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NFL suspends R.J. Dill for taking testosterone while not in the NFL

Dallas Cowboys v San Diego Chargers

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NFL players remain subject to the league’s strict performance-enhancing drug-testing policy even after they think their careers have ended, as a little-known player named R.J. Dill has found out the hard way.

Dill, an offensive lineman with the Cowboys who was suspended for the first four games of this season, said in a statement today that the banned substance he took -- prescription testosterone -- was something he needed for medical reasons, and he only took it after he failed to make a roster last year and thought his career was over. That doesn’t matter to the NFL. Testosterone is banned by the NFL except when a player gets an exemption for extraordinary circumstances (such as a player whose body stopped producing testosterone because he lost his testicles to cancer), and so when Dill returned to the NFL and tested positive for testosterone, he was suspended.

“I saw my doctor, and blood tests revealed that my testosterone levels were very low,” Dill said. “My doctor suggested that I undergo testosterone replacement therapy, and I accepted the recommended treatment. I completed one round of testosterone replacement therapy in November of 2014, and almost immediately, I felt like my old self again. At this time I was not under contract with any NFL team, nor was I actively pursuing an NFL career.

“Then, in January of 2015, I unexpectedly received a call from the Dallas Cowboys. They were interested in signing me to a futures contract, and after passing a physical, I signed a contract and immersed myself in training for the 2015 NFL season. Unfortunately, my excitement was subdued when in May 2015 I was told by the NFL that I had failed a drug test. While my doctor had told me that the residual amounts of the testosterone would be out of my system about eight weeks after treatment, that was not accurate, and I failed a drug test a full six months after I had received the prescribed treatment.”

Dill attempted to get a therapeutic use exemption, but the NFL declined it, and so he is suspended. Realistically, Dill probably wasn’t going to make the 53-player roster anyway, and there’s a good chance he’ll get cut soon and be out of the league anyway.

The league’s rules are tough for players who have a legitimate medical need for testosterone and tough for players who use substances while they’re not even under contract to an NFL team, but that’s how it should be. Handing out permission slips for players to take otherwise banned substances would lead to huge numbers of players using those substances to get an edge. And allowing players to get out of the PED-testing policy by declaring their retirement would lead to a rash of players calling themselves retired, using banned substances, and then coming out of retirement and returning bigger and stronger thanks to PED use.

“It is very difficult for me to accept that a suspension is imposed by the NFL after I followed treatment prescribed by a medical professional during a time when I was not employed by an NFL team,” Dill said.

It’s easy to see why Dill feels that way. But it’s also easy to see why the NFL feels that it has to suspend him.