World Anti-Doping Agency calls on Major League Baseball to implement HGH testing

Leaders of Major League Baseball's players' union have been bad-mouthing the science of human growth hormone testing for years, and have amplified their skepticism in the month since a British rugby player became the first pro athlete banned for a positive HGH laboratory test.

Now the World Anti-Doping Agency is pushing back against the criticism, calling on Thursday for the league and the union, the Major League Baseball Players Association, to implement HGH testing, which at this point would involve collecting blood samples from players - a line the union doesn't want to cross.

"We continue to read statements from the MLB Commissioner and MLBPA representatives questioning the appropriateness of implementing blood testing in their league. This is nonsense," said John Fahey, the president of WADA, in a statement posted on the organization's Web site. "Joint blood and urine testing is the only way to go for sports organizations to ensure that they use proper means to protect the integrity of their sport."

A representative of the players' union did not immediately respond to a call on Thursday, and an MLB spokesman did not offer any comment on Fahey's statement.

Since 2002, baseball has conducted mandatory urine sample collection for steroid testing, but there is currently no detection method for HGH in urine. While MLB and other professional leagues have funded research into an HGH urine test, Fahey said such a test is still "years away."

Police actions and tell-all confessions suggest that HGH, which is thought to help repair tissue and improve strength, is wildly popular in sports. In the second paragraph his 2007 report on performance-enhancing drugs in baseball, former Senator George Mitchell wrote that the use of HGH in baseball had risen since 2002.

Following the release of the Mitchell Report, MLB commissioner Bud Selig said the league would support the utilization of a "commercially available and practical test for HGH" whenever it became a reality, regardless of whether the test was based on blood or urine samples.

Last month, the U.K. Anti-Doping Agency announced that rugby player Terry Newton Rugby Football League had accepted a two-year ban based on signs of HGH being found in a blood sample taken from him late last year. Newton's case was the world's first "analytical positive" for HGH, meaning it was based on a laboratory finding, not a courtroom admission or another indirect confirmation of an athlete's use.

After Newton's ban was announced, Selig's office suggested baseball was reassessing its policies, particularly regarding the minor leagues.