Paul Kimmage

[yellowcard]

Some people just can't accept Kimmages hoesty. He is a brilliant journalist however and the problem is that he so brutally honest and straight to the point that people can't accept it. I thought he went a slight bit OTT on the Gavin press conference although he did also have a point. However the hysterical reaction of a large portion of Dublin fans was funny. People can accept criticism just as long as it is not on their own doorstep. Kimmage has never compromised his principles for money. Fitzgerald was totally out of his depth and whilst I sort of expected him to get schooled, the least he could have done was a little bit of research before the podcast took place.

[AZOffaly]

Is taking a painkilling injection cheating? If so I cheated several times.

Is taking painkillers when you don't need them?

That's not what you said earlier. You said taking a headache tablet or something.

If you take a substance that is banned then it's cheating, if it's not banned it's not cheating.

You're putting words in my mouth. I said it was performance enhancing.

Have you listened to the debate? There are very clear distinctions made and different parts of it cover different topics - what is defined as cheating, what is performance enhancing etc.

As for your final point, that's complete and utter bollocks. If it's not on the banned list it's fine, take whatever you want?! Non asthmatics using inhalers for example?

Performance enhancing has a clear implication of cheating these days. If you are being pedantic, then yes you are right. But then again everything is Performance Enhancing. Training enhances your performance. New Boots can enhance your performance. Fecking first aid and physio are performance enhancing if they allow you to perform at a higher level than you would with a tight hammy or a cut over your eye.

I think it was you, but someone said about taking headache tablets. If you have a headache and couldn't play without a tablet, then I don't see that as cheating, if it is nonetheless performance enhancing.

Hence my comment about banned v not banned. If you take cocaine because it gives you a mad burst of energy, just before a game, that's performance enhancing and cheating. If you take an anadin because you have a sore head, it's not.

If you take an inhaler, because you realise it gives you more aerobic capacity, but you don't need it? that's performance enhancing and cheating.
If you take an inhaler because you are asthmatic, that is performance enhancing but not cheating.

[gallsman]

There's nothing pedantic about it. Whether something is performance enhancing or not it's a matter of fact. Either it does or it doesn't. We'll agree to disagree.

What about if you have a prescription for asthma but abuse it for physical gain? Is that cheating?

Half the discussion was about the actual concept of what is cheating/what is performance enhancing etc. Kimmage agreed that taking a paracetamol for a headache isn't cheating. I would agree. Routinely taking painkillers twice a day throughout your career would be cheating in my view too.

[seafoid]

Some people just can't accept Kimmages hoesty. He is a brilliant journalist however and the problem is that he so brutally honest and straight to the point that people can't accept it. I thought he went a slight bit OTT on the Gavin press conference although he did also have a point. However the hysterical reaction of a large portion of Dublin fans was funny. People can accept criticism just as long as it is not on their own doorstep. Kimmage has never compromised his principles for money. Fitzgerald was totally out of his depth and whilst I sort of expected him to get schooled, the least he could have done was a little bit of research before the podcast took place.

Journalism is like everything else. Most of it is crap. Kimmage isn't.

[AZOffaly]

There's nothing pedantic about it. Whether something is performance enhancing or not it's a matter of fact. Either it does or it doesn't. We'll agree to disagree.

What about if you have a prescription for asthma but abuse it for physical gain? Is that cheating?

Half the discussion was about the actual concept of what is cheating/what is performance enhancing etc. Kimmage agreed that taking a paracetamol for a headache isn't cheating. I would agree. Routinely taking painkillers twice a day throughout your career would be cheating in my view too.

I agree with most of that. I just think you are ascribing a nefarious motive to perfectly normal activities and calling them 'performance enhancing' to make a point. Performance enhancing is not a dirty phrase. Performance enhancing using illegal methods is cheating.

So I absolutely agree, taking painkillers to dull feeling in rugby for example, when you don't need them, is cheating.
Taking an inhaler to excess when you don't need to is cheating too.

