Union Tells NFL: No Blood Samples Yet

"We informed the NFL (Tuesday) that absent a collective agreement on several critical issues, blood collection is not ready to be implemented on Monday," the NFL Players Association said in a statement released Wednesday. "We have advised the players."

The league was preparing to draw the blood samples beginning Monday, although full testing for HGH was not yet scheduled.

"We are disappointed in the union's response," NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said. "It is contrary to the terms of the CBA and the agreements reached last Friday with the chairman and ranking member of the House Government Reform Committee.

"We are ready to begin educating players on the testing program and collecting samples. This approach was put forward by Congressmen Issa and Cummings," he added, referring to California Rep. Darrell Issa and Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, "It is well-reasoned and balances the need to ensure immediate deterrence with the union's desire for further review and education. We know of no reason why these initial steps should not begin next week, and none has been identified by the union."

The NFL and the players agreed to begin blood testing for HGH as part of their new collective bargaining agreement reached in late July — but only if the union agreed to the methods. The union has delayed implementing the test, asking for more scientific data to prove it is reliable.

One of the key items the NFLPA is seeking is a population study of the test — the data from the athletes who were used to originally set thresholds as to what constitutes a positive test. The union wants to compare that data to a population study on football players; the union believes players could have naturally higher HGH levels above those of other athletes.

"I am all for it, as long as it's a test that can be regulated and proved to be very accurate," Packers quarterback and Super Bowl MVP Aaron Rodgers said. "So until we get some information and data that we're very confident in, I don't know that there's going to be anything in the immediate future. I think it'd be great to even the playing field for the rest of the league."

Earlier this month, nearly two dozen scientists and lab directors from around the world signed a letter sent to the NFL and the union stating the current test for HGH is safe, scientifically reliable and appropriate for use in professional sports leagues.

The letter, obtained by The Associated Press, was dated Oct. 3 and sent to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and union Executive Director DeMaurice Smith.

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AP National Writer Eddie Pells in Denver and Sports Writer Chris Jenkins in Green Bay contributed to this story.

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HGH Testing: NFL, Union Have Differing Takes

After Friday's high-profile mix of sports and politics, HGH testing in pro football didn't seem closer to reality.

"We're not guaranteeing any outcomes except there was an agreement to begin testing immediately," Rep. Darrell Issa, a California Republican and chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, told reporters after the meeting. "The other aspects of what you do with the tests will be resolved over the next many weeks, and we've agreed on a bipartisan basis to have the committee play a role if necessary" to bring the sides together again.

Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, the top Democrat on the committee, said he felt the two sides benefited from being called in. "Because I think they had their own disputes, and it seemed like they just could not move quite past a certain point," he said.

He stressed that the lawmakers wanted action now: "Not get there next year — we were clear that the ball has to move down the field immediately."

But the NFL Players Association didn't seem inclined to move off its previous position: That it wants questions answered before moving ahead with a blood-testing program.

"We believe that we have to report back to our players, make sure that the protocol and the testing protocols are safe," union spokesman George Atallah said, standing in the same spot as the lawmakers shortly after their news conference. "Once we feel that way, which we hope will be as soon as possible — obviously the chairman and Congressman Cummings can help us facilitate that — we'll be in a position to start testing as soon as possible."

Asked if the union agreed to testing this season, he responded, "We will begin implementing testing as fast as possible."

Later, he tweeted, "The challenge for us as a league and a sport is to ensure that we have a clean game, but a fair system."

The latest collective bargaining agreement between the league and its players includes a provision to begin testing players for HGH — contingent on the union agreeing to the testing methods. The NFLPA has asked for more scientific data to prove the most popular test is reliable.

Baltimore Ravens cornerback Domonique Foxworth, who attended the meeting, said the union has a responsibility to players to make sure the test is accurate, so "we can look them in the eye and say this is a safe and fair process."

If the issue isn't resolved shortly, both sides can expect a quick return visit to Capitol Hill. Issa said he wants another meeting in 30 days to review progress, but if testing doesn't start soon, he'll ask for a quicker follow-up, perhaps in two weeks.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell saw things the way the lawmakers did, saying that Issa was clear he wanted testing to begin within the next two weeks.

Did the players agree to that?

"Everyone around the table agreed to that," the commissioner said. He added that the league could have testing in place within seven to 10 days.

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Follow Fred Frommer on Twitter: http://twitter.com/ffrommer

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Heidelberg Faces Mount Union With Unusual Optimism

“Professors after class get a sad look on their face and say: ‘Mount Union this week? Yeah, good luck,’ ” Suddeth said. “They mean: All the luck in the world won’t help.”

The story of Mount Union’s extraordinary success has been examined many times as the team trounced opponents during the past two decades. But perhaps its dominance is felt most sharply on the other campuses in the Ohio Athletic Conference — places like Heidelberg, a small liberal arts institution here in northwestern Ohio where the Mount Union game looms like Halloween, an annual rite of fall, except much scarier.

“But everyone goes to the game,” David Kindall, a sophomore at the university, said this week. “Even if it’s just to see if we score this time.”

Heidelberg has not defeated Mount Union since 1988 and has been outscored, 1,096-179, since then, which makes the average score in the last 22 seasons 50-8. Since 2000, Mount Union has scored more than 60 points five times and Heidelberg has scored more than 10 points only twice. Heidelberg is not the only team that Mount Union dominates; the Purple Raiders tend to rout everyone in Ohio.

