The SIG Column – 6 February

Recent weeks have seen two high-profile cases of sport stars using recreational drugs in the form of US swimming legend Michael Phelps and England rugby star Matt Stevens. Drew Barrand, head of media at Sport Industry Group, looks at whether the punishments fitted the crimes.

Sport, drugs and rock n’ roll. You just can’t escape it lately it seems.

On the one side, you have governing bodies across the world desperately trying to control the impact of performance-enhancing drugs on their sports and their reputations. And on the other, there’s recreational drug use by the sports stars themselves, their actions as men and women betraying their standing as athletes.

Never has it been so pointedly proven in such a short space of time that the drugs effect hits from all sides. But just because the effect is all encompassing doesn’t necessarily mean that all drug-taking warrants the same damning reaction.

Let’s review the two recent high-profile cases of recreational drug use. In the first example, part-man part-fish Michael Phelps is photographed smoking a marijuana pipe after celebrating his astonishing gold medal haul at the Beijing Olympics. In the second we see England rugby prop Matt Stevens admitting a recreational drug addiction, thought to be cocaine.

The two events produced very different outcomes. Phelps receives a ban from all competition for three months – a period during which there is no major, or for that matter minor, swimming event rendering the decision relatively toothless, a very obvious slap on the wrist at best. Would the ban have been enforced had the incident happened a few weeks prior to the Olympics? Probably not.

Despite most looking on with pity, Stevens however is castigated by all, dropped from the England squad and now faces a lengthy spell out of the sport while he ‘rebuilds his life’ after his ‘shameful behaviour’.

The worst argument in defence of either action is that how sports stars act in their personal lives has no impact on their professional occupations. By reaching the top of their sport they have become, whether intentionally or unintentionally, role models. Of course, they should be held up to a higher moral standard than those outside of the limelight. To ask anything less is merely letting down the thousands of kids who look up to their way of life.

Do the punishments however fit the crimes? Most would argue yes.

Even putting to one side the different classifications between marijuana and cocaine in terms of the severity of the drug abuse, Phelps’ misdemeanour appears on the face of it to be a one-off incident while Stevens’ openly admitted to an ongoing addiction.

Public perception is also equally polarised on the nature of the two incidents – there are those who share a strange feeling that somehow Phelps had earned the right to cut loose a little bit after his Beijing performances and that his admission of smoking marijuana was a minor offence at best. On the other foot, Stevens was not only letting himself down significantly but all his teammates and the sport as a whole as well – a far greater crime in the eyes of many. A fundamental difference between individual and team sports perhaps?

Perception also dictates that smoking a joint is an adolescent slip while snorting cocaine amounts to hardcore drug abuse.

Of course, none of this is meant to condone drug taking in any way. Both men should have known better. Both men acted improperly. The shade of grey lies in the perceived severity of the failing.

Have they been fairly treated? It’s difficult to say with an absolute belief but then none of this is an absolute science. Each case is unique with its own pros and cons for each course of action.

The one thing that is abundantly clear is that there is no right answer across the board. Drug taking is undoubtedly bad. How bad is a moving feast.

With all the pre-conceptions that come with drugs that are within the public conscience, there are still any number of permutations. And that’s for the drugs we think we know about.

Pity the soon-to-be named chief executive of the new national anti-doping agency which will take full responsibility for drug testing of UK elite athletes as of later this year. For him or her, the difference between one drug and the other is even more complex and the repercussions even more severe.