More details have emerged from Fayetteville, GA throughout Tuesday regarding the apparent suicide of Chris Benoit and double murder of his wife and son. As such, the WWE — who spent all 3 hours of Monday’s RAW paying tribute to Benoit — are in full damage control mode, both distancing themselves from the Canadian grappler, and trying to point the traditional media somewhere other than the inevitable steroid questions.
Said efforts were dealt a blow this evening with the following report from the Associated Press :
A professional wrestler who killed himself and his family was a former customer of a company implicated in an upstate New York investigation of illegal steroid sales.
That’s according to the Albany County District Attorney’s Office, which is conducting the investigation here.
In Albany, the DA’s office confirms the 40-year-old Benoit was a customer as recently as last year of the south Florida company MedXLife.
2 of its co-owners pleaded guilty to drug charges in Albany County in April, admitting they helped get prescriptions drugs in 2006 for customers in upstate New York who had no medical need for them. The pair testified Signature Pharmacy of Orlando filled the orders.
Signature Pharmacy is the same firm that was raided earlier this year and is accused of suppling PED’s to a list of professional athletes not limited to the Angels’ Gary Matthews Jr. and boxer Evander Holyfield.
This guy had roid rage since at least ’83, when he charged the umpire after the Yanks said he had too much pine tar on his bat.
Benoit is a wrestler so obviously he’s only pretending to kill himself and his whole family. I fully expect him to shoot out of the grave during the burial while “Get Ready for This” blares out of a boombox. It’s all ‘pretend’, kids.
Interestiing info on drug testing from pro wrestling torch:
WK Analysis: Just a reminder. According to WWE’s Wellness Policy, prescription drugs (anabolic steroids are a prescription drug) can be found in one’s system, but if a prescription is produced by a talent within five days and WWE and the drug testing agency deem the purpose medically justified, the test doesn’t count as a failure. Also, wrestlers are allowed to have steroids in their systems at a T/E ratio of 10/1. Natural levels are 1/1. Anything above a 4/1 ratio calls for a retest. It’s not clear whether the wrestler would have time to “clear his system” back down to a 4/1 ratio or less for the retest. The Olympic committee considers a 6/1 ratio a failure.
I bring this up because nobody on cable news is doing even the most cursory of preparation of research for these interviews. The wrestlers, including Bret, don’t acknowledge or understand the minutia that makes “passing a WWE drug test” and “having zero steroids detected in one’s system” are two different things. The Today show should ask Vince McMahon these very questions. The interview should educate themselves on what was publicly reported in their policy, then ask if the policy has changed, and then ask directly whether Benoit had any steroids in his system back in April or previous to that and how long he had to “clean out his system” if he tested positive once and had to take a retest. This isn’t a simple story, and the mainstream media is taking a lazy, sensationalistic approach by just focusing on “roid rage” and bringing on experts for soundbite answers to an issue that is more complex and nuanced.