Roger Clemens, the best pitcher of this generation and arguably the best ever, has certainly fallen on hard times since his retirement following the 2007 season.
Since being named in the infamous Mitchell Report as being an alleged steroid user, Clemens has denied such charges on 60 Minutes, been re-accused by former personal trainer Brian McNamee of the same allegations, and subsequently denied them again, this time in front of Congress.
Things got a bit darker for The Rocket last week when he was indicted by a federal court on six counts, most notably two perjury charges, stemming from his denial on Capitol Hill in February, 2008. The grand jury trial is expected to start late this year or early next year and will certainly mar Clemens’ legacy even further as it will be dissected every-which-way for weeks and months, regardless of how high-profile his defense team may be.
So with as many milestones surpassed and awards won as any pitcher in history, we should begin to look at some of his accomplishments in lieu of the fact that he may very well have been using steroids.
However, it would be unfair to throw everything he’s done under the bus at once, as Clemens has never been accused of taking steroids for his entire career.
Instead, let’s take a look at some of Clemens’ more memorable moments that fall in the range of his suspected use. For that time table, we will be focusing on the years of 1998, 2000 and 2001, as these are the seasons in which McNamee has testified that he and Clemens spoke explicitly about steroid use and that he even injected Clemens on several occasions.
Considering the fact that a grand jury believes McNamee enough to indict “The Rocket,” I’d say we’re pretty safe in assuming there is more to his testimony than a scorned trainer trying to make a name for himself.
So in chronological order, here are five of Clemens’ most notable moments on the baseball field that are directly in the shadow of his cloud of steroid allegations.