Donald Hooton Sr.

Hooton died at his home in McKinney, Texas, on Tuesday 10 November 2026, aged 76. The Taylor Hooton Foundation announced his death the following day. No cause of death was made public.

MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred said Hooton had been a tireless advocate for educating young people about the dangers of performance and appearance enhancing drugs, and that his dedication made a lasting impact on the sport. New York Yankees president Randy Levine, a member of the foundation's board, said Hooton singularly brought the surge of steroids to the public's attention and would be remembered as a fighter for young people's health. He was survived by his wife, Gwen, his son Donald, his daughter Mackenzie and four grandchildren.

Donald M. Hooton was born on 30 March 1950 in Longview, Texas, to Claude and Mary Julia Hooton.

Hooton spent 33 years as a marketing executive in the telecommunications software business and worked in worldwide business development at Hewlett-Packard, from which he later retired.

After his son Taylor's death in 2003 he became a full time advocate. With his wife, Gwen, and his son Donald Jr. he founded the Taylor Hooton Foundation in 2004 and served as its executive chairman. On 17 March 2005 he testified before the House Committee on Government Reform in its investigation of steroids in Major League Baseball, alongside Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Rafael Palmeiro and Jose Canseco. He testified before Congress three times in all, contributed to Senator George Mitchell's 2007 report on performance enhancing drugs in baseball, met state governors and spoke to several state legislatures.

Major League Baseball partnered with the foundation for more than two decades. In 2014 the foundation formed an MLB-endorsed advisory board of active players, which came to include a representative from every one of the 30 clubs. The foundation's programmes reached more than 3 million people in schools and universities across the United States, Canada and Latin America.

Hooton married Gwen Hopkins, and the couple lived in McKinney, Texas. They had three children, Mackenzie, Donald Jr. and Taylor. Taylor, a 17 year old pitcher at Plano West Senior High School, died by suicide in July 2003, a death his family linked to his use of anabolic steroids. Donald Jr. went on to serve as president of the foundation.

Hooton helped put youth steroid use on the national agenda at the height of baseball's steroid era, and the foundation he built remains the leading education programme on the subject in the United States. He was named Texas Sports Personality of the Year by The Dallas Morning News, listed among the Top 100 Most Influential Sports Educators in America by the Institute for International Sports, and received the Distinguished Service Award of the United States Sports Academy.