There’s Nothing Positive About This One

Maid Marion, some called her.

She was beauty. She was toughness. She was fable.

She was Mia Hamm with a bigger smile, Michelle Kwan with a bigger leap, Serena Williams with more steel.

She was Title IX to the power of 10, one of the first female athletes whose popularity bridged the gap from niche to national, from cult to late-night TV couch, from women to men.

Marion Jones was beloved because her grace had no limits, and her inspiration had no gender.

Simply a great athlete, she was.

Simply a great big fat lying drug-cheating athlete.

Allegedly.

Jones has tested positive for the banned performance-enhancer EPO, and if her “B” urine sample later says otherwise, I’ll give Floyd Landis a ride down the Harbor Freeway on my handlebars.

She’s busted. She’s finished. She’s a fraud.

And if I sound angry, it’s because, of all the drug cheats that have been exposed in recent weeks, her mission was larger and her abuse was greater.

Justin Gatlin? Nice little sprinter but, c’mon, is his picture hanging on any bedroom wall other than his own?

Landis? A quirky story that appeared, and disappeared, as suddenly as a frumpy bike messenger.

Jones was more enduring. Jones was more symbolic. Jones was about more than Marion Jones.

She was about empowerment. She was about self-esteem. She showed how a smart, talented woman could succeed in a man’s world without losing herself.

“She captured the essence of what women in sports could be,” said Ron Rapoport, a former sports columnist who several years ago wrote a book about Jones. “She was one of the first great Title IX babies -- ‘I am woman, I am strong.’ She captured that feeling among young girls. This would be her legacy.”

This is why, even though Jones has been trailed by steroid allegations since winning five medals in the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, it seemed as if nobody really wanted her to get caught.

You wondered if she was dirty when a drug calendar bearing her initials turned up in the BALCO investigation.

You figured something was wrong when her ex-husband, an allegedly steroid-shooting shotputter named C.J. Hunter, claimed she was dirty, even explaining to federal agents how she would inject herself.

You questioned when the father of her child, Tim Montgomery, was busted for steroids, and when her former coach, Trevor Graham, was being investigated for steroids.

She walked like a cheat, and talked like a cheat, but she was always missing the final ingredient to the making of a cheat.

She had never failed a drug test.

So, unlike with Barry Bonds, sports fans ultimately sighed and looked the other way.

I mean, she was somebody’s mother, for Pete’s sake.

And then this summer, she failed the mother of all tests, one administered after she won the 100 meters at the U.S. Track and Field championships in Indianapolis.

When those test results were revealed Friday, the guy working the public-address microphone at that meet was nearly speechless.

“This is really deflating ... just deflating ... that’s all I can tell you,” said Scott Davis, a track announcer who is better known as the longtime director of the Mt. San Antonio College Relays in Walnut. “It just seems like this thing is permeating all of sports now. It’s like, what is real anymore?”

Not Marion Jones, that’s for sure.

In Rapoport’s book -- “See How She Runs: Marion Jones & the Making of a Champion” -- she is quoted thusly:

“All I can do is continue to be clean and to be around people who are clean.”

Strike one. Strike two.

Four years later, in 2004, Jones was involved in another book, called “Marion Jones: Life in the Fast Lane.”

This time, the steroid quotes were in large, red letters:

“I have always been unequivocal in my opinion: I am against performance-enhancing drugs. I have never taken them and I will never take them.”

Strike three.

“This is such a black eye for the sport,” Davis said.

Only, it’s about more than track and field.

It’s about hope and glory. It’s about a Thousand Oaks girl who watched the carrying of the 1984 Olympic torch and believed in its magic and followed it with a charm and passion that worked its way into a nation’s skin.

While she was apparently pulling down her pants and sticking a steroid-filled syringe into her own.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

*

Run to glory

Marion Jones’ achievements:

* Five-time Olympic medalist, two-time Olympian (2000, 2004).

* Became the first female track and field athlete to win five medals in one Olympics in Sydney in 2000, winning three gold (100m, 200m, 4x400m relay), and two bronze (long jump, 4x100m relay).

* Two-time high school athlete of the year in 1991-92 while at Rio Mesa High in Oxnard. In 1993 transferred to Thousand Oaks High.

* Two-time world 100m champion (‘97, ‘99); 2001 world 200m gold medalist.

* Returned to competition in 2004 after giving birth to her first child (June 2003).

--

Source: U.S. Olympic Team;USTA