Missing the Sign

By Talmage Boston on May 16, 2008 Posted in Park Cities People

On March 12, Basketball Hall of Famer Charles Barkley was asked at an SMU Athletic Forum luncheon, “If you could trade places with anyone else in the world today, in any arena, who would it be?” 

Always glib, and in the aftermath of the Governor of New York’s resignation earlier that day, Sir Charles replied, “Gosh, if you’d asked me that question a week ago, I would have said Eliot Spitzer.”

If asked the same question this week, Mr. Barkley might well answer, “If you’d asked me that question last fall, I would have said Roger Clemens.”

Through last November, baseball’s Rocket Man appeared to hold the world by its proverbial tale. He had a legendary major league baseball career, including a record-shattering seven Cy Young Awards; fabulous wealth earned from an extended series of multi-million dollar free agent contracts; a stable home life with a beautiful wife and four sons; and business and endorsement opportunities running out his ears.

With his destiny as a certain first ballot inductee into Cooperstown assured, baseball analysts entertained themselves with a running battle in response to the question: Is Roger Clemens the greatest pitcher of all time?

And then came the release of the Mitchell Report on Dec. 13, 2007, filled with allegations of Mr. Clemens’ repeated use of steroids and Human Growth Hormones (HGH). Rather than acknowledge and apologize for his past drug use as many players named in the report soon did, the Rocket Man made the decision (as Pete Rose once did) to deny having engaged in any acts of misconduct. He believed that with his stature, he had the power to steamroll over the thoroughly investigated evidence compiled at the request of the Commissioner of Baseball.

Bad decision. The nationally revered pitcher soon transformed himself into a national joke. His attempts “to set the record straight,” first in an unpersuasive 60 Minutes interview with Mike Wallace (“Gosh, if I’d used steroids, I’d have grown a third eye”) and then in testifying before Congress, redefined Shakespeare’s concept of a man hoisting himself on his own petard. His own best friend Andy Pettitte corroborated the Mitchell Report’s conclusion about Clemens’ prior drug use, and Clemens lamely admitted, “Well, I didn’t get HGH shot into my buttocks, but my wife did.”

In an effort to intimidate his drug supplier and accuser Brian McNamee, Clemens filed a lawsuit against his longtime personal trainer alleging defamation of character. He was apparently unaware that Mr. McNamee’s surefire defense to the ludicrous litigation would be “What I told Senator Mitchell was the truth.” In response to the suit, McNamee started investigating everything in Clemens’ life that spoke to whether the Rocket was or was not a truthful person.

Uh-oh. Roger Clemens’ squeaky clean All-American family man image vanished in a flash amid McNamee’s revelations of the pitcher’s series of extra-marital affairs. After (of course) initially denying them, Clemens soon admitted that the allegations were true, because his lovers either publicly acknowledged the affairs or refused to deny their existence.
Yes, Sir Charles, like Eliot Spitzer, Rogers Clemens has gone from the top of Prestige Mountain to the bottom of Disgrace Pit in a short time. He probably now wishes he had followed the example of his now ex-best friend, Andy Pettitte. He should have admitted the truth about his past drug use when the Mitchell Report came out, and then let the chips fall where they may.

Here’s the irony of this American tragedy: In his days as a student at the University of Texas in the early eighties, Roger Clemens surely walked past the campus’ Main Building hundreds of times. To his everlasting regret, he failed to notice the words chiseled there in stone: “And you shall know the truth; and the truth shall set you free.”