I, like many others, watched in awe through the years as Roger Clemens pitched his way to 354 major league wins. The invincible Roger had the "it" factor right from the start as a collegiate star at the University of Texas.
Clemens also possessed Hall of Fame appeal from the first day he stepped out on the mound for the Boston Red Sox, and would have been a Hall of Famer if he had retired with the Red Sox after the 1996 season.
Like Roger or hate Roger, it seemed you had to respect Roger. Clemens worked hard at his trade, can't take that away from him.
Always in search of the competitive advantage, the edge, the equalizer.
Clemens understood opposing players injected steroids, and as a competitor, probably felt disadvantaged.
The perceived risk for Clemens remained that if injecting steroids helped to over enhance his performance, especially in the "twilight" of his career, which in theory, the steroids appeared to do, people would start asking questions.
And ask, we did.
Without stating the obvious, many of us scratched our heads and shrugged our shoulders.
How could he continue to be so productive so late in his career?
There must have been honest explanations for this continued success.
We compared Clemens workout to Nolan Ryan's ferocious workout routine.
That must have been it.
We pointed to his healthy diet, a great trainer, a champions attitude for success.
Failure was clearly not an option here, at any cost.
Ultimately, The Icarus-like flaw for Clemens was not that he appeared to have cheated, but that he appeared to have arrogantly lied to the American public. We would still forgive him, many of us thought, if he had just come clean.
Now Clemens faces the prospect of jail time for being accused of lying under oath in front of a Congressional inquiry.
At the inquiry, Clemens came off as being jaded, thinking he had become untouchable. After all, Roger held friends in high places, such as the Bush family, who in turn, would keep him out of harms way.
We watched him stammer, struggle, and sulk his way through the Congressional inquiry. Even the haters couldn't help but be floored by watching this sports icon blow up his career right in front of our eyes. Something went wrong here, something didn't add up.
His best friend, Andy Pettitte, admitted wrongdoing and contradicted Clemens' claims of innocence. Surely, Clemens never felt that he would be duped by his best friend. What Clemens did not realize is that not even best friends will lie to cover one's sins.
The stakes just got too high, the potential punishments too severe.
And what about the fans who believed in him all those years? The fans who sat out in the cold to cheer him on, who brought their children to watch him, who invested their hard-earned money to support him. What about them?
I suppose a few of Roger's hardcore fans will follow Roger no matter what happens. The cultish types, the ones in denial, the conspiracy theorists.
For the die hard followers, I wish 'em well, because as the saying goes, "you reap what you sow" and "the truth always comes out in the end."
The problem remains that many can't take the truth, for the truth can be too bitter a pill to swallow. The truth has a way of shattering illusions of grandeur, wrecking false images of honor, dismantling fake auras of supremacy.
On that note, I hope Roger can find peace within himself and reach out to those he touched in this life, and make it better for them, too. Then, in some way, he will become a true champion once again, perhaps a champion of the highest order.
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