and there was no warning label on the bottle.
From here it would be a downhill spiral, and that hill was a lot steeper than the pitcher's mound.
On Oct.1, Romero was told that the legally bought supplement was the reason for the positive test and thought the case would be dropped altogether.
He was even tested again on that same day, this time the results were negative, which means the World Series games 3 and 5 winner was clean throughout the playoffs.
Then the union blew a fastball by him saying that they would reduce the suspension to 25 games if he admitted guilt. Once again he couldn’t understand the scenario since he thought he had done nothing wrong.
On Oct. 12, MLB told Romero that if he started the suspension immediately he would still only miss 25 games, an ultimatum he obviously turned down so he could play in the World Series.
The move paid off for Philadelphia, not Romero.
After Romero turned down the reduction, an arbitration meeting held Oct. 22 revealed that MLB had bought the same supplement which read on the warning label "Use of this product may be banned by some athletic or government associations."
This is an interesting turn of events considering Romero’s bottle had no such warning.
On Sunday, it was confirmed that the arbitrator was going against his original ruling and later today MLB will announce Romero’s suspension.
First Published: Jan 6, 2009 6:33 AM EST
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