Ethics CasesSport

Cases · NFL / NFLPA · 2011–2014

The NFL's Three-Year Wait for HGH Testing

In the 2011 collective bargaining agreement, the NFL and the NFL Players Association agreed to blood testing for human growth hormone. Implementation stalled for three years. The union questioned the science and the appeals process and insisted on a population study to set an NFL-specific limit, while USADA called the study unnecessary and congressional leaders accused the union of 'remarkable recalcitrance.' In September 2014, the parties agreed a package that started HGH testing, moved appeals of positive tests to neutral arbitrators, and revised other drug penalties. The case asks how collective bargaining should handle anti-doping, and when concerns about fairness become delay.

By Tanner Simkins, editor

Timeline

  1. The NFL and NFLPA agree to HGH blood testing in their new CBA.
  2. The House Oversight Committee first meets with the league and union about HGH testing.
  3. The committee holds a hearing: 'HGH Testing in the NFL: Is the Science Ready?'
  4. MLB becomes the first major pro league to implement in-season HGH testing.
  5. Committee leaders accuse the NFLPA of 'remarkable recalcitrance.'
  6. The union explains a planned population study; USADA's CEO criticizes it.
  7. The league and union announce HGH testing, third-party arbitration of appeals and other drug-policy changes.
  8. The league says unnamed players have been suspended for positive HGH tests.

The ethical issues

  • Collective bargaining over anti-doping rules.
  • Scientific validity and fairness of tests for individual players.
  • Delay as a negotiating tactic versus legitimate due-process concerns.
  • Government pressure on private labor negotiations.
  • Who decides appeals: the commissioner or neutral arbitrators.

Stakeholders

StakeholderInterests & obligations
PlayersFair, scientifically valid tests and neutral appeals, plus clean competition.
The NFLPAProtecting members and bargaining leverage.
The NFLThe game's integrity and image, and the commissioner's authority.
USADA and WADAAdoption of validated testing in pro sports.
CongressPublic health and the influence of pro sports on youth.
Fans and young athletesA clean game and good role models.

The case

In 2011, the NFL and the NFL Players Association (NFLPA) agreed a new collective bargaining agreement (CBA) that included blood testing for human growth hormone (HGH).[2][4] The NFL was the first major US league to agree to HGH testing.[3] Yet testing did not begin until the 2014 season.[1]

Background

HGH is naturally produced by the body and stimulates cell regeneration. It can also be taken artificially and is banned by the world’s anti-doping bodies.[4] Anti-doping agencies had used HGH blood testing in other sports since 2008.[4]

After the 2011 agreement, the players “balked at the science in the testing and the appeals process for positive tests.”[2] The union’s central demand was a population study to determine a “decision limit” for NFL players: the highest HGH level a player could have without facing discipline.[4] In August 2013, the union described a design in which about 100 recent former players would take part, two-thirds receiving HGH and one-third a placebo, and current players would give a single anonymous blood sample.[4]

Anti-doping agencies criticized the population study from the start as a stalling tactic.[4] The US Anti-Doping Agency’s CEO said: “Something isn’t right when they think that 100 tests of former players are better scientifically than 10,000 male samples … done since 2008 in worldwide sport.”[4]

Former players differed. One said he would volunteer “in a heartbeat,” saying: “We’re cheating our game.” A Hall of Fame tight end said he would not be “somebody’s guinea pig” without more information. He also argued that the risk-reward calculation in football differed from baseball, where a suspended player could come back to a huge contract, while in football “you lose four weeks pay with a non-guaranteed contract.”[4]

The rules and governance

Congress weighed in. The House Oversight Committee met the league and union on October 14, 2011, and held a hearing in December 2012 titled “HGH Testing in the NFL: Is the Science Ready?”[3] In January 2013, Major League Baseball became the first pro league to implement in-season HGH testing.[3] Later that month, the committee’s chairman and ranking member wrote to the union: “We are disappointed with the NFLPA’s remarkable recalcitrance, which has prevented meaningful progress on this issue.” They said the committee would examine whether the union’s position “that HGH is not a serious concern and that the test for HGH is unreliable” reflected the views of rank-and-file players.[3]

