Commissioner lauds NFL players union.

Byline: Ashley McGeachy Fox

PHILADELPHIA _ Like many people intimately involved in professional sports in this country, Paul Tagliabue watched Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and other baseball players testify before the Government Reform Committee recently.

The NFL commissioner's prevailing thought: He was grateful that the NFL Players Association acknowledged nearly 20 years ago that performance-enhancing drugs are a health problem and have no place in professional football.

"Our union gets a lot of credit for being as focused as it was, going back to the late `80s and early `90s, on the fact that this is a health hazard and a health risk and a competitive issue among players and they had to get rid of it," Tagliabue said in a telephone interview last week.

"I think Gene …