I'm pretty sure Roger Clemens took steroids. If someone like George Mitchell says he did, that's gonna carry a lot of weight with me.
But seeing Clemens go on in high escutcheon and in withering self-righteousness over the last week or so, I have to say I'm a little less sure than I was the day the Report came out.
If Clemens were playing a game of Texas Hold 'em, you'd say he's gone all in. Which in its own way is worthy of at least some respect. It's easy to say that Clemens is bluffing, but now, you have to recognize he's gone and bet it all on a single hand.
People would have forgiven the Rocket if he'd meekly given some kind of bullshit apology like Pettitte went and did. For the good of the team, whatever the fuck. But if Clemens is subsequently found to be lying now, even as he makes his angry point-by-point denials, even as he does the interview with Mike Wallace, even as he hires Rusty Hardin, well, people will never ever forgive him.
He'll go down in baseball history as a villain worse than Bonds.
The New York Times today has an excellent profile of Hardin, and I gotta say after reading it, I'm even more interested in how all this turns out than I was before.