Until recently, players accused of cheating selected from two popular options: vehemently deny, as Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens have chosen, or remain silent, as McGwire has. But beginning with the admission last season by Pettitte that he had used human growth hormone, a third option has emerged: quickly apologize and move on.
“Obviously, success on the field has helped, but isn’t it something how they beautifully and effectively transcended their humiliation?” said Richard Emery, one of the lawyers representing Brian McNamee, the physical trainer who cited Pettitte and Clemens in George J. Mitchell’s investigation into steroids for Major League Baseball.
Emery added: “Watching the way all this has unfolded makes me believe that it was the stark juxtaposition of Clemens and Pettitte that changed the game. Alex had an easy road because Pettitte showed you exactly what you do when you’re caught.”
Will others who made a less judicious choice when they came to a fork in the road learn from Rodriguez?
“There has always been a tremendous compulsion in the American DNA to cover up, and lie, going all the way up to the White House,” the former baseball commissioner Fay Vincent said. “McGwire got terrible advice, and I think coming back almost certainly leads to him handling this better. But with this issue, it’s so obvious what to do now that maybe it even leads to Bonds and Clemens waking up, too.”
...“I think in some cases, it just comes down to intelligence, and Rodriguez is significantly more intelligent than Clemens and Rose,” Vincent said.
Ouch…sorta like having the biggest bundle of crap at ShredFest.
Repoz
Posted: November 03, 2009 at 04:01 PM |
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I find it hard to believe that this is specific only to Americans.
Vincent likes the pretentious turn of phrase. It makes him feel like he's Bart Giamatti.
I told my wife that if my daughter reaches any developmental milestones in the next week, I'm going to put a big asterisk next to them in her baby book.
I think my wife regrets marrying me.
The irony of these claims is that exactly two people (*) have been proven liars: Andy Pettitte and A-Rod. And yet they're praised for their honesty, while people whose alleged lies have never been substantiated are attacked.
(*) I'm not counting Emery's own client, McNamee, who's an admitted liar and criminal.
This was my first thought too. Any time I think of Pettite and steroids my instinct is "liar!" (not that I care - it's just he came back and admitted he lied). Yet everywhere his name comes up on this site the author mentions how he was the only honest one.
Anyway I agree with the premise that the talk has died down.
Having said that I have some questions for you smart people.
Will McGwire be voted in the HoF?
If not, is the fact that he wouldn't answer the questions in front of the committee still a big deal to writers? So many of them seemed to take it personally at the time.
It'll die down until after winter meetings and before spring training when another name will leak because the baseball writers need something to be worked up about. I've come to dread the offseason because of the annual steroid thing.
I think with each name it moves farther and farther from the front page. For most casual fans there is no name bigger than A-Rod. In NY and here a Jeter announcement would be the only name that would elicit a bigger response.
I suppose it is not gone for good but I wonder if it will reach the heights it hit the last two offseasons.
Did Pettite, A-Rod, and Brian Roberts publicly deny ever using steroids and then fess up once they were caught? It doesn't make them liars if they never said anything on the subject beforehand.
I'm pretty sure that Pettitte claimed he only used hGH once until some NY paper was about to run a story, at which point he amended to claim that he only used hGH twice. A-Rod told Katie Couric that he never used steroids a year or two before the Selena Roberts book.
A-Rod denied claims he used, and angrily denounced Selena Roberts, and then later admitted she was correct.
Roberts? How did he get into the conversation? Why not Chris Truby? (Yes, I know Roberts used, but nobody had raised his name.)
(To be clear, when I said "two people," I meant two people of the ones discussed in TFA; obviously others have lied about steroids over the years.)
I don't know, saying "I only used hGH one time" if I have, in fact, used hGH more than one time would seem to be a textbook example of a "lie". How you feel about that is entirely up to you, of course.
"just a couple" -> 6 1/2 oceans worth
"one" -> 212 oceans
Pettite's amended recollection is a lot more believable
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