Posted on 01/10/2008 8:35:18 AM PST by canuck_conservative
Most of you have never heard of Ralph Beard, or if you did, had forgotten him by the time he died a few weeks ago just short of 80. But back in the 1940s, Beard was a terrific All-American basketball player, who led Kentucky to two national championships and the United States to a gold medal in the 1948 Olympics. He was already a first-team NBA All-Star when it was revealed that he had taken money from gamblers to shave points in games at Kentucky.
Beard, like so many other players of that era, was summarily banned for life from the game. He admitted his guilt, too, saying that he had simply grown up poor and just couldn't resist taking the money. He lost it all for only about $700 -- branded forever as a fixer.
We tend to be more critical of athletes, like Ralph Beard, who conspire to lose, rather than those, like steroid users, who cheat trying to win. That's often dismissed as just being canny, looking for an edge. Why, Gaylord Perry was celebrated outright for his ability to throw illegal pitches; he tricked his way into the Hall of Fame, everybody laughing right along with him.
But the fact is that it makes no difference in which direction an athlete cheats. Either way, he is distorting fairness, which is the very essence of sport. Ralph Beard's transgressions cost his own team victory. If Roger Clemens -- or any other baseball player named as a user of steroids and human growth hormone (HGH) in the Mitchell Report -- is guilty as charged, then he cost other teams their fair due. What, pray, is the difference?
Now, of course, Clemens has taken a refrain from so many other accused athletes' lyrics by claiming that he didn't know that he was being given a banned substance. Barry Bonds swore he thought it was all just flaxseed oil -- remember? Hasn't C l e m e n s read that Bonds is up for perjury, that Marion Jones may well be sentenced to prison this very Friday for the same sort of lies? But here Clemens is, disputing his trainer, Brian McNamee, who testified -- under threat of jail if he was caught lying -- that he injected Clemens with steroids and HGH. The sad and bizarre phone call with McNamee that Clemens
taped last Friday, and then played in public, seemed only, to me, to confirm the pitcher's guilt. Mc-Namee was distraught for having testified against his old friend and meal ticket. Time and time again, he pleaded: What do you want me to do, Roger?
Wouldn't an innocent man, with the tape secretly running, say: just tell the truth, Brian. Clemens so often
told McNamee that he wanted the truth out, but when McNamee specifically asked Clemens what he should do, Clemens did not flat out ask him to tell the truth. Because, one can only surmise, then McNamee would say that he had already done that. And never did McNamee volunteer that he had lied. He seemed only to regret that the truth had hurt so.
All right, I'm sorry. Perhaps I'm just too cynical and hard-hearted. Perhaps I have just heard it all too often -- even emotionally, to my face -- from athletes claiming, with just as much dramatic insistence as Clemens supplied, that they were innocent …only to be convicted later.
Even after he told the truth, Ralph Beard spent more than 50 years of his life in shame. If Roger Clemens is guilty, then he deserves no better. Let's put the right word on it. Any player who took steroids is a fixer. He fixed games.
- Frank Deford is the senior contributing writer at Sports Illustrated and a regular commentator at National Public Radio, where this column originally was aired.
Let me say it another way — speaking as someone who knows everything about the Duke rape case, the truth is that “This smells NOTHING AT ALL LIKE the Duke Rape case journalism.
Nobody knows everything about the Duke Rape case, except God.
WL law knows everything about the Duke Rape case.
Therefore, WL Law is God.
Let’s be honest. Clemens is ALWAYS angry.
Think if the Babe had steroids instead of beer
Instead of 550 ft homers they would have been 650footers
Who is more scuzzy, Clemens and McNamee? To me it’s a toss-up. They deserve it each other! (Kinda like Hill and Billary!)
Truly, I’m still as “befuzzled” about this as I was when I wrote that a month ago.
LOL at the syringes and bloody gauze “proof” - aaacck! I *almost* agree with Rusty Hardin - who keeps stuff like that for years and years? But far be it from me to just fall in line with *him* on that. It’s just that when he calls it a set-up from the get-go, it *does* look that way.
But then, when McNamee added the wife into the mix and how she was prepping for the SI Swimsuit issue (or something like that), I thought surely that has to be true - that’s too many witnesses to have to overcome.
And *then,* the party thing - with someone (Conseco maybe?) calling up and saying there was no way Clemens was at that party 8 years ago (or however long ago it was) - that didn’t seem believable.
As of now, Clemens is supposed to testify tomorrow - then we’ll have more weird stuff to weigh and ponder, I’m sure, lol. So, yeah, *scuzzy and scuzzier* seems to fit, but I’m not happy about it.
I can only think of two explanations for the needles and gauze
1. It’s fake
2. Future blackmail opportunity
The “I kept it b/c Roger might roll on me later” part does not seem plausible.
Either way, who needs friends like McNamee? Yuck!
Heh heh, *as the worm turns.* Guess you’ve heard the overnight news - Pettitte has rolled on Clemens.
But, it’s just a semi-roll ... he claims Clemens talked to him about having taken HGH, but then several years later, took it back and said AnPet misunderstood and it was Roger’s *wife* who took the HGH, for the SI swimsuit photos.
Today *should* tell the tale - but I bet it doesn’t!
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