Taking paracetemol for a headache or a sore arm is not.

If we want to argue about cheating, lets define cheating, and take it from there. I don't think we'd argue much at all.

[IolarCoisCuain]

Kimmage is ultra consistent with his moral indignation and pursuit of cheats, there's no grey areas with him, It must be totally exhausting. I greatly admire him but he annoys the f**k out of me at times as well, a lot of innuendo and half truths fired about without evidence, but then again I do realise he's entitled to air his suspicions. What I find most annoying is the basking in reflected glory sycophants who weigh in behind him on every twitter spat, but then again the Dubs, Rugger buggers, cyclists all close ranks when he has the bit between his teeth against them.

I'm with him on the Dubs thing, they did cheat and he called it, but I would have done the same in their situation so I wouldn't care if anyone called my a cheat in such circumstances tbh.

What is clean? Kimmage said that a year or more ago and it's a question with lots & lots of answers and even more questions.

He's a fantastic journalist.

The libel laws in this country are very severe Benny. The onus of proof on a journalist is the more or less the same as needed for a criminal conviction. It shouldn't be. The journalist's job should be to raise legitimate questions, but he or she can't do that if the person being questioned then sues and the publisher can't take the risk of going bust in the courts.

People are confused about this because US culture is so big in our culture. In the US, you can publish before and after pictures of football players and ask if someone got that big through steroids. If you do it here, you get the solicitor's letter in the morning and no publisher is currently willing to risk losing so much money over a case that, if won, won't make the publication any money in the long run. Who changes paper because someone defended a libel case?

You might remember a book was published a few years ago called GAAconomics: https://www.amazon.co.uk/GAAconomics-Secret-Life-Money-GAA-ebook/dp/B00EQ8J11G. Who was named as being paid to play/manage in that book? Nobody. And we all know it's going on. That's what the libel laws do to open debate in this country.

[screenexile]

The flip side is that someone is named in the wrong and then they're vilified for the whole "no smoke without fire" nature of Irish Society!!

[gallsman]

There's nothing pedantic about it. Whether something is performance enhancing or not it's a matter of fact. Either it does or it doesn't. We'll agree to disagree.

What about if you have a prescription for asthma but abuse it for physical gain? Is that cheating?

Half the discussion was about the actual concept of what is cheating/what is performance enhancing etc. Kimmage agreed that taking a paracetamol for a headache isn't cheating. I would agree. Routinely taking painkillers twice a day throughout your career would be cheating in my view too.

I agree with most of that. I just think you are ascribing a nefarious motive to perfectly normal activities and calling them 'performance enhancing' to make a point. Performance enhancing is not a dirty phrase. Performance enhancing using illegal methods is cheating.

So I absolutely agree, taking painkillers to dull feeling in rugby for example, when you don't need them, is cheating.
Taking an inhaler to excess when you don't need to is cheating too.

Taking paracetemol for a headache or a sore arm is not.

If we want to argue about cheating, lets define cheating, and take it from there. I don't think we'd argue much at all.

I'm not ascribing anything to anything. Again, you've joined the debate late so have perhaps missed the context.

Part of what Kimmage was trying to get across was a whole discussion about what do phrases likes "performance enhancing" and "cheating" actually mean - that's the context of discussions around painkillers/cortisone shots/inhalers etc. Fitzgerald, displaying his idiocy, struggled badly with this.

It comes back to the claim by Fitzgerald that if done under medical supervision, it's ok. You yourself initially said "If you take a substance that is banned then it's cheating, if it's not banned it's not cheating." This is clearly bollocks.

In reality doping/performance enhancing/cheating isn't black and white - it's very, very grey.

[seafoid]

I just listened to.it. Kimmage wiped the floor with him. I think rugby is fucked. If it isn't concussion it will be addiction that kills it.

