You know what coffee is?  It's not just the kickoff of one of the great movie scenes of all time.  It's also a performance enhancer.  And I don't mean, "wah wah, I get headaches and my vagina hurts if I don't get my coffee in the morning."  I mean, it's a legitimate performance enhancer.

Exercise physiologists have studied caffeine’s effects in nearly every iteration: Does it help sprinters? Marathon runners? Cyclists? Rowers? Swimmers? Athletes whose sports involve stopping and starting like tennis players? The answers are yes and yes and yes and yes.

I've felt that the steroid controversy is ridiculous for some time.  The furor about, say, HGH, even more so, considering the evidence suggesting HGH is "performance enhancing" is anecdotal at best, and the evidence that it's detrimental seems to be mounting.

But even if something is widely accepted as performance enhancing, like steroids, why should we care?  Why are some things okay, and others not?  Why was andro okay for a while but now it isn't?

The performance improvement in controlled laboratory settings can be 20 to 25 percent, Dr. Tarnopolsky said. But in the real world, including all comers, the improvement may average about 5 percent, still significant if you want to get your best time or even win a race.

It's stupid.  It's the same blinkered, stupid thinking that goes into drug prohibition.  Who gives a fig?  Steroids or caffeine, why should we care?  Baseball culture was apparently dominated by amphetamines for a significant amount of time, why is the current "steroid era" supposed to be some kind of dark time in baseball?

I hate this idea that athletes are supposed to be these mythical figures of purity.  Jim Bouton said that if you gave a pitcher a pill and told him it would take five years off his life but he would win 20 games, he'd ask for a glass of water. 

I say: take the steroids.  Think it makes you a better ballplayer?  Maybe it does.  I don't care if you shrink your balls.  Girlfriend put a hex on your glove?  Maybe she did.  Or maybe this whole thing is because sportswriters realize that sanctimony draws readers and politicians like to scowl indignantly into microphones during hearings on CSPAN.