They still don't know who destroyed the CIA interrogation tapes or ordered the firing of US attorneys, but Capitol Hill bloodhounds will stop at nothing to find out if Roger Clemens used steroids.
On January 15th, the House Oversight Committee starts two days of hearings to pursue this pressing national issue, a month after the well-publicized Mitchell Report was issued and ten days after Clemens appears on 60 Minutes.
"It could be a circus with players, true," the Committee's minority staff director, David Marin, admits. "But if you tailor it right and invite people who clearly have pertinent information about the substance of the report, then it's anything but a circus. It's substantive."
The lawmakers will be following in the footsteps of Mike Wallace, whose grilling of Clemens to be shown tomorrow night elicits testimony that he only took legal injections of Lidocaine and B-12, not steroids.
"Swear?" Wallace asks Clemens. "Swear," Clemens answers. Would the Rocket lie to CBS' 89-year-old icon? Congress will put him under oath to find out.
In 2005, the same panel questioned other baseball stars and got blanket denials, but this time with 400 pages of documents and rumors compiled by a former Senate Majority Leader and paid for by anxious team owners, the results may very well be different.
One of the eagerly anticipated witnesses will be former New York Yankees All-Star second baseman Chuck Knoblauch, who intrigued observers of the national pastime some years back by suddenly losing the ability to make an accurate throw to first base without the aid of a Seeing Eye dog. Could steroids have had anything to do with that?
Showing posts with label New York Yankees. Show all posts
Showing posts with label New York Yankees. Show all posts
Saturday, January 05, 2008
Tuesday, October 09, 2007
Giuliani Stays Ahead of the Game
America’s Mayor prepared for tonight’s Republican debate by going to a ball park last night. It couldn’t have been relaxing since he saw his beloved New York Yankees eliminated from the American League playoffs and. at the same time, had to face the fact that front runners and favorites can be beaten.
But if he loses, the scoreboard shows it’s unlikely to be to the former Governor of the hated Boston Red Sox’s state, Mitt Romney.
A new Gallup Poll today shows Rudy 12 percentage points ahead of Fred Thompson, 16 over John McCain and in another ballpark from Romney, whose free-spending still leaves him at 9 percent, barely ahead of practically penniless Mike Huckabee at 7.
Giuliani will be saddened by the Yankees’ loss not only by empathy for the ball club he loves but a blow to his New Hampshire campaign where he has been connecting with Red Sox fans with good-natured bantering about their respective teams.
Now, as they say in the national pastime, the fat lady has sung for his favorite team, but there hasn’t been a peep out of her for his Presidential campaign.
But if he loses, the scoreboard shows it’s unlikely to be to the former Governor of the hated Boston Red Sox’s state, Mitt Romney.
A new Gallup Poll today shows Rudy 12 percentage points ahead of Fred Thompson, 16 over John McCain and in another ballpark from Romney, whose free-spending still leaves him at 9 percent, barely ahead of practically penniless Mike Huckabee at 7.
Giuliani will be saddened by the Yankees’ loss not only by empathy for the ball club he loves but a blow to his New Hampshire campaign where he has been connecting with Red Sox fans with good-natured bantering about their respective teams.
Now, as they say in the national pastime, the fat lady has sung for his favorite team, but there hasn’t been a peep out of her for his Presidential campaign.
Monday, October 08, 2007
Gnats to You, George Steinbrenner
In the race for Most Obnoxious New Yorker, the Yankee owner has always been neck and neck with Donald Trump, but this weekend “The Boss” made a strong bid for the title as he nears the finish line.
Emerging from what was assumed to be senile silence, the 77-year-old Mouth managed to offend everyone who enjoys baseball as an oasis from the cruder realities of modern life by threatening to fire his polar opposite, 67-year-old Joe Torre, one of the most gifted managers in sports history and a model for what a decent, caring man can accomplish in competition.
The team had lost two games of a playoff with Cleveland, the second of which hinged on the bizarre attack of swarms of insects that unnerved 22-year-old Joba Chamberlain, who up to that point had been their American Dream savior.
But Steinbrenner has no sensitivity to anything beyond money, power and his own insatiable ego.
The Yankees rallied to win last night and save their manager’s job. But even if they go on to win it all, Steinbrenner has once again, hopefully for the last time, poisoned our pleasure in seeing them do it.
Emerging from what was assumed to be senile silence, the 77-year-old Mouth managed to offend everyone who enjoys baseball as an oasis from the cruder realities of modern life by threatening to fire his polar opposite, 67-year-old Joe Torre, one of the most gifted managers in sports history and a model for what a decent, caring man can accomplish in competition.
The team had lost two games of a playoff with Cleveland, the second of which hinged on the bizarre attack of swarms of insects that unnerved 22-year-old Joba Chamberlain, who up to that point had been their American Dream savior.
But Steinbrenner has no sensitivity to anything beyond money, power and his own insatiable ego.
The Yankees rallied to win last night and save their manager’s job. But even if they go on to win it all, Steinbrenner has once again, hopefully for the last time, poisoned our pleasure in seeing them do it.
Monday, September 10, 2007
American Dream Tableau
In Little Leagues or Bigs, baseball fields are places to celebrate our national ideals--individual skills as part of a team effort where everyone knows the boundaries and plays hard to win but respects the rules.
This weekend, when we needed it more than ever, there was a tableau in Kansas City to bring tears to the most hardened observer of American life. A 22-year-old named Joba Chamberlain stepped out on the mound and began throwing 100-mile-an-hour pitches for the New York Yankees.
But the real drama was in the grandstands where his father, Harlan, in a wheelchair, surrounded by neighbors from Lincoln, Neb. was seeing his son in the Major Leagues for the first time.
The elder Chamberlain, afflicted by polio when he was nine months old, was born on a reservation of the Winnebago American Indian tribe and left with little use of his left arm, a severe limp and deafness in his left ear.
Nonetheless, as a single father supporting his family, he played catch with his son while sitting in the wheelchair until his hand stung so much he couldn’t stand it. "If it wasn't blowing or a million degrees below zero, we were out there," Harlan Chamberlain recalls.
Joba, born Justin, is now a sensation in the American League after pitching in eleven games without giving up a run. But his father was not watching with statistics in mind.
“I just want to reach out to my son and touch him,” he said. "I just want to hold him for a few minutes."
This weekend, when we needed it more than ever, there was a tableau in Kansas City to bring tears to the most hardened observer of American life. A 22-year-old named Joba Chamberlain stepped out on the mound and began throwing 100-mile-an-hour pitches for the New York Yankees.
But the real drama was in the grandstands where his father, Harlan, in a wheelchair, surrounded by neighbors from Lincoln, Neb. was seeing his son in the Major Leagues for the first time.
The elder Chamberlain, afflicted by polio when he was nine months old, was born on a reservation of the Winnebago American Indian tribe and left with little use of his left arm, a severe limp and deafness in his left ear.
Nonetheless, as a single father supporting his family, he played catch with his son while sitting in the wheelchair until his hand stung so much he couldn’t stand it. "If it wasn't blowing or a million degrees below zero, we were out there," Harlan Chamberlain recalls.
Joba, born Justin, is now a sensation in the American League after pitching in eleven games without giving up a run. But his father was not watching with statistics in mind.
“I just want to reach out to my son and touch him,” he said. "I just want to hold him for a few minutes."
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