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Team doctor for the NFL’s Pittsburgh Steelers for 22 years, appeared in federal court before U.S. District Judge Joy Flowers Conti on January 10, 2017 for opening arguments in the United States government’s trial against him. Federal prosecutors have accused Rydze of several crimes including the trafficking of anabolic steroids and controlled substances such as oxycodone and oxycontin and the unlawful distribution of human growth hormone as well as health care fraud.
Rydze was originally charged in an 185-count criminal indictment filed in October 2012. Rydze’s trial was delayed numerous times for various reasons since 2012. The court case has since been reduced to nine counts for trial.
In addition to being a team doctor for the Steelers until his departure in 2007, Rydze was also an internal medicine specialist at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) and the sole owner of Optimal Health Center LLC (OHC) as well as a partner with James Hatzimbes who owned the HSE Anti-Aging & Wellness Center (HSE).
Rydze was co-indicted with Hatzimbes for conspiracy to distribute anabolic steroids from September 2007 until March 2011. These included the prescribing of several popular steroids such as testosterone (testosterone enanthate and testosterone cypionate), stanozolol (Winstrol), nandrolone decanoate (Deca Durabolin) and oxandrolone (Anavar).
The indictment filed by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Ohio accused Rydze and Hatzimbes of conspiring “to unjustly enrich themselves to causing the distribution of the steroids for unauthorized uses such as bodybuilding and athletic performance enhancement.”
Hatzimbes was scheduled to go to trial with Rydze but decided to plead guilty to lesser charges on the day before the trial began. Hatzimbes may testify against Rydze as part of his plea agreement.
Rydze’s career as an internal medicine specialist and the celebrated team doctor for the Pittsburgh Steeler began its downward trajectory when law enforcement officers interrogated him about the purchase of $150,000 worth of anabolic steroids and hGH with his credit card in 2007. The performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) had an estimated retail value of $1,000,000 and were purchased from the much-maligned Signature Compounding Pharmacy in Orlando, Florida.
The purchase of massive quantities of steroids by the team doctor of an NFL football team didn’t play well in the media. The Pittsburgh Steelers promptly ended its association with Rydze. Rydze strongly denied ever prescribing PEDs to Steeler players.
"Because I was associated with the Steelers, the assumption was that I was giving everyone on the Steelers growth hormone or steroids," Rydze told ESPN in 2009. "You say a team doctor for the Pittsburgh Steelers, and you are saying he is buying growth hormone from a pharmacy in Florida -- what the hell else are you going to think?
"That whole thing got way overblown. I was doing some kind of little bit of research back then and using growth hormone to help heal people with tendon injuries. That seems to be, in my estimation in looking at that hormone, the only role it really plays in helping people. It does seem to make you heal better, quicker. So we were using it with various orthopedic patients.
"It was never done in athletes. It was never with any Steelers."
The 2007 law enforcement visit marked the beginning of the fed’s continued interest in Rydze’s prescribing activities. However, Rydze remained an outspoken advocate of the off label use of human growth hormone (hGH) for the treatment of soft tissue injuries over the next couple of years. And Rydze continued to prescribe it for his patients in spite of the questionable legality of its off-label use.
Rydze has clearly paid the price but he finally has his day in court. His trial is expected to continue for the next several months.