For most, the efforts taken in recent years within baseball and other sports to eliminate the use of performing-enhancing drugs are a step in a positive direction. For that minority of fans, however, who want their athletes to be as big and strong as modern science can possibly make them, there is a new hope, and it comes in the form of a rejuvenated television show.

If indeed there is a place in sports for steroid usage to flourish, or at least to exist peacefully, it is on NBC?s revived series ?American Gladiators,? which shook off the rust and returned to airwaves in early January after a decade-long hiatus.

With a new cast of gladiators boasting so much muscle even BALCO founder Victor Conte would be impressed, the show chooses to defy the stance taken in the last couple of years by Major League Baseball and fans of the game against steroids by flexing its unnaturally giant biceps in the face of controversy.

Though the show doesn?t exactly come out and proclaim the gladiators are pumped full of performance-enhancing drugs, it wouldn?t be too much of surprise to find out the ?athletes? are in fact using.

While the television show may not technically qualify as a sport, it has certainly marketed itself to sports fans, and it?s classified as a ?sports game show,? so practically speaking, it at least occupies a spot in the gray area currently shared by the WWE and ballroom dancing on the outskirts of sports.

Admitted and accepted steroid usage could work on the show much better than it has in the other sports in which it has recently appeared, because that?s all ?Gladiators? is: a television show.

It?s clear that steroids don?t have a place in international competition. Former track and field star Marion Jones was recently handed down a six month jail sentence and thus saw her legacy, career and records taken away because of the performance-enhancing drugs. And they certainly don?t work in baseball, where the Mitchell Report is on its way to becoming as synonymous with the sport as chewing tobacco or Cracker Jack. People who invest their lives in sports are supposed to represent the best athletes our society has to offer, and steroids just don?t fit into that equation.

However, unlike other ?sports,? nobody is watching ?American Gladiators? for the purity of it, and nobody is searching for redeeming values or role models in a program that boasts a hulking woman named Hellga (yes, the spelling is accurate) as one of its regulars. In fact, if some of the gladiators admitted to using steroids, it might be even better for ratings. It would give viewers even more incentive to root for the challengers in  somewhat good-versus-evil confrontation.

As it is now, little about the show comes off as legitimate. Most dialogue between co-hosts Hulk Hogan and Laila Ali and the challengers sounds incredibly scripted and borders on sickeningly cheesy. It’s become hard to believe that the same guy who defeated Andre the Giant in Wrestlemania III is the one asking such ridiculous questions to each contestant that it might be better to just watch the show on mute. So, as long as ?Gladiators? already comes off as phony, why not just add steroids to the mix? Could the show?s credibility really deteriorate any further?

Is there any real consequence for allowing ?American Gladiators? to become a steroid safe-haven? Let Titan and Militia and Fury become as big as they please. Just go ahead and make the gladiators as big and as mean as possible. It?ll give fans of ?roids a place for the drugs to thrive. Plus, if steroids aren?t taboo on the show, it could also work as a refuge for former athletes who have been caught using.

From now on, anyone caught using steroids should just be banished to ?American Gladiators.? Wouldn?t it be more fun to see someone like Barry Bonds swinging for the heads of challengers at The Joust than for the fences at the ballpark near you?

Regardless of whether or not the show embraces the steroid culture, you?ve got to take a step back and realize what?s going on here. If the last decade has been the steroid generation, the next one looks like it?s going to be the steroid backlash era. Yet, even as we use one hand to point our fingers at the ?cheaters? ruining our sports, the other hand is on the remote, flipping to watch a show that practically glorifies the steroids faulted with corrupting them.

Unless ?American Gladiators? embraces steroids fully and openly, supporting the show while admonishing the athletes in other sports on the juice is just hypocritical.

Mike is a sophomore majoring in journalism. If you think he?d make a good challenger for ?American Gladiators,? you obviously don?t know him very well. If you?d like to get to know him better, he can be reached at [email protected].