BREAKING NEWS ... Roger Clemens Found Not Guilty ....

[onewearz]

Watching clemens try to cry in the press conference was

I think regardless of what these idiots shot up they still belong in the hall if not for anything else but the dedication to the craft . I'm sure the old heads had their own stuff they used to cheat with . I mean , didn't Ty Cobb sharpen his spikes and go in crazy high sliding.

Let em all in , especially the Yankees

 

[macbk]

^Is there a video of his press conference? I wanna see this cry attempt

.

Somewhere, Suzyn Waldman is crying sweet tears of joy.

 

[witnessmycalm21]

It was a "Is he serious!? 

" moment

The clapping though

 

[loveofthegame916]

Originally Posted by MFr3shM

Originally Posted by onewearz

verdict just came in , he was found not guilty on the perjury charges


so does this mean he didn't do steroids ?

Sure just like Ryan Braun didn't take PEDs 

 
They're all guilty Bonds, Arod, Braun, McGuire, Clemens, Sosa, Pettite, etc...

Fixed

 

[trunks206]

The only thing worse than the attempt at a "cry" is his suit/shirt/tie combo. 

 

[degenerate423]

Originally Posted by dakid23

 I can't believe they wasted tax payer money on this.

exactly! if they must stick their nose in sports, then at least make it worthwhile and go for the corruption in the nba or boxing. who really cares if they took steroids or not?

...

 

[buggz05]

Let that boy cook.

 

[rusty shackelford]

Originally Posted by buggz05

Let that boy cook.

How do you wear heat?

 

[da doc03]

 @ the cry attempt

 

[RyGuy45]

exactly! if they must stick their nose in sports, then at least make it worthwhile and go for the corruption in the nba or boxing. who really cares if they took steroids or not?

...

Sports had nothing to do with this case.

On August 19, 2010, a federal grand jury at the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., indicted Roger Clemens on six felony counts involving perjury, false statements and obstruction of Congress.[sup]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Clemens#cite_note-ClemensIndicted-1[/sup]

 

[proshares]

Should all be in the HOF anyway. This was just a waste of time.

Spoiler

Spoiler

Spoiler [+]

Spoiler

The prosecutors representing the government in the case against Roger Clemens called dozens of witnesses, including experts in everything from beer cans to the handling of DNA. The attorneys argued so meticulously, in such excruciatingly thorough detail, that some jurors were excused during the nine-week trial because they fell asleep.

But in the end, in the face of that mountain of preparation and presentation, jurors decided overwhelmingly and quickly -- so quickly that Clemens had to scramble to be in the court to hear the verdict -- that the pitcher was not guilty beyond a reasonable doubt on each of six counts of perjury.

And yet five years ago, those who generated the Mitchell report -- most notably, George Mitchell, the former senator -- determined that it was appropriate to publish a public indictment of Clemens based on the word of one person, trainer Brian McNamee.

The 12 jurors voted that Clemens was not guilty. But they also, by extension, effectively repudiated the standard of proof used in the Mitchell report -- a woefully incomplete history that was a bad idea at its inception and became, in the end, an unconscionable exercise that generated a handful of scapegoats to distract the mob from the failings of more powerful men.

Nobody should be naive about what took place during the steroid era. It may well be that all 86 players linked to the use of performance-enhancing drugs in the Mitchell report did, in fact, take steroids or human growth hormone or some other form of performance-enhancing drug.



Clemens was found to be not guilty, which is not the same as being found innocent. He was cleared of perjury charges, which doesn't mean he told the truth. The inclusion of his name in the Mitchell report was incredibly unfair, but after his name was published, he made some awful choices. In trying to save a pitching legacy that was already lost the instant the Mitchell report was released, he exposed those around him to unnecessary embarrassment and scrutiny.




Andy Pettitte, who was like a little brother to Clemens, chose a different path, acknowledging his use of performance-enhancing drugs and then moving on, and the split in their stories effectively led to the end of their friendship.



But none of the players should've been forced to defend themselves, ever. Bud Selig, the commissioner of baseball, should've done that for them -- and instead, he chose to expose the sport, unnecessarily, to an investigation that never had a chance for success.



The entire institution of baseball -- the union leaders, the owners, Selig, clean and dirty players, those who covered the sport in the media -- failed to respond quickly as the use of performance-enhancing drugs grew exponentially during a period of about 20 to 25 years. Selig had been called to Congress repeatedly to explain baseball's handling of the steroid mess, and as a result, Major League Baseball and the players' association greatly strengthened their drug-testing system.



The commissioner should've been satisfied with that. He should have been willing to simply say that terrible mistakes were made, including some of his own, and because of those mistakes, the sport had been deeply infected and affected by drug use.



