In a decision that could affect the Milwaukee Brewers’ chances of repeating as National League Central champions, reigning NL MVP Ryan Braun has officially had his appeal heard of his 50-game suspension for testing positive for elevated levels of testosterone.
The appeal on Thursday came just two days before Braun will accept his MVP award at the New York Chapter of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America’s dinner Saturday night. Some have called for Braun to give the award back, but the BWAA says it won’t take it back. But his acceptance speech certainly should be interesting.
A decision by the panel, which includes MLB Players Association executive director Michael Weiner, MLB executive vice president for labor relations Rob Manfred and independent arbitrator Shyam Das, is not expected to come before Braun accepts his award.
When the positive drug test was first reported last month, Braun had a spokesman issue a statement saying there were circumstances supporting “Ryan’s complete innocence.” Under the joint drug agreement between baseball teams and the players’ association, Braun will have to prove “the presence of a prohibited substance in his urine was not due to his fault or negligence.”
Braun and his representatives have strongly denied that he took a performance-enhancing drug and were expected to challenge the “insanely high” levels of his test on several fronts. Those challenges could include the veracity of the test itself, chain of custody issues or an inadvertent ingestion of a substance or drug on the banned list. The MLB drug policy rules prohibit players from taking any banned drugs or substances, even if accidentally. According to a source, Braun tested “insanely high, the highest ever for anyone who has ever taken a test, twice the level of the highest test ever taken.”
As Braun tries to avoid a 50-game suspension, the burden is a heavy one to overcome. A baseball arbitrator has never ordered a suspension overturned following a grievance hearing.
The 28-year-old, who was the 2007 NL Rookie of the Year, hit .312 with 33 homers and 111 RBIs last season and led Milwaukee to the NL Championship Series, where the Brewers lost to the eventual World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals.
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