Andy, Roger, and Sammy

By now I'm sure you've heard of the allegations by former pitcher Jason Grimsley that his onetime teammates Roger Clemens and Andy Pettite joined him in using performance-enhancing drugs. That's a charge both current Astros strongly deny.

"I'm stunned, obviously," Pettitte said about the Los Angeles Times report that was posted on-line late Saturday night. "I don't really know what to say. I played with Grimsley for a couple years in New York obviously. Had a great relationship with him.

"Obviously it's embarrassing any time your name gets brought up with something. It's embarrassing."

Clemens was equally adamant in his denial.

"I'm angry about it. It shouldn't happen," he said. "The assumptions that are out there, I just don't understand it. I don't understand how people can do that and get away with it. I really don't. I don't know how you can just on assumption or hearsay just throw it out there and it's fact."

Grimsley played with Pettitte and Clemens in 1999 and 2000 with the New York Yankees, but Pettitte and Clemens said they didn't work out with Grimsley other than if they were in the weight room together in the clubhouse.

Not long after federal agents raided Grimsley's home in June, rumors throughout baseball circulated that Grimsley had named Pettitte and Clemens in his affidavit.

After hearing the rumblings, Pettitte went on-line and read the 20-page affidavit. The names of the six players who were in the affidavit were blacked out when it was released to the public in June.

"I think that there is so much hearsay," Pettitte said. "Obviously these (affidavit) reports came out, I think, four or five months ago. I was able to go on-line and look at the affidavit. To tell you the truth, I would have bet my life that there was no way possible that my name could even be on the affidavit.

"As far as I'm concerned, there is so much hearsay it just to me doesn't hold a lot of water."

Richard Justice laments the fact that Clemens and Pettite will forevermore have a cloud hanging over their heads due to Grimsley's accusation, then goes on to demonstrate why he's a part of the problem.

That's the problem with the denials issued Sunday by Clemens and Pettitte. They sound a lot like the denials used by Bonds, Rafael Palmeiro, Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire.

Sammy Sosa has failed a drug test. He has strenuously denied ever taking them. The only evidence that exists is an accusation by Jose Canseco, who was never a teammate of Sosa's and who is hardly more credible than Jason Grimsley. Yet there's Justice, blithley naming him along with Bonds, Palmeiro, and McGwire as non-believable in his denial. Quite the double standard you've got there, Richard.

I don't know any more than Richard Justice if Grimsley's charges about Pettite and Clemens are true. As a longtime Yankee fan, I fervently hope they're not. Pending any corroborating evidence, I'll continue to believe in their innocence. It would be nice if that courtesy could be extended to all players who are in their situation. Even the ones that sportswriters have decided they don't like.

Posted by Charles Kuffner on October 03, 2006 to Baseball | TrackBack