“People look at the 10 schools in our conference and see one Goliath and nine Davids,” Heidelberg Coach Mike Hallett said. “We’re cast as the lovable losers. But that’s not how we look at it, or approach it. You don’t measure the value of athletics at an educational institution by the result, however lopsided, of one game. You’re missing every lesson if you do that.”

Indeed, at a time when the conversation at the highest levels of college football is dominated by academic dishonor and money-fueled, conference realignment deals, at tiny Heidelberg 150 players fill the roster without a single athletic scholarship. The team’s collective grade point average is just above 3.0. The practice field is dusty and only one locker room has adequate space for the equipment.

Heidelberg is the team that is supposed to lose big to mighty Mount Union on Saturday, and it knows it. But as they gathered this week, the players greeted the late afternoon with boisterous whoops, chants and hollers that drowned out the rattle of an adjacent railway and turned heads in the parking lot of a nearby machine factory.

“Where else would you rather be?” wide receiver Mario Escalante shouted as the first drills began Tuesday.

“Nowhere but here!” his teammates yelled in unison.

It is Mount Union week, and Heidelberg, which has won four of its first five games for the first time in 18 years, actually thinks it can win.

Hallett, who played on Mount Union’s first national championship team, in 1993, remembers his first year as the Heidelberg coach, preparing to play his alma mater.

“I looked at the film of them and of us and I knew we had no chance,” Hallett said. The team he inherited had a 1-39 record in its previous four seasons.

“So I told the kids that we don’t have a prayer of winning,” he said. “I didn’t want to give a typical gung-ho speech because I wanted them to know I wouldn’t lie. So I said we can’t win. But we can compete and prove to ourselves that we can get better.”

Heidelberg had been outscored, 187-0, in the previous three Mount Union games.

“But in 2007 we became the only team in the conference to score a point against their first-team defense,” Hallett said. “We kicked a field goal.”

They lost, 62-3.

“It’s not always going to be a proud moment, but there are things you can be proud of,” Hallett said, adding that the next week Heidelberg upset the conference power Baldwin-Wallace by 22 points, the first Heidelberg win over Baldwin-Wallace in 18 years.

Hallett’s first three teams had 4-6 records. Last season, Heidelberg, whose mascot is named the Student Prince, was 5-5. The scores against Mount Union have gotten marginally closer: 49-0, 44-14, 45-7.

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N.F.L. Union Not Ready to Allow Blood Testing for H.G.H.

After a private meeting in Washington with officials from the league, the union, the United States Anti-Doping Agency and the two members of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, the league and two members of the committee said an agreement had been reached to begin H.G.H. testing imminently. But the union said that was not the case.

A program for blood testing for H.G.H. was agreed upon, in concept, in the recently completed collective bargaining agreement. But the league and the union have been at an impasse since the union determined that it wanted to independently examine the accuracy of the test, which has been used by the World Anti-Doping Agency since 2004. With the N.F.L. season in its sixth week, Representatives Darrell Issa, Republican of California, and Elijah E. Cummings, Democrat of Maryland, called Friday’s meeting to pressure the league and the union to reach a testing agreement.

“We’re not guaranteeing any outcomes except there was an agreement to begin testing immediately,” Issa, the chairman of the House committee, told reporters after the meeting. “The other aspects of what you do with the tests will be resolved over the next many weeks, and we’ve agreed on a bipartisan basis to have the committee play a role if necessary” to bring the sides together again.

N.F.L. Commissioner Roger Goodell said it was clear that Issa wanted testing to start in the next two weeks.

“Everyone around the table agreed to that,” Goodell said.

According to people briefed on the meeting, a proposal was raised to begin the collection of blood samples within 10 days and store them until an agreement is reached over the technical aspects of the tests. Union officials remained noncommittal about a time frame, saying they still wanted to see the information they have been seeking from doping officials about the thresholds established for a positive test. The union said it would not allow testing to begin until it reviewed the information.

Issa and Cummings told the sides that if blood collection did not begin within two weeks they would bring them back for another meeting.

The committee can compel the sides to appear at a public hearing. Otherwise, the league and the union will meet with committee members again in a month, with the expectation that all outstanding issues on testing will have been resolved.

According to people in the meeting, Issa said he would try to help the union obtain the scientific information it wanted and have it studied independently. The World Anti-Doping Agency has declined to make public information about the population studies used to establish the threshold for a positive H.G.H. test. Even if Issa were successful in getting the information, it seems unlikely that full testing could start within a week. And if the union does not get the information, it is steadfast that it will not allow testing to begin.

The agreement in place since August, which said testing would begin this season, stipulated that the union had to agree to procedures for testing, and the union has raised concerns about whether the established ratio for a positive human growth hormone test is appropriate for professional football players.

The union’s leader, DeMaurice Smith, did not attend the meeting because, the committee was told, he was traveling abroad.

George Atallah, a spokesman for the union, said: “Chairman Issa’s and Congressman Cummings’ involvement is an important step to helping us agree to a fair, safe and transparent test and testing protocol. We will continue to work with both the chairman and committee staff to implement a safe test.”

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The Fifth Down: Goodell, Union to Meet with Congress on H.G.H. Testing

October 14

The New York Times N.F.L. reporter assesses Tim Tebow, Alex Smith, the Jets, Steelers and Eagles.

October 14

The Hamburglar, Alan Rickman and Gregg Allman all make an appearance this week.

October 13

Roger Goodell and union representatives will meet with a House committee to discuss implementing a drug-testing program.

October 13

Another suggested recipe from Times readers for football tailgating parties.

October 13

Fred Jackson and Ahmad Bradshaw are in line for big fantasy days in Week 6 when the Buffalo Bills and Giants meet on Sunday.

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