Clemens; Clearing his Name

Rogers Clemens is trying extremely hard to clear his name and keep his cool. Clemens was included in the Mitchell report. The report said that Clemens' personal trainer Brian McNamee injected Clemens' with HGH or Human Growth Hormone in 1998 and 2002. Clemens is fiercely denying any accusations that he used performance-enhancing drugs during his long career. On a 60 Minutes interview Roger said that he swore that McNamee has never injected him with any performance-enhancers. He did say, however, that McNamee injected him with the pain-killer lidocaine and the vitamin B-12. Their is one thing suspicious about that. Your personal trainer is not supposed to inject you with anything. Injections are supposed to happen at a doctor's office or a hospital.

I don't think Roger used the drugs. I am not just saying that because I want to believe the game's greatest players aren't drugged-up freaks. I do believe that that baseball's so-called Home Run King (Barry Bonds) has been using drugs to get an edge over players for many year. Bonds is a self-coincided player, who mostly only cares about his own stats. Roger made a comment at a press conference saying that he "doesn't give a rat's ass about the hall of fame." And I can tell you that most selfish, steroid-using sluggers would not say that. Of course, he could have been lying. He could be lying on all these things, though.

On ESPN, they showed a taped phone conversation between Clemens and McNamee that was bogus. Clemens knew it was taped but McNamee didn't. If it wasn't taped, I think Clemens would have gone berserk on McNamee, whether he took the drugs or not. Clemens did say something like this: if he came down here I'd feel sorry for him. Back to the phone conversation, McNamee said to Clemens,"What do you want me to do?" like 20 times. Come on McNamee, it doesn't take a brain sergeant to figure this one out. Clemens wants you to take back your comments about his steroid use. The other thing vaguely interesting about the phone conversation is that McNamee never denied anything Clemens said about never using performance-enhancers.

Even if Clemens did use the 'roids, I don't think it's that bad. McNamee said he only injected Clemens twice. According to the book Game of Shadows, their were guys who were being injected multiple times a day and also taking like 25 pills to enhance their performance. I am not saying what Clemens did was O.K. by any means, he legacy should be tarnished if he did take steroids.

The biggest reason for me not thinking Clemens used performance-enhancers is this: Clemens agreed to show up to a hearing with his friend and admitted-HGH user Andy Pettitte and McNamee. Clemens will be under oath when he is asked if he ever used the drugs at the hearing. It would be downright stupid to lie under oath after what has happened to Bonds. Bonds will be in court for lying under oath in a court case against BALCO (for more on Bonds' chargers look for my article titled "*Bonds Indited*"). Clemens doesn't want to be in the same situation as Bonds is in right now. Clemens will do anything to clear his name and if he says he didn't cheat at the hearing, that will convince me. Even if he lies, I'm sure it will come back to bite him.