But Selig went a different way. Maybe he felt he had absorbed an unfair share of criticism; in the '90s, after all, the greatest portion of the sport's practical power actually resided in the hands of union leaders Don Fehr and Gene Orza. Maybe Selig was as concerned with shaping and preserving his legacy as Clemens would become with his own.



Whatever the root cause, Selig chose to devote millions of dollars to hire Mitchell -- and more importantly, Mitchell's good name -- to start an investigation that was doomed from the start. There was no chance that the union was ever going to allow its members to participate and expose themselves to what was essentially a private investigation, and therefore, there was no chance -- ever -- that the full context of what happened and when it happened would ever be learned. Mitchell and his lawyers never held subpoena power.

There was no chance, of course, that Fehr and Orza would participate and talk about their evolution of thought and action. Based on the information in the final report, there is little indication that Mitchell and his investigators delved into the conversations about steroids among the owners and Major League Baseball's power brokers. After all, there were reports of steroid use in baseball as far back as 1988, a decade before the Mark McGwire-Sammy Sosa summer of '98.

But Selig hired Mitchell, against the advice of others around him, and as the former senator waded into a murky history, he must've learned what everybody in sport understood -- that by the first years of the 21st century, there had probably been hundreds of ballplayers who had used performance-enhancing drugs in the major leagues and minor leagues.

Nevertheless, what Mitchell produced in his report, most notably, were the names of 86 suspected users, with a high percentage through the reprinting of media reports.

A small handful of names were generated through Mitchell's investigation. Clemens was among those, after McNamee was compelled to speak to the Mitchell lawyers by federal investigators. Clemens was given an opportunity to respond to allegations, generally, although he was never formally presented with the precise details of exactly what McNamee had said before Mitchell's report went to print.

Clemens did not respond, and we'll never know what he and others would have done if they had known that Mitchell's standard of proof was like something pulled out of the Joe McCarthy playbook: If somebody accuses you, that's good enough for us.

What was sacrificed in the Mitchell report, of course, was the all-important context. If Clemens and the other 85 players used performance-enhancing drugs, then they were among many at a time when the sport effectively condoned use through inaction. But Clemens was used as the crown jewel in the Mitchell report; he became Public Scapegoat No. 1.

Now, years later, a jury determined that McNamee's word -- even when braced and bolstered by experts and exhibits -- wasn't good enough.

Monday's verdict was really only about jail time for Clemens. He won't have to go to prison, but he'll never recover his legacy.



For Selig, the verdict was only about legacy. In what has generally been a strong career in baseball, this is the end of a chapter that should embarrass him.

 

[maddog345]

Originally Posted by dakid23

 I can't believe they wasted tax payer money on this.

This is what is wrong with America

  

 

[rillo561]

To bad they didn't go after the Iraq war criminals or the ones involved in the financial crisis we are currently experiencing. All a dog and pony show anyway.

 

[dmxfury]

Going after perjury and obstruction is not what's wrong with America, and certaintly nowhere near the top of the list if you disagree.


That said I found the initial involvement pretty dumb years ago, but par for the course

 

[bossdonvah]

Originally Posted by 651akathePaul

Not surprised and don't really care.

 

[ag 47]

Originally Posted by denni5themenace

Originally Posted by dakid23

 I can't believe they wasted tax payer money on this.

THIS

Do ya'll understand why he was on trial? It wasn't for steroids. It was for perjury.

 

[RyGuy45]

good grief 

[h3]Was this a complete failure?[/h3]
The government spent more than $120 million and countless hours pursuing Clemens. They examined 15,732 pages of Clemens’s family bank records from JPMorgan Chase, 1,139 pages of records from American Express credit cards, more than 300 pages of medical records from MLB teams for which Clemens played, and hundreds of pages of phone records. Ninety-three agents also interviewed 179 people in 68 different locations and produced 235 reports of their interviews. They called 24 witnesses. And yet all they had to show for it was a flawed “star

 

[savraj1]

I understand that this was a perjury case but it's for lying under oath for a previous conviction, which I'm assuming that tax payer money was spent on as well. As far as baseball athletes and steroids, let these athletes cook. I could care less what they do to their bodies, but don't spend MY money on an issue I don't even remotely care about. Even hardcore baseball fans are laughing at this. 

 

[illoquent aka dsk]

Originally Posted by RyGuy45

good grief 

[h3]Was this a complete failure?[/h3]
The government spent more than $120 million and countless hours pursuing Clemens. They examined 15,732 pages of Clemens’s family bank records from JPMorgan Chase, 1,139 pages of records from American Express credit cards, more than 300 pages of medical records from MLB teams for which Clemens played, and hundreds of pages of phone records. Ninety-three agents also interviewed 179 people in 68 different locations and produced 235 reports of their interviews. They called 24 witnesses. And yet all they had to show for it was a flawed “star