Thursday, January 15, 2009

Thoughts on the steroid scandal

1. Roger Clemens is the subject of a federal grand jury for lying to Congress about his steroid use.

2. The Clear was legal and not a steroid, which seems to exonerate Barry Bonds of perjury.

3. Bonds will remain a pariah while Clemens's steroid use and subsequent lying will not significantly damage his legacy.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Strongly disagree. Clemens, Bonds's equal in poltroonhood, will be scarred almost equally, largely because of the way he has so thoroughly fumbled a once barely tarnished reputation as one of the game's top five pitchers of all time. Bonds's problem is that he broke two cherished records -- one completely illegitimized by the clown twins Mark and Sammy, and the other held by an actual American hero. That incites animus. Clemens is more head-shaking because he was already one of the best ever, and yet he felt the need to invite his trainer into his bedroom to inject HGH into his cougar wife's buttocks, go before COngress in Palmeirian fashion, then have the balls to do the 60 Minutes thing, an interview that more or less finished him. Anyone who takes this jerkwad seriously as a Hall of Fame candidate should have their fergusonjenkins re-examined. But, then again, I'm only the guy in favor of a one-strike-and-your-out rule. (Would also like to see prison time for McGwire, Sosa, Giambi, Brady Anderson, both brothers Boone, and, posthumously, Ken Caminiti.) Also, props to Jim Ed Rice, the last legitimate power hitter.

Brian Doyle said...

I hope you're right that Clemens' career will be discounted to the same extent. But the coverage of the two situations has already been quite different. We don't have ESPN's Pedro Gomez rifling through Clemens' underwear drawer and telling viewers what he found twice a day. Pure speculation: if you asked non-baseball fans about Bonds and Clemens, twice as many would associate Bonds with steroids than Clemens.

And I don't think the fact that Bonds/Clemens broke records makes them more morally culpable than, say, Neifi Perez.

Brian Doyle said...

And Ken Caminiti? That's cold. Dude had enough problems.