Marion Jones' admission of steroid use Friday in a New York courtroom tarnishes more than her own reputation: It stains every elite athlete, even those who have never been accused of doping.
That's the conclusion of many in the athletic and anti-doping communities trying to come to grips with the confession of drug use by one of the highest-profile competitors in sports.
"Her sins will be felt by all athletes," said Michael Straubel, a defense attorney for athletes in doping cases and director of the sports law clinic at Valparaiso University School of Law.
Jones, who first made her name as a star high school athlete in Oxnard and Thousand Oaks, pleaded guilty Friday to lying to investigators in 2003 about her illegal steroid use. She admitted that she had taken a then-undetectable form of the substance before the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, where she won a record three gold and two bronze medals in track.
The admission sent shock waves through the sports and legal communities, not least because Jones had for years steadfastly denied steroid use and did so in the face of reports that tied her to the infamous Bay Area Laboratory Cooperative. BALCO allegedly dispensed performance-enhancing drugs to dozens of athletes, including baseball slugger Barry Bonds, who has denied knowingly using banned substances.
Even people who had long been skeptical of Jones'protestations of innocence were stunned by Friday's developments.
"It shows the demonstrated willingness of many athletes to lie through their teeth," said John Hoberman, a University of Texas professor and expert on steroids in sports. He argues that the Jones case testifies to how the pressure to excel alters moral compasses and drives a surprising number of elite athletes to performance-enhancing drugs.
"A lot of us did not believe that doping was occurring on the scale it turned out to be," he said. "Many athletes held up to us as role models have turned out to operate in an ethics-free zone."
Jones' plea follows admissions to prior drug use by other prominent international athletes this summer, including Danish cyclist Bjarne Riis, who won the 1996 Tour de France and placed third in 1995. And it refocuses the spotlight on others who have vehemently insisted on their innocence in the face of accusations that in some cases have persisted for years.
