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Excellent analysis as usual. The Tennis Industry is indeed fortunate to have a brilliant mind, dig deep into relevant facts.

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I agree with the "carefully curated", especially the quote you cite which jumped off the report to me as a bit too convenient. Like you and everyone I don't know and won't know the truth of things. What I do know is that, given that the facts accepted by both ITAA and WADA, it seems insane that Sinner's physio - who those facts clearly establish as highly negligent - can go on and be an ATP physio for Berrettini!!

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There is a huge logic flaw that undermines the conclusions of this article.

Mr. Rothenberg believe it is reasonable to cast doubt on Sinner’s entire season of excellence from January to November (and counting) based on the finding of 86 trillionths of a gram per ml of his urine in March (btw, Mr. Rothenberg, according to literature, for example https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27085012/, clostebol is detectable for up to a month from the date of exposure. Two tests taken 8 days apart measure the effect of the same exposure, so referring to them as 2 failed tests is misleading. If he had been tested also every day in between, would you talk of 9 failed tests?) .

How this is reasonable is explained in the last paragraph, where the author tries to establish a very audacious cause-relationship effect by simply using the word measurably, linking the presumed effect, a very measurable series of matches and tournaments wins, to the presumed cause, an alleged measurable performance enhancement provided by a generic doping agent (“substances like clostebol”).

The problem is that the author does not even attempt to provide a measure of this second quantity, the performance enhancement over an entire year provided by the 86 picograms/ml of clostebol that were found, which is a necessary step to verify whether the two measurements coincide or not. It is a known fact , not only to those familiar with science, but basically with every basic activity that requires a minimum of thinking, that to establish a cause effect-relationship between two events, it is not sufficient that both are measurable.

While I can understand that Mr. Rothenberg, does not possess the necessary competence to make that measurement, I can understand much less why he completely discounted the opinion of the world experts on the subject who have already made that measure and unanimously excluded any performance benefit. Prof. Cowan for example wrote “ Even if the administration had been intentional, the minute amounts likely to have been administered would not have had [...] any relevant doping, or performance enhancing, effect upon the Player.” as anyone can read in the ITIA report.

Just this simple check would have led maybe even Mr. Rothenberg to the obligatory conclusion that the measured value of performance enhancement of 0 that is provided by the amount of clostebol found by the test had exactly 0 probability of being the cause of Sinner's excellent breakout season. Just this simple check would have led him to change his final “We cannot be sure” into “Of course, we can be sure, with 100% confidence".

How to explain this missed check? I can only guess that either Mr. Rothenberg ignores that a trial has already taken place, in which experts have evaluated the evidence, saving us amateurs to have to opine on matters on which we have no competence. Or the problem was math, which for many can be an obscure discipline. Realizing how small a picogram is, 10 elevated to -12 of a gram is not very intuitive. One has just to think about how rich he’d be with a trillion dollars, to realize how minuscule its inverse is

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Thanks for writing this. I've been a Sinner fan, but the casual dismissal of the doping allegations ("he's a good guy! who microdoses for doping anyway, lol") are troubling. Microdosing is an established route for cheaters. Italian athletes are using Clostebol. (https://honestsport.substack.com/p/italys-clostebol-doping-crisis-across/)

I started watching tennis in the 90s. Petr Korda was a top 10 player who never got within a sniff of a major until the won the Australian Open. Later that year he tested positive for a banned substance. At the time, the reaction was "well, obviously it didn't help him win." It didn't? Actually, I think it did. He never got close to a major final again.

The framing tennis uses for athletes who run into trouble is weird. Zverev was lauded for succeeding despite the problems he created off the court. Sinner is lauded for succeeding despite the stress of two positive drug tests, a problem he created.

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