An NFL vice president Thursday blamed the lead lawyer for Vikings Pat and Kevin Williams for leaking their positive tests results to the media in 2008 and confirmed other players tested positive for the same substance but weren't disciplined.
Adolpho Birch, NFL vice president of law and labor policy, brought major attitude to his responses to questions from the Williams' lawyer, Steve Rau, including asserting lawyer Peter Ginsberg leaked test results to reporters.
Birch said it "did not strike" him as a coincidence that in the initial news story about their tests, Kevin and Pat Williams' names surfaced with an Atlanta Falcons player also represented by Ginsberg. He called Ginsberg the "most logical" source of the reporter's information.
Rau said, "You're speculating?"
Birch said tartly, "It's a little more than speculation."
The notion that the Williams' own lawyer leaked their names strikes to the heart of their claims. The two are appealing their four-game suspensions for testing positive for Bumetanide, a banned substance that can be used as a masking agent for steroids. The players, who comprise the "Williams Wall" and are not related, say they took the over-the-counter dietary supplement StarCaps to help them shed water weight in July 2008. Bumetanide is an unlisted ingredient in StarCaps.
Ginsberg will go on the record Friday on whether he leaked news about the tests. "Absolutely not," he said after court Thursday. "And the NFL knows I wasn't the leak."
Also testifying Thursday were Bryan Finkle, a toxicologist for the NFL steroid program, Angelo Wright and Tom Condon, agents respectively for Pat and Kevin Williams.
The agents both testified that the players missed endorsement and earning opportunities because of the positive test. Both say neither player would likely be chosen for a future Pro Bowl or the NFL Hall of Fame with a positive test on his record.
Both agents said they were unaware that StarCaps were banned until after the Williamses tested positive. A December 2006 memo that put StarCaps on a list of products that couldn't be endorsed by NFL players ended up in Condon's junk e-mail mailbox, he said. Wright said he never saw it.
Birch testified that other players tested positive for Bumetanide in 2006 and 2007 but were not disciplined.
Vikings vice president Rob Brzezinski and coach Brad Childress are expected to testify Friday.
Rochelle Olson • 612-673-1747