And the Dubs were a disgrace 

I took a few notes

Fitz : Inside the setup. They are endeavouring to do their best. Are you angry. Have they got things wrong. I am sure they have. I am not a doctor. First generation of players with this ultra muscle physique. We have entrusted the doctors.  WADA are in all the time. 
PK  : Concerns about player health. Benezech
Médicalisation of performance in rugby. Cortisone . Anti inflammatoires. Caffeine. Painkillers. Addiction. 
You don't know what I know. You don't know who has spoken to me.  
Fitz : Under the direction of a doctor  . Within the rules of the sport. 

PK Lewis Moody. Inflammation of the colon.
Those are the rules. You go through them to show me where it is ok to do what Dublin did last Sunday. 37:00
 Three Mayo players are wrestled to the ground in the last few minutes. Disgraceful way to win all Ireland. Cheating.

Fitz The bully thing. Incredibly aggressive. People are afraid of you. I think you are a bully

[Stall the Bailer]

I would see it as taking something that improves your base/normal performance as performance enhancing as wrong. While taking something that just helps you to perform, but not beyond your normal standards as not performance enhancing or headache tablets and the likes. Not an easy thing to define.

[AZOffaly]

I just listened to.it. Kimmage wiped the floor with him. I think rugby is fucked. If it isn't concussion it will be addiction that kills it.

And the Dubs were a disgrace 

I took a few notes

Fitz : Inside the setup. They are endeavouring to do their best. Are you angry. Have they got things wrong. I am sure they have. I am not a doctor. First generation of players with this ultra muscle physique. We have entrusted the doctors.  WADA are in all the time.
PK  : Concerns about player health. Benezech
Médicalisation of performance in rugby. Cortisone . Anti inflammatoires. Caffeine. Painkillers. Addiction. 
You don't know what I know. You don't know who has spoken to me.   
Fitz : Under the direction of a doctor  . Within the rules of the sport.

PK Lewis Moody. Inflammation of the colon.
Those are the rules. You go through them to show me where it is ok to do what Dublin did last Sunday. 37:00
Three Mayo players are wrestled to the ground in the last few minutes. Disgraceful way to win all Ireland. Cheating.

Fitz The bully thing. Incredibly aggressive. People are afraid of you. I think you are a bully

I actually agree with you. The only time Fitzgerald was coherent really was when he clearly outlined why he thinks Kimmage is a bully. For what it's worth I think he has a very aggressive debating technique, has veered into obsession with this issue, and is quite an angry man.

However, none of that precludes him from being right, and while I think it's a bit uncomfortable for someone who is so vocal on drugs in sport starting to speak about cynicism in a team game, I think he may be spot on about Rugby. Again I stood in Thomond Park on Saturday and just marvelled at the punishment these guys give out and take, and they'll do it again next week. Then you look at the sheer size of them. Something is wrong there.

[seafoid]

I just listened to.it. Kimmage wiped the floor with him. I think rugby is fucked. If it isn't concussion it will be addiction that kills it.

And the Dubs were a disgrace 

I took a few notes

Fitz : Inside the setup. They are endeavouring to do their best. Are you angry. Have they got things wrong. I am sure they have. I am not a doctor. First generation of players with this ultra muscle physique. We have entrusted the doctors.  WADA are in all the time.
PK  : Concerns about player health. Benezech
Médicalisation of performance in rugby. Cortisone . Anti inflammatoires. Caffeine. Painkillers. Addiction. 
You don't know what I know. You don't know who has spoken to me.   
Fitz : Under the direction of a doctor  . Within the rules of the sport.

PK Lewis Moody. Inflammation of the colon.
Those are the rules. You go through them to show me where it is ok to do what Dublin did last Sunday. 37:00
Three Mayo players are wrestled to the ground in the last few minutes. Disgraceful way to win all Ireland. Cheating.

