Associated Press
IRVING, Texas ó Terrell Owens isn’t worried about being tested for drugs as many as 24 times a year now. Still, he’s frustrated.
“They can test me 1,000 times,” the Dallas Cowboys receiver said Wednesday. “I know that I don’t use illegal stuff, so I’m good.”
Owens just isn’t very happy that what he insists was a simple miscommunication landed him in the NFL’s “reasonable cause” testing program after he missed a random test.
“Especially with everything with the steroids and performance-enhancing drugs, for me to be put out there in that light, I think it’s just a negative connotation for me,” Owens said during the fourth week of the team’s voluntary offseason workouts. “It’s all because of a missed call that negative perception is out there.”
The 34-year-old Owens said he has never had a positive test “for substance of any kind” during his 12 NFL seasons.
Owens said contact information he gave the NFL after last season included agent Drew Rosenhaus’ number “because I know he always answers the phone.” Owens said the league also had a phone number that wasn’t his and then tried to reach him on “an old number I never even put down.”
On the same day last week that Owens signed his new $34 million contract with the Cowboys through the 2011 season, he was in New York visiting with NFL officials. That meeting didn’t include commissioner Roger Goodell.
“The thing is they had already put in the reasonable cause testing program, which I didn’t want to do,” Owens said. “I didn’t want to be a part of that.”
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said this week that the Owens was signed to a new contract because there were no issues with the receiver.
“I am very excited about the fact that he would stand up for me,” Owens said.
Jones was aware of everything before Owens went to New York.
“I think it shows how together and what a family this is, and how committed he is to this team and his players,” Owens said about Jones’ support of him. “It wouldn’t be any different than somebody accusing your son of something you know your son wouldn’t do anything like that.”
While every NFL player gets tested, Owens is upset that could be taken out of his routine for additional testing.
“It’s just ridiculous,” Owens said. “I take pride in what I do. I take pride in keeping myself healthy. … I know what I put in my body.”