Yet another black eye for baseball...

And Sandi...

Bonds got steroids, feds were told
Slugger's trainer said to have given substances to several athletes

Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams, Chronicle Staff Writers © 2004
San Francisco Chronicle
Tuesday, March 2, 2004
©2004 San Francisco Chronicle

San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds, New York Yankees stars Jason
Giambi and Gary Sheffield and three other major league baseball
players received steroids from a Burlingame nutritional supplement
lab, federal investigators were told.

The baseball stars allegedly got the illegal performance-enhancing
drugs from the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative through Greg Anderson,
Bonds' personal weight trainer and longtime friend, according to
information furnished the government and shared with The Chronicle.

In addition to Bonds, Giambi and Sheffield, the other baseball players
said to have received steroids from BALCO via Anderson were two former
Giants, outfielder Marvin Benard and catcher Benito Santiago, and a
former A's second baseman, Randy Velarde.

Oakland Raiders linebacker Bill Romanowski also was said to have
received performance-enhancing drugs.

Anderson allegedly obtained a so-called designer steroid known as "the
clear" and a testosterone-based steroid known as "the cream" from
BALCO and supplied the substances to all six baseball players, the
government was told. In addition, Bonds was said to have received
human growth hormone, a powerful substance that legally cannot be
distributed without a prescription, investigators were told.

Agents obtained the information about the baseball players and illegal
drugs last September during a probe that resulted in the indictment of
Anderson, BALCO owner Victor Conte and two other Bay Area men on
steroid conspiracy charges.

The information shared with The Chronicle did not explicitly state
that the athletes had used the drugs they were said to have obtained.
Bonds, who is baseball's single-season home-run king, and Giambi, who
won the American League Most Valuable Player award when he was with
the Oakland Athletics, have publicly denied using steroids. So has
Sheffield. All three declined to discuss the matter Monday.

Last week, attorneys for Anderson and Conte quoted their clients as
saying Bonds had never used illegal drugs.

The information about Bonds provided to The Chronicle was corroborated
by a source familiar with Anderson. The source told The Chronicle that
the weight trainer had obtained steroids and human growth hormone for
Bonds dating back to the 2001 season. That was the year the Giants
outfielder broke baseball's storied single-season record for home runs
-- hitting 73.

"We continue to adamantly deny that Barry was provided, furnished or
supplied any of those substances at any time by Greg Anderson,"
Michael Rains, an attorney for Bonds, said Monday. He also questioned
the credibility of the source familiar with the trainer.

Other attorneys interviewed Monday answered in the same vein.

Sheffield's attorney Paula Canny said, "Gary Sheffield has never
knowingly ingested a steroid ... and Gary Sheffield has never
knowingly applied an anabolic steroid cream to his body."

Santiago's attorney, David Cornwell, declined specific comment but
said: "Based on my involvement in this matter, I know that many of the
athletes involved did not know they were being given a banned
substance."

Anna Ling, an attorney for Anderson, said the trainer had "never
knowingly given any illegal substance to anybody."

Velarde did not respond to requests for comment. Benard could not be
reached.

Investigators also were told that pro football player Romanowski had
allegedly obtained both steroids and human growth hormone from BALCO.
Romanowski was one of the early big-name boosters of Conte and his
legal supplements, and the linebacker helped draw other elite athletes
to BALCO. In 1999, Colorado court records show that Romanowski's wife,
Julie, told investigators that the linebacker had obtained human
growth hormone from BALCO. An attorney for Romanowski didn't return a
reporter's phone call.

Bonds, Giambi, Sheffield, Santiago and Romanowski were among more than
30 of the world's greatest athletes -- stars of baseball, football,
boxing and track and field -- who testified last year before the San
Francisco federal grand jury that investigated BALCO and handed up the
steroid conspiracy indictments.

The names of Benard and Velarde have never before surfaced in
connection with the steroid investigation, which has roiled the
upcoming 2004 Olympic Games in Athens and, increasingly, the world of
American professional sports as well.

The probe began making worldwide headlines last October, after the
head of the agency that administers drug tests to U.S. Olympians
alleged that Conte and BALCO were at the center of an international
sports doping scandal.

The scandal attracted the attention of President Bush, a former owner
of the Texas Rangers, who in his State of the Union address in January
denounced steroid abuse in baseball and football. Then, on Feb. 12,
U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft convened a nationally televised
press conference in Washington to announce the 42-count indictment
against Anderson, Conte, famed track coach Remi Korchemny and BALCO
Vice President James Valente.

The men are charged with conspiring to distribute
performance-enhancing drugs, including human growth hormone and a
newly created steroid called THG that allegedly had been designed to
help elite athletes pass doping tests.

All four men have pleaded not guilty.

Ashcroft vowed to crack down on steroid abuse, saying it threatens the
integrity of sports and "fosters a destructive culture contrary to the
values that make sports such an important part of American life."

But even as it promised to get tough on steroids, the government took
unusual steps to turn the focus away from the elite athletes suspected
of using the illegal substances that BALCO allegedly supplied. Early
on, the government said it was not interested in prosecuting athletes
for using steroids, instead granting them immunity when they were
called to testify before the grand jury.