At the December 2012 hearing, the published record of which runs as House Serial No. 112-192,[6] USADA’s chief science officer, Larry Bowers, laid out the anti-doping side. The test in use, the “isoforms” blood test, compares the ratios of different forms of growth hormone; synthetic hormone upsets the natural ratio. It had been used on a limited basis since 2004 and worldwide since 2008, on almost 13,000 athletes in sports including track and field, weightlifting, bobsled, boxing, cycling, swimming and wrestling. MLB had run about 1,700 tests in two seasons.[5] Bowers noted that the union had argued, in the press and in correspondence with WADA, that NFL players differed enough in size and ethnicity to need a study of 500 players. He answered each point: size had no relation to the isoform ratio; possible ethnic differences were reflected in conservative decision limits; and the effect of exercise vanished well within the two hours of rest required before a sample. “The only people who are still questioning the methodology and validity of the growth hormone isoforms test,” he said, “are lawyers, not scientists.”[5]

Neither the league nor the union testified. The witness list was made up of scientists, prevention advocates and Hall of Famer Dick Butkus, who led I Play Clean, a group that encourages student athletes to compete without performance-enhancing drugs.[6] Chairman Darrell Issa opened by noting that the 2011 agreement contained “a time limit that would have, in fact, put it in play last season,” and that “no such implementation has occurred.” He linked the issue to player safety, saying football “is a tough sport when played honestly”; “we need not make it tougher or more dangerous by the use of banned substances.” Ranking member Elijah Cummings said there was “no daylight” between the two of them, and he credited Commissioner Roger Goodell with pushing for testing.[6]

The National Institutes of Health’s principal deputy director, Lawrence Tabak, described the science. He gave a more complicated account than the debate over testing suggested. Studies, he said, “have found little or no evidence” that the extra lean mass from high doses of HGH boosts “strength, power, or aerobic capacity in healthy individuals.” He added that nonmedical use might even hurt performance by increasing lactic acid buildup. He was more definite about the risks. Drawing on the clinical history of treating hormone deficiency, he listed possible harms including features of acromegaly, diabetes, cardiomyopathy, drug-induced hepatitis and renal failure. Athletes who take HGH, he concluded, “are taking serious risks with their health,” and the “technical obstacles” to detection “have been overcome.”[6] On this account, the case for testing rested on health and fair play more than on any proven performance benefit.

The negotiations were linked to other disputes, particularly the appeals process for positive tests.[2][4]

The 2014 agreement

In September 2014, the union’s player representatives approved a league proposal, and on September 19 the parties announced “a wide-ranging series of improvements.”[1][2] The agreement:

  • implemented HGH testing that season, with testing to begin by the end of September;
  • moved appeals of positive tests in both drug programs, including HGH, to third-party arbitrators jointly selected and retained by the league and union;
  • set a four-game suspension for a first violation for steroids, stimulants or HGH, two games for a diuretic or masking agent, and six games for attempting to manipulate a test; and
  • revised other penalties, including referring off-season stimulant positives to the substance abuse program, raising the marijuana threshold, and increasing DUI discipline.[1]

Several suspended players were reinstated or had suspensions shortened under the new rules.[1][2] The union also secured independent investigation of breaches of drug-test confidentiality.[2] The NFLPA president called it “an historic moment,” saying the policies “will keep the game clean and safe, but also provide our players with an unprecedented level of fairness and transparency.”[2]

Aftermath

The commissioner said the changes gave the league and union “the finest and most comprehensive set of drug policies in sports.”[1] HGH testing began more than three years after it was agreed.[1][2] The joint population study the union had demanded never became a precondition. The league’s current performance-enhancing substances policy lets a player challenge “any aspect of the science of the isoforms test,” including the decision limits and any population studies used to set them. But it states that “neither the absence of a joint NFLPA/NFL population study nor the election to forgo such a study” is relevant or admissible in an appeal.[7]

Testing is routine but limited. Under the 2026 policy, all players are eligible for growth hormone testing by dried blood spot analysis. Twenty percent of players picked for annual testing also give blood, as do two players per club each week of the preseason and regular season, and five per club each week in the playoffs. Players outside reasonable-cause testing face no more than six blood tests a year.[7]

Results stay largely private. In September 2017, three years after testing began, a league spokesman said for the first time that an unknown number of unnamed players had been suspended for positive HGH tests.[8] At that point no player had been publicly identified as banned for HGH.[8]

The core dilemma

The union had legitimate concerns about test validity and fair appeals. But the delay meant HGH went untested in a sport where it might be used, and critics saw the population study as a stall. When does protecting members’ due-process rights become obstruction of integrity measures?

