The Dark Side: Secrets of the Sports Dopers

"The Dark Side: Secrets of the Sports Dopers", investigating professional athletes' possible use of performance-enhancing substances, is an episode of Al Jazeera Investigates which was broadcast by Al Jazeera English and Al Jazeera America. The documentary identified Peyton Manning, Ryan Howard, Ryan Zimmerman, James Harrison, and Clay Matthews III.

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On December 27, 2015, Al Jazeera English and Al Jazeera America released a report conducted by the Al Jazeera Investigative Unit called The Dark Side: Secrets of the Sports Dopers which investigated professional athletes' potential use of Performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) naming several prominent athletes as having received drugs from Charles Sly, a pharmacist who had worked at the Guyer Anti-Aging Clinic in Indianapolis during the fall of 2011. The report involved Liam Collins, a British hurdler, going undercover in an attempt to obtain banned substances from Sly and other medical professionals. The report claimed that Manning's wife, Ashley, had been shipped off-label human growth hormone (HGH) by the Guyer Institute during the fall of 2011 while Manning was out with a severe neck injury, with the intention of hiding that Manning was the one actually receiving the drugs; as well as several other athletes been provided the banned hormone supplement Delta-2. Moreover, Sly spoke with apparent knowledge about doping and tossed out several athletes like Howard, Zimmerman, Manning and fellow football players Mike Neal and Dustin Keller.[1][2][3]

Sly said on a hidden camera record:

Reactions

Manning told ESPN's Lisa Salters about the reports, on an interview on the morning of the 27th for ESPN Sunday NFL Countdown: "'Disgusted is how I feel. Sickened by it. I’m not sure I understand how someone can make something up about somebody, admit he’s made it up and yet somehow it gets published in a story. I don’t understand that. Maybe you can explain it to me, somebody else can. It’s completely fabricated, complete trash, garbage. It makes me sick it brings Ashley into it. Her medical history, her medical privacy being violated. That makes me sick. I don’t understand that. It’s not right. I don’t understand it.'[6]" Salters pointed other cases have been seen in which athletes deny first and then eventually admit allegations and Manning answered he cannot speak for others and he knows how hard he worked.[7] Nevertheless, Manning also stated he had visited the Guyer Institute 35 times during 2011 and that he had received both medication and treatment from Guyer during this time.[7] Sly recanted his story and requested the report not to be aired via a YouTube video following the release of the report.[8][9]

Further investigations

Sly said he had never seen the Mannings and told ESPN's Chris Mortensen that he is not a pharmacist and was not at the Guyer Institute in 2011, as Al Jazeera claimed, but state licensing records indicate that someone named "Charles David Sly" was licensed as a pharmacy intern in Indiana from April 2010 to May 2013 and that his license expired May 1, 2013.[25] Al Jazeera later confirmed that Sly had worked at the Guyer Institute during the Fall of 2011.[26] Sly also claimed to ESPN that the reporter involved, Collins, had taken advantage of him during a vulnerable time in his life as Sly's fiancée had allegedly died, although Sly refers to his fiancée, "Karen", several times in the present tense during his conversations with Collins and gave no indication to Collins that she had died.[2] Sly had also described one of the athletes mentioned, Mike Neal, as a good friend and told in the documentary he had spent about six weeks in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where Neal played; and while on Green Bay, Sly was introduced by Neal to several of his teammates, in a roster which has included players like Matthews III and Julius Peppers, both whom Sly mentioned on camera. Neal served a four-game suspension for doping in 2012.[27]