Clemens, Tejada named in Report

Clemens, Tejada named in Report

Pettitte, Roberts, Knoblauch, Justice also implicated

Posted: Thursday December 13, 2007 12:45PM; Updated: Thursday December 13, 2007 3:43PM

Roger Clemens works out with trainer Brian McNamee, who injected the Rocket with steroids, according to the Mitchell Report. AP

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NEW YORK (AP) -- Roger Clemens, Miguel Tejada and Andy Pettitte were named in the long-awaited Mitchell Report on Thursday, an All-Star roster linked to steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs that put a question mark -- if not an asterisk -- next to some of baseball's biggest moments.

Barry Bonds, already under indictment on charges of lying to a federal grand jury about steroids, and Gary Sheffield also showed up in baseball's most infamous lineup since the Black Sox scandal.

The report culminated a 20-month investigation by former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, hired by commissioner Bud Selig to examine the Steroids Era.

"Everyone involved in baseball over the past two decades -- commissioners, club officials, the players' association and players -- shares to some extent the responsibility for the steroids era," Mitchell said. "There was a collective failure to recognize the problem as it emerged and to deal with it early on."

Clemens was singled out in eight pages, with much of the information on the seven-time Cy Young Award winner coming from former major league strength coach Brian McNamee.

"According to McNamee, from the time that McNamee injected Clemens with Winstrol through the end of the 1998 season, Clemens' performance showed remarkable improvement," the report said. "During this period of improved performance, Clemens told McNamee that the steroids 'had a pretty good effect' on him."

McNamee also told investigators that "during the middle of the 2000 season, Clemens made it clear that he was ready to use steroids again. During the latter part of the regular season, McNamee injected Clemens in the buttocks four to six times with testosterone from a bottle labeled either Sustanon 250 or Deca-Durabolin."

Mitchell urged Selig to hold off on punishing players in the report "except in those cases where he determines that the conduct is so serious that discipline is necessary to maintain the integrity of the game."

Several stars named in the report could pay the price in Cooperstown, much the way Mark McGwire was kept out of the Hall of Fame this year merely because of steroids suspicion.

Besides Clemens and Pettitte, other ex-Yankees named include Mike Stanton, Chuck Knoblauch and Jason Grimsley. Orioles second baseman Brian Roberts also is in the report, as is Yankees and Braves postseason hero David Justice. More than a dozen Yankees, past and present, were cited.

Other players include: Troy Glaus, Gary Matthews Jr., Rick Ankiel, Jay Gibbons, Mo Vaughn, Paul Lo Duca, Eric Gagne, Glenallen Hill, Gregg Zaun, Rondell White, Hal Morris, Todd Hundley, Larry Bigbie, Lenny Dykstra, David Segui, Matt Herges, Kevin Brown, Mike Lansing, Wally Joyner, Nook Logan, Jason Giambi, Jeremy Giambi, Benito Santiago, Denny Neagle, Ron Villone, Fernando Vina, Todd Pratt, Jack Cust, Matt Williams, John Rocker, Paul Byrd, F.P. Santangelo, Scott Schoeneweis, Jerry Hairston Jr. and Randy Velarde.

There's an All-Star at every position. Some were linked to Human Growth Hormone, others to steroids.

"Former commissioner Fay Vincent told me that the problem of performance-enhancing substances may be the most serious challenge that baseball has faced since the 1919 Black Sox scandal," Mitchell said in the 409-page report.

"The illegal use of anabolic steroids and similar substances, in Vincent's view, is 'cheating of the worst sort.' He believes that it is imperative for Major League Baseball to 'capture the moral high ground' on the issue and, by words and deeds, make it clear that baseball will not tolerate the use of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs."

"We identify some of the players who were caught up in this drive to gain a competitive advantage," the report said. "Other investigations will no doubt turn up more names and fill in more details, but that is unlikely to significantly alter the description of baseball's `steroids era' as set forth in this report."

Mitchell is a director of the Boston Red Sox, and some questioned whether that created a conflict.

"Judge me by my work," Mitchell said. "You will not find any evidence of bias, special treatment, for the Red Sox or anyone else. That had no effect on this investigation or this report, none whatsoever."

Giambi, under threat of discipline from Selig, was the only current player known to have cooperated with the Mitchell investigation.

"The players' union was largely uncooperative for reasons that I thought were largely understandable," Mitchell said.

In 2006, the Los Angeles Times reported that Grimsley had accused six players, including Clemens and Pettitte, in a federal agent's affidavit as players who had used performance-enhancing drugs. Both Clemens and Pettitte denied the rumors at the time.

Pettitte, who in September reached the 200-win mark, recently agreed to return to the Yankees for one year and $16 million after mulling retirement for at least the second time in recent years. He has long credited Clemens, his longtime friend and teammate, with boosting his workout regimen and enabling him to stay in better shape. The two men have both worked with trainer Brian McNamee, who has also reportedly been linked to figures in the Mitchell Report.

Clemens, who has not made a decision yet whether to play in 2008, has maintained his famously rigorous workout routine and credits his long hours in the gym with helping him continue to perform at a high level. He initially retired after the 2003 season, but, thanks in large measure to Pettitte's persuasion, joined the Astros instead and won the 2004 NL Cy Young at age 42. He joined the Yankees in June of this season and finished 6-6 with a 4.18 ERA, then had to leave his start during Game 3 of the AL Division Series with a hamstring injury in the third inning.

Rafael Palmeiro, who was suspended by MLB for failing a drug test just weeks after reaching the 3,000-hit mark, had angrily denied using steroids during an appearance before Congress in March of 2005. After his suspension later that summer, he speculated he might have tested positive after receiving a B-12 shot from Tejada, who was his teammate with the Orioles in 2004 and 2005. B-12 isn't a steroid or illegal, and subsequent searches of Tejada's other vials of B-12 found no traces of steroids.

Stanton has pitched for eight different teams over a 19-year-career and was once one of the game's premiere left-handed set-up men. Roberts is a switch-hitting speedster and two-time All-Star who had hit just 12 home runs in 1,502 at-bats through 2004 -- with a career high of five -- before breaking out for 18 in 2005, including seven in April alone.

Tejada won the 2002 AL MVP award with Oakland and drove in no fewer than 98 runs between 2000 and 2006. After playing 1,152 straight games, Tejada landed on the disabled list with a broken wrist this season after being hit by a pitch. He finished the 2007 season batting .296 with 18 HRs and 81 RBI in 133 games.