Andy
Pettitte didn’t want to talk about Roger Clemens’ acquittal on perjury and
other charges. I don’t blame him. If I were Pettitte, I wouldn’t want to talk
about how I put my hand on a Bible, swore to tell the whole truth and nothing
but the truth, then completely bent the truth to save my old pal.
Clemens was
acquitted for many reasons, but Pettitte’s suddenly hazy memory didn’t help the
prosecution’s case. I’m still quite shocked that the jury couldn’t bring itself
to find Clemens guilty of even one charge. But the members of that jury were
not baseball fans – some of them had never even heard of Clemens – and didn’t
understand the context of just how much damage Clemens and the other
performance-enhancing drug users did to the game and how he should have been
punished for that.
It’s amazing
how my opinion of Pettitte has completely changed since his appearance at the
Clemens trial. I root for him to pitch well for the New York Yankees’ sake and
I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the starters have been on such a hot
streak since he came back. (Phil Hughes, brilliant of late, has
openly talked about how much of a help Pettitte has been to him). But I get no
joy from watching Pettitte pitch. Not anymore. I went from being uncontrollably
excited about Pettitte’s comeback when it was first announced to completely
disappointed at his off-the-field actions.
By the way,
I couldn’t disagree more with Derek Jeter about the acquittal being good for
baseball. I know that the Yankees Captain grew fond of Clemens as a teammate,
but what Clemens and the other baseball cheaters did has put a permanent black
mark on the game. I believed that the biggest names among the cheaters, Barry
Bonds and Clemens, had to pay for what they did for the game to truly begin to
heal and neither of them did.
But Pettitte’s
cocoon of silence won’t protect him from the fact that he went out of his way
to bend the truth to get his friend off the hook. And that is something he will
have to live with.
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