Colabello still looking for answers following suspension
Chris Colabello, the indefatigable Toronto Blue Jays journeyman slapped with an 80-game suspension last week, won't deny that traces of dehydrochlormethyltestosterone made its way into his urine, but he insists he has no idea how they got there.
In an exclusive interview with Sportsnet's Jamie Campbell released Tuesday, Colabello unsuccessfully fought back tears as he pleaded that he "would never, have never, and will never compromise the integrity of baseball."
"I won't rest until the day I figure out how this happened," Colabello said. "The damage has already been done to me emotionally and mentally. I'm never going to get that back. I just need to figure out why. Figure out where it came from. And then go from there."
Frankly, the distraught 32-year-old said, intentionally taking a banned substance would've been better than his current predicament. He could've just apologized and moved on.
"It would be so awesome for me if I could stand here in front of you and tell you that I did this," Colabello said. "I know how the world works. I know how things are. I'm not naive or stupid. I've seen the way this has played out. Guys have done this stuff in the past, they've come out and said 'I'm really sorry guys, I didn't mean to' or 'I made a mistake.' And then people move on. They wipe their hands of it and they forgive people. But I can't stand in front of a camera and apologize."
In his efforts to ascertain how the banned substance known as turinabol got into his system, Colabello - who said he passed 20 drug tests in the last four years - has gone to "bewildering" lengths, sending in every piece of medication he's taken and even trying to determine if a hand cream or toothpaste could've triggered a positive test.
Still, despite Colabello's protestations, Dr. Stuart Phillips, a kinesiology professor at McMaster University and an expert in exercise metabolism said it's not probable those DHCMT metabolites appeared in his urine inadvertently.
"If there's any deniability on Chris Colabello's part, it's that it could potentially have entered his system inadvertently. Is that possible? Sure," Phillips told Sportsnet's Arden Zwelling. "It’s possible to win Lotto 6/49 as well. But it's unlikely. Highly unlikely."