The government also has deleted from public court files the names of
every athlete who allegedly obtained illegal performance-enhancing
drugs from BALCO.

Court records show that agents of the Internal Revenue Service and
Food and Drug Administration had been investigating BALCO and Conte
for 18 months when they served search warrants on the lab and on
Anderson's Burlingame condominium Sept. 3. That was when agents were
told the names of athletes said to have been provided the illegal
drugs.

In affidavits that don't name the athletes, investigators allege that
Anderson was the link between the baseball players and their source of
illegal steroids at BALCO. The indictment alleges that on two
occasions, once in November 2001 and another time in November 2002,
Anderson distributed human growth hormone to a "professional baseball
player."

Agents claim that Anderson, Conte and Valente admitted their roles in
providing steroids to baseball players -- and in some cases named
names.

Internal Revenue Service investigator Jeff Novitzky wrote that while
agents were searching Anderson's home on Sept. 3, the trainer
allegedly told them the names of the ballplayers to whom he had
provided illegal performance-enhancing substances.

"Anderson admitted that he had given steroids to several professional
baseball players whose names I was familiar with from my review of
other documents in this case," Novitzky wrote. Another IRS
investigator, Brian Watson, wrote that Conte, the BALCO president, had
made a "confession" to illegal steroid dealing to elite athletes. That
also came on Sept. 3, after agents had raided BALCO and Conte's San
Mateo home.

Conte, the agent wrote, gave a "complete statement regarding his
involvement in knowingly, illegally, distributing steroids to numerous
professional athletes." Conte said he knew it was illegal and assumed
Anderson knew that, too, when allegedly receiving the steroids for
professional baseball players, the affidavit says.

Later, Conte is quoted as saying that in early 2003, he had given a
"clear" steroid-like substance to Anderson to give to a professional
baseball player. The agent acknowledges he was not sure whether the
substance qualified as a banned substance under federal law.

J. Tony Serra, Anderson's attorney, said last week that the affidavit
referred to a "100 percent legal" substance the weight trainer had
offered to Bonds. Bonds declined it, Serra said. Conte's attorney,
Robert Holley, couldn't be reached for comment. Last week, he told
reporters that Conte knew of "no illegal activity that has ever been
done by Barry Bonds."

Anderson, 37, is a beefy former collegiate second baseman who has been
Bonds' friend since their boyhood days in the San Carlos Little
League, according to people who know the men. In 1998, the Giants star
hired Anderson as his weight trainer, and Anderson has been a presence
in the Giants' clubhouse since the team moved to Pacific Bell Park in
2000.

Anderson often conducted workouts for Bonds and other training clients
at the former World Gym near San Francisco International Airport, a
few blocks from BALCO. Conte and Anderson met through the gym. Later,
the trainer introduced Conte to Bonds.

Through Bonds, Anderson met several of the other baseball players said
to have obtained illegal substances from the trainer, according to a
source who knows the men.

Bonds befriended Giambi after the 2000 season, when Giambi, then the
first baseman for the Athletics, had won the American League Most
Valuable Player award, the source said.

After the 2002 season, Bonds and Giambi were part of a team of big
leaguers who traveled to Japan on a baseball barnstorming tour. Bonds
brought Anderson along on the trip, and the trainer got to know Giambi
at that time.

Bonds also had been friendly with Sheffield since the outfielder's
days with the Florida Marlins in the 1990s. After the 2001 season,
Sheffield, then with the Atlanta Braves, moved to the Bay Area for
several weeks so that he could work out with Bonds. A source said
Anderson had supervised some of the workouts.

Anderson became acquainted with Benard and Santiago during the
trainer's visits to the Giants clubhouse, the source said.

Benard left the Giants after the 2003 season and signed a minor league
contract with the Chicago White Sox organization. Santiago also left
the Giants after 2003, signing with the Kansas City Royals. Velarde
retired from baseball in 2002.

During spring training on Monday, Bonds, Giambi and Sheffield declined
to discuss BALCO and steroids.

"You're asking me about something we don't want to discuss," Bonds
said at the Giants camp in Arizona. "... I'm tired of all these
games."

At the Yankees camp in Florida, Giambi and Sheffield also declined
comment.

Giambi referred to a conversation with reporters last week in which he
denied using steroids. "I addressed it,'' he said. "I've got nothing
more to say."

Sheffield also referred to his earlier statements in which he denied
taking steroids.

"The issue is done with, as far as I'm concerned," he said.

The BALCO case and its connection to some of baseball's biggest stars
have increased pressure on the sport to become more aggressive in the
commissioner's stated goal of zero tolerance toward steroids. Last
year, baseball implemented its first-ever plan to test for
performance-enhancing drugs, but the policy has been widely criticized
as too soft by officials from the Olympic movement as well as other
sports governing bodies.

Contacted for comment Monday, Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig called
steroids "sinister and seductive" and said he was distressed about the
allegations about the players.

"We at Major League Baseball must strive for zero tolerance as it
relates to the use of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs,"
Selig said in a statement. "We will do everything in our power to get
to zero tolerance as soon as possible."