Are our Athletes being managed properly?

Recent happenings in the world of Jamaican athletes have caused me to wonder if the managers of our athletes know what they are doing.  The failure of a drug test by reigning Olympic and World 100 metres champion Shelly Ann Frasier has revealed a weakness in the management process.  The story given by the management team is that Miss Frasier had a toothache and went to a dentist to resolve the problem, so far no problem.  The dentist treated the symptoms with one of the usual painkillers.  The problem arose when the substance that was given to her turned out to be on the banned list and caused her to fail a drug test.  The IAAF has a procedure whereby an athlete can declare any substance that was taken for medical purposes.  What is not clear however, is why neither the athlete nor the management team filed for the exemption.

At a time when Jamaica’s athletes are under the microscope this has caused more discussions to be had about whether are athletes are clean or not.  It is extremely unlikely that her team was not aware of her situation and the question must be asked as to whether they were aware of the rules.  Given that Bruce James is part of the team and that he certainly knows all of the rules then I have to assume that her team overlooked the requirement.  That mistake could cause her to receive a ban of up to two years and thus eliminate her earnings from athletics.  This type of error is unacceptable as the team is responsible for monitoring everything that the athlete consumes and should only be excused in cases where the athlete lied about it.

The second case is the statement by Usain Bolt that he will stop sprinting in 2012 and will probably do another event like the long jump and that he will retire in 2016.  Now, Mr. Bolt is free to do what he likes but these pronouncements may encourage sponsors to restrict their endorsements to shorter periods.  Even if he were to break the long jump world record he would not receive the attention that he has garnered for running which is the more popular event.  The management team must monitor and clear all press statements and interviews to ensure that the athlete does not say things that will hurt his career.

The management of athletes involves knowing what they eat and drink, what they say, where they run, managing their finances and their health among other things.  It is more than a full time job and may require several persons to carry out the tasks.  The team must ensure that sufficient resources are devoted to the welfare of the athlete and not to the amount of money that can be made from them.