Fitz The bully thing. Incredibly aggressive. People are afraid of you. I think you are a bully

I actually agree with you. The only time Fitzgerald was coherent really was when he clearly outlined why he thinks Kimmage is a bully. For what it's worth I think he has a very aggressive debating technique, has veered into obsession with this issue, and is quite an angry man.

However, none of that precludes him from being right, and while I think it's a bit uncomfortable for someone who is so vocal on drugs in sport starting to speak about cynicism in a team game, I think he may be spot on about Rugby. Again I stood in Thomond Park on Saturday and just marvelled at the punishment these guys give out and take, and they'll do it again next week. Then you look at the sheer size of them. Something is wrong there.

Calling him a bully is a STFU technique. Fitz kept on coming back to the same points. In the setup. Approved by doctors.
And he was passive aggressive. He would not engage with the facts. He kept on repeating that Kimmage was a cheat. I think he was projecting. He is a bully. Bullies project what they are onto other people. I thought Fitz was very aggressive and underhand.

In his  book Carbon Detox, George Marshall argues that people are not persuaded by information. Our views are formed by the views of the people with whom we mix. Of the narratives that might penetrate these circles, we are more likely to listen to those that offer us some reward.

Everyone Fitz knows says there is no problem. The IRFU says there is no problem. Same with concussion. That kid in Ballymena died. Nothing changed.

Rugby is a sport of attrition. We do not know the damage that they are doing to themselves.

There have never been players as big as they are now. There is a freak show aspect to the photos of players and their girlfriends at awards ceremonies. 

[easytiger95]

Could I suggest that the level of debate on this subject, automatically precludes Kimmage from being right? If most of the posters here follow through their train of thoughts, you end up at there being a lot of ambiguity and grey areas. So how can you support the view point of Kimmage, who is completely black and white on the subject? I don't think nuance is a cop out. Anyone who doesn't understand the difference between a yellow card offence and systemic doping is either a moron, or trying to win an argument. At all costs. Said argument started about winning. At all costs. Kimmage obviously doesn't do irony.

I didn't listen to this debate as I believe the whole premise (ie. that Dublin's "actions" in the last two minutes are the same as a premeditated conspiracy to dope) was conflated to make headlines for Newstalk. Well done them. I did listen to the paper review the previous week, and I thought Kimmage was a disgrace. He is aggressive, ignorant and completely dismissive of others. I don't think writing "Rough Ride" or pursuing Lance Armstrong, admirable and heroic as both were, entitles someone to moral carte blanche or permanent occupancy of the high horse for the rest of their natural lives.

Again, with the irony - Kimmage's own reputation as a crusader rests on there being a crusade - and this one re the Dubs is a complete media creation. Listen to the paper review again, and Gavin's mortal sin with Kimmage appears to be having a truculent attitude and being 20 minutes late to a press conference. Having spent a lot of my working life waiting for managers to appear at interviews such as the one in Croke Park, I'll tell you, 20 mins after a trophy was given, was actually a result for the journos. Of course, not all of them had to go off to visit their mothers in Beaumont hospital - which kimmage actually says!

I notice people talking about libel and this is why Kimmage has to cover his truth telling in allusions and metaphors. Well it could also be that he is a controversialist and a catastrophe tourist - he takes day trips to sports he doesn't know well, latches on to one "fact" that he leverages into a narrative, reaps the whirlwind, and walks away.

And what is left? Well, I could say that he has tarnished the dubs three in a row, but he hasn't and this will be forgotten about before long. But he has tarnished his reputation for me (not that he'd care) - but to invest such anger and vitriol into something so clearlynot substantive makes me wonder about all his other crusades and which windmill he will be tilting at next.

[AZOffaly]

You should listen to it easytiger. To be honest it's not that much about the Dubs in the end, it's more about Kimmage's problems with Fitzgerald's tweets. For such a crusader, he has remarkably thin skin.

He is right about Rugby though.

[seafoid]

The Dubs only get mentioned at the end.