Karl says NBA has PED issue
If you thought the sport of basketball - by nature of its reduced reliance on sheer muscle power compared to its cousins in football and baseball - was immune to steroid accusations, then you've never read a book by George Karl.
In the longtime NBA head coach's new tome, "Furious George: My Forty Years Surviving NBA Divas, Clueless GMs, and Poor Shot Selection," he asserts that the league has a problem with performance-enhancing drugs.
"(The NBA has a more) thorough drug-testing program than the NFL or MLB, which we always brag about," Karl writes in the book, as transcribed by PBT's Dan Feldman. "But we've still got a drug issue, though a different one than thirty years ago.
"And this one bothers me more than the dumbasses who got in trouble with recreational drugs. I'm talking about performance-enhancing drugs - like steroids, human growth hormone, and so on. It’s obvious some of our players are doping. How are some guys getting older - yet thinner and fitter? How are they recovering from injuries so fast?"
Karl has already raised the ire of some of his former players with other passages from the book, including the suggestion that Carmelo Anthony and Kenyon Martin couldn't act like men because they grew up in fatherless households.
He adds that he finds it mysterious that modern-day players travel to Europe during the summer.
"Why the hell are they going to Germany in the offseason? I doubt it’s for the sauerkraut," he writes, without citing a specific player. "More likely it's for the newest, hard-to-detect blood boosters and PEDs they have in Europe. Unfortunately, drug testing always seems to be a couple steps behind drug hiding. Lance Armstrong never failed a drug test. I think we want the best athletes to succeed, not the biggest, richest cheaters employing the best scientists."
The idea that wealthy athletes seek out high-tech treatments that may push the boundaries of the rules certainly isn't a new theory, but it does allow Karl to continue his burning of bridges. He was fired by the Sacramento Kings last spring after butting heads with another star player in DeMarcus Cousins.
The 64-year-old Karl remains in fifth place all time with 1,175 NBA head coaching victories, 35 wins behind Pat Riley.