Competing values

  • Due process vs. integrity: fair tests and appeals against prompt anti-doping enforcement.
  • Bargaining leverage vs. public interest.
  • Scientific caution vs. established practice.
  • Private bargaining vs. government oversight.

Strongest arguments

For the union’s approach: tests should be validated for the population tested, and a fair, neutral appeals process is essential. Linking testing to appeals reform won lasting protections for players.

Against the union’s approach: the HGH test was already used across sport, and USADA said the population study was unnecessary. Delay left the game exposed and harmed players who compete clean.

For a middle view: both sides used HGH testing as leverage, and the final package improved fairness as well as integrity.

Applying the frameworks

Justice

A justice lens asks whether the testing and appeals process is fair to players, and whether the union’s delay was fair to clean players and the public.

Utilitarianism

A utilitarian lens weighs the benefits of earlier testing against the gains from a better appeals system and stronger player buy-in.

Rights

A rights lens focuses on players’ rights to bodily privacy, fair process and collective bargaining, balanced against competitors’ rights to clean competition.

Walk it through: the Simple Decision Model

  1. Spot the issue. You are the NFLPA executive director. Stakeholders include players, the league, Congress, USADA and fans. Less visible are young athletes who look to NFL players. The codes are the CBA and federal labor law.
  2. Gather facts. What does the science say about the test’s validity? What do players want? Beware groupthink inside negotiating teams.
  3. Test options. (a) Implement testing immediately. (b) Insist on a population study first. (c) Agree to testing in exchange for neutral appeals.
  4. Check codes and law. Check the CBA’s terms and labor law obligations.
  5. Decide and document. Explain the decision to players and the public.
  6. Communicate and follow up. Monitor testing and appeals and revisit the policy at the next CBA.

What’s settled and what’s contested

  • Settled: the 2011 agreement; the delay; the September 2014 package.
  • Contested: whether the population study was necessary; whether the delay was principled or tactical; whether Congress should have intervened.

Why this case matters

The NFL’s HGH saga shows how anti-doping works in unionized leagues, where testing is bargained rather than imposed. It is a case study in due process, leverage and public accountability.

Key terms

Due process
Fair procedures before a sanction: notice, a chance to respond, an impartial decision-maker and a right of appeal.
Controls
Concrete safeguards that make ethics operational: training, disclosure forms, testing, monitoring, hotlines. Ethics needs principles, process and controls.
Sanction certainty
The principle that the likelihood of being caught and punished deters misconduct more than the severity of the punishment.
Principal–agent problem
When those acting on others’ behalf (agents such as executives, officials or agents) have interests that diverge from the people they serve.
Stakeholders
Everyone with something at stake in a decision: athletes, coaches, parents, officials, fans, employees, sponsors, media, communities and regulators, including the less visible ones.
Trust
The public’s belief that what they are watching is real. Integrity failures are ultimately failures of trust.

Definitions from the Ethics Cases glossary.

Discussion questions

  1. The union argued that the HGH test had not been validated for NFL players. USADA said existing data from 10,000 samples were enough. Who should decide whether a test is valid for a particular population?
  2. Was it legitimate for the union to link HGH testing to changes in the appeals process?
  3. Should Congress pressure private parties in collective bargaining over drug testing?
  4. A former player said the risk-reward calculation for HGH differs in football and baseball. How should sanctions reflect a sport's economics?

Sources

  1. Joint NFL-NFLPA statement on wide-ranging changes to drug programs (19 September 2014) — NFL Players Association
  2. NFLPA approves HGH testing for 2014 — ABC7 San Francisco (ESPN)
  3. Issa, Cummings warn NFLPA that players may be called before committee — US House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
  4. Shannon Sharpe on joint HGH study: I'm no 'guinea pig' — USA Today
  5. Testimony of Dr. Larry Bowers, USADA, 'HGH Testing in the NFL: Is the Science Ready?' (December 12, 2012) — US House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
  6. HGH Testing in the NFL: Is the Science Ready? Hearing, Serial No. 112-192 — US Government Publishing Office (GovInfo)
  7. National Football League Policy on Performance-Enhancing Substances (2026) — NFL Players Association
  8. NFL: Unnamed players have been suspended for positive HGH tests — theScore