Roger Clemens is showing the same ferociousness going after Brian McNamee that he displayed against AL hitters throughout a career that took a colossal hit last week when his former trainer accused Clemens of using performance-enhancing drugs in the Mitchell Report.
After vehemently denying McNamee’s accusations through his lawyer hours after the George Mitchell’s findings were made public, Clemens continued the tirade yesterday.
“I want to state clearly and without qualification: I did not take steroids, human growth hormone or any other banned substances at any time in my baseball career or, in fact, my entire life,” Clemens said yesterday in a release issued by agent Randy Hendricks. “Those substances represent a dangerous and destructive shortcut that no athlete should ever take.
“I am disappointed that my 25 years in public life have apparently not earned me the benefit of the doubt, but I understand that Senator Mitchell’s report has raised many serious questions. I plan to publicly answer all of those questions at the appropriate time in the appropriate way. I only ask that in the meantime people not rush to judgment.”
McNamee told Mitchell’s investigators that he injected Clemens with steroids in 1998 when he was a Blue Jay and HGH in 2000 and 2001 when Clemens was a Yankee.
Clemens’ second strong denial came three days after Andy Pettitte admitted that for two days in 2002 he used HGH in the hope that it would heal a barking left elbow and help him return from the DL quicker. McNamee told Mitchell’s investigators that he injected Pettitte “two to four times.”
Yesterday, Mitchell refused comment when asked about Clemens’ denial. Earlier in the day, talking to The Post, Mitchell said he had no reason to believe McNamee was lying to his team.
“We made every effort to establish the truth of the information we received. I told every witness who I interviewed and my colleagues did the same for the interviews I was not present at that we wanted the truth – nothing more, nothing less. We did not want them to exaggerate for our benefit. Don’t exaggerate, don’t minimize is what we told them,” Mitchell said.
“In addition, in the case of some witnesses they were interviewed in the presence of federal law enforcement officials and they were warned that if they made false statements they faced the risk of further criminal jeopardy for making those false statements to federal agents so there was an overwhelming incentive for them to tell the truth when they spoke to us.
“Thirdly, the federal agents subsequently told us that they had interviewed these witnesses, including McNamee, several times before I talked to him and the testimony provided to me was entirely consistent with what had been said to them right from the very beginning.
“There was absolutely no evidence and a total and emphatic denial by all concerned as to the allegation that somehow witnesses were browbeaten or somehow forced to change their stories. Everything we’ve been told and we’ve looked into it as closely as we can suggests that there is no basis for that allegation and the opposite was the case.
“They were represented by their own attorneys, who were present. I asked each witness are you speaking under duress, do you feel any undue pressure, are there any inappropriate statements or inducements that have been made to you. Each of them answered that they were speaking completely voluntarily, that they were aware of the circumstances in which they risk further criminal jeopardy if they made a false statement. There were very strong incentives for them to tell the truth and very strong disincentives for them not to make false statements.”
In light of Clemens’ strong denial, the Texas High School Baseball Coaches Association put off its decision to rescind an invitation to Clemens to its annual convention next month where Clemens, 45, is slated to discuss his training regiment.
“It took Senator Mitchell 20- something months to come up with his report,” association executive director Rex Sanders said. “For us to come up a decision on something like this, I don’t think it’s fair to do this in three days time.”
Sanders said he’s been in touch with Clemens’ reps, who told him Clemens still wants to speak at the Lone Star baseball convention.