Comments on: The most undercovered aspect of the Roger Clemens love-in, 2007 edition http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/ Media, Baseball, Boston, the Red Sox, Music, Literature, and Mnookins Fri, 16 May 2008 21:57:21 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.2 by: Clemens’ Crisis « 1Manstanding’s Weblog http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-441519 Fri, 21 Mar 2008 21:59:55 +0000 http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-441519 [...] Blog coverage, as a more personalized medium, gives mostly unfavorable opinions concerning Roger Clemens and this incident. No sympathy is extended to Clemens, with blogs expressing dissatisfaction and even boredom with the seemingly endless claims of PED use that have recently become ubiquitous to the MLB and other professional sports leagues. Of the four blogs I visited, only two actually featured a photo of Clemens. One was an action shot of Clemens reigning on the pitcher’s mound, while another blog offered links to two pictures supposedly before and after the alleged steroid use. Blog coverage is focused mostly on speculation from the Web site author on whether or not Clemens did actually engage in the use of PED’s. Blogs frame the crisis as just another fallen hero, not unlike prominent stars in the past who have been knocked-down from their demi-god status. [...] […] Blog coverage, as a more personalized medium, gives mostly unfavorable opinions concerning Roger Clemens and this incident. No sympathy is extended to Clemens, with blogs expressing dissatisfaction and even boredom with the seemingly endless claims of PED use that have recently become ubiquitous to the MLB and other professional sports leagues. Of the four blogs I visited, only two actually featured a photo of Clemens. One was an action shot of Clemens reigning on the pitcher’s mound, while another blog offered links to two pictures supposedly before and after the alleged steroid use. Blog coverage is focused mostly on speculation from the Web site author on whether or not Clemens did actually engage in the use of PED’s. Blogs frame the crisis as just another fallen hero, not unlike prominent stars in the past who have been knocked-down from their demi-god status. […]

]]> by: The Feeding the Monster Blog — In which the author discusses Boston, the Red Sox, the media, and very occasionally popular music. » How to lie with statistics, academia edition: Here’s what your $40,000 a year is paying for http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-333048 Sun, 23 Dec 2007 17:02:25 +0000 http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-333048 [...] Let’s drill down a little more. Cole and Stigler write, “The Roger Clemens is a case in point: a great pitcher before 1998, a great (if increasingly fragile) pitcher after he is supposed to have received treatment. But when we compared Clemens’s E.R.A. through 1997 with his E.R.A. from 1998 on, it was worse by 0.32 in the later period.” As I pointed out last year, the salient point here is how Clemens performed in his late 30s compared to his mid 20s. In the 12 years from Clemens’ breakout year in 1