Baseball commissioner Bud Selig says Major League Baseball doesn't need to turn its drug testing over to a third party but should increase the amount of independence of the doctor who currently runs it.
Bryan Smith, MLB's independent program administrator, is best suited to run the program because he understands MLB's intricacies, Selig said on Tuesday before a banquet for fans of the University of Notre Dame baseball team.
"Every sport has different nuances," Selig said. "Comparing our sport to Olympics sometimes in terms of penalties is just not fair because we play every day, every year. But we need to work on independence and transparency. There's no question about that."
The Mitchell Report on doping in MLB recommended the league increase independence and transparency.
"If it doesn't work, I'm so anxious to solve the problem that I won't rule anything out at this point," Selig said.
Players and owners have had a series of meetings on the Mitchell Report, which includes recommendations subject to collective bargaining. WADA wants MLB to get out of the drug-testing business and turn the league's program to outsiders.
Selig did say he wants the sport's top executives, such as executive vice president for labor relations Rob Manfred, out of the process. Selig said they "have better things to do with their time."
Selig's statements came on the eve of the long-awaited US congressional hearing starring Roger Clemens and Brian McNamee, his former trainer. McNamee has said he injected Clemens with steroids and human growth hormone from 1998-2001.
Selig doesn't think the congressional hearings will cause any long-term harm.
"Look, we've broken attendance records for four straight years at the same time with this situation going on, and we'll break one for a fifth year. That doesn't in any way obviate my desire to really strengthen our programs in every way. And we will do that," he said.
Selig spent most of his 20-minute talk during the banquet talking about MLB being in its "golden age," citing the growth in revenues and attendance. He touched briefly on the congressional hearing and the doping controversy, saying MLB has constantly faced challenges.
"We have survived wars, the Great Depression, gambling scandals, strikes, lockouts, and the cocaine trials of the 1980s. And we will survive the current issue, the performance-enhancing substances, because we have, as I said earlier, addressed it aggressively," he said.
In a Q&A afterwards, Selig was asked about the international growth of baseball, particularly about whether there might be some teams based overseas. Selig said it was still a way off, but added: "A decade from now, you won't recognize Major League Baseball the way it is now."
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