YFSF

Pay It Forward

This article reports that Roger Clemens donated three million dollars towards the construction of a pediatric wing at Houston's Memorial Hermann Medical Center. The facility opened three years ago with Clemens' name attended. Due to the desire "To better reflect its commitment to all sports and athletes", the center has chosen to remove his name from the Roger Clemens Institute for Sports Medicine.

There is a lot of room here to cast aspersions and make sport of "the Institute for Sports Medicine," but Mr. Clemens, from my perspective, is approaching a sympathetic character.

Sign Barry?!

Do you think most Sox fans have cheated in some tiny form or another on their taxes? I do. I bet most of them have. I say these jerks are taking money away from poor people. When they deducted that round at Leo J. Martin as a business expense, they were taking money away from people who really needed it. Which do you think is worse, Theo Epstein/America? Stealing money from poor people, or taking banned substances to try to make yourself better at your job?

Exactly. So who are these assholes to tell you that if you sign Barry Bonds, you'd be somehow tainting the sanctity of Fenway Park? These jerkstores taint it every time they sit their thieving asses down in the bleachers, am I right? I've sort of lost the point of this rhetorical exercise, so I hope you're still on board.

Once Fire Joe Morgan covers the subject, there's not much else left to say.  Click through for the comic brilliance.

[Full disclosure: I never deducted a round at Leo J, but definitely thieved range balls as a yute.  Maybe the worst-maintained Donald Ross course ever, at least back in the 80s.  Leo J. gave Raynham a run for its money.]

Walk Away?

I think I would have to really consider not watching a single game that Bonds plays in a Red Sox uniform, thus completely ignoring the idea that the Red Sox would stoop to such an insulting level.

- commenter Brad

it's a great study in human behavior, and how one's standards can be greatly altered by desperation...i'm amazed that any sox fans, who take pride in their team's clean image, even regulars here, who have professed past disdain for bonds, would even consider adding him to this team

- commenter dc

These comments, from the previous thread at this site, are worth a separate discussion.  It's one thing to object to a Bonds signing. That is certainly within the right of any fan. And it's within the right of any fan to forsake one's allegiance over such a signing. That's always the fan's right, to root or not root. But it is another thing to walk away from a team that has been your love for years over such a signing. How many chumps have we all rooted for over the years for either of our teams? Did we SFs stop rooting for the Sox when they signed Jose Canseco? Did we stop rooting for Wade Boggs when the Margo Adams brouhaha dropped, a distasteful affair that highlighted the egotism of a morally retrograde Hall of Fame hitter? Have Yankee fans stopped rooting for their team because they employed Gary Sheffield and still employ Jason Giambi, known cheaters? If the Sox sign Bonds I won't be all that happy - I very much dislike him as a character and feel like the distraction won't be great for us fans and this site in particular (we'll end up in circular firing squads about the signing, and instead of talking about real baseball issues YFSF will surely become a "nyaah nyaah nyaah" debate between our "I told you our teams are all the same" Yankee fans and "hoist by their own petard" Sox fans), but why should it keep me from rooting for the Sox as a team? Why should I disavow my decades of allegiance just because the Sox sign a good ballplayer and (probably) a very bad guy?

I think we should all consider how many reprobates we have rooted for as fans, in any sports league - not just the Majors - before making what I find to be overly dramatic claims of disavowal.

ARod News: Sorta Hafta

Guess I gotta post a link. Don't wanna, but gonna. Okay, there. Done with that.

After that, read this. Much betta.

Edit: also, just for gits and shiggles, check out the video just added in the extended

Your Official Andy Pettitte Self-Abnegation Thread

This has been a horrible situation for me. I'm hoping and praying I don't have to do anything else with this.—Andy Pettitte

This pretty much sums things up for me, too. For those who somehow feel compelled to continue down this road to nowhere, the comments field is yours.

Light Hair On Fire, Put Fire Out With Hammer

Congressman Henry Waxman regrets holding the Wednesday hearings.

From Duff Wilson and Michael S. Schmidt in the NY Times:

"I'm sorry we had the hearing. I regret that we had the hearing. And the only reason we had the hearing was because Roger Clemens and his lawyers insisted on it." - Waxman

Clemens' attorney, Emperor Palpatine Rusty Hardin, sez oh, well then, allow me to retort:

... Waxman’s statements were “unbelievable, disingenuous and outrageous.” ..and.. “He is the one who created this circus in the first place"

What a fustercluck.

Wasting Taxpayer Money: Clemens-McNamee Gamer

Pitchers and catchers report tomorrow. Unfortunately, that's about the last thing on everybody's mind this morning.

Things don't look good for Roger Clemens. We don't know if he was kissed, but it appears he was certainly betrayed by a friend, as Andy Pettitte apparently filed an afidavit saying he discussed using HGH with Clemens, and the New York Times also is reporting that congressional investigators dug up their own corroborating evidence for Brian McNamee's story.

It's a story fascinating for its tawdriness. You don't want to watch, yet you can't look away, so you might as well comment on the hearing here.

Selection Bias

Two weeks ago YF linked to a piece by Alan Schwarz detailing the work of Eric Walker, who posits that late career performance spikes may have nothing at all to do with PED usage. Eric took time to detail his case further at this site here and here, in addition to his extensive work on his own site.

Today the Times gives space to three Wharton faculty members who examine Clemens' own camp's report, a report intended to explain the common-ness of Roger's geriatric excellence. Unlike Walker's views of Barry Bonds' late surge, the Wharton boys cast a skeptical eye over his accomplishments, seeing something "unusual" at work. Though they will not charge PEDs with influence (like the rest of us these Professors, advanced degrees and all, cannot know whether Roger actually used), their skepticism is reasoned and apparently impartial. Click over for some interesting reading.

Needles and Pins

I collect baseball cards. Others collect signed baseballs. The memorabilia market is hot for uniforms, old programs, photographs, and just about any bric-a-brac even marginally connected to the national pastime. Brian McNamee collects used syringes, which is a new one, but, let's face it: if there's any way to exploit the great game of baseball for profit, trust that someone will figure out how. That's just one of the many lessons raised by PED use. Those who wish to flame on about Clemens and the allegations against him can do so below. I'll take a pass.

The Clemens Report

Proving that his competitive drive is stronger than ever, Roger Clemens has released his own report. At 49 pages, it's a bit short of George Mitchell's, but it promises to be just as interesting a read. In it, he makes the case that his trendlines are not as anomalous as his critics (including myself) have argued.

Update: My take on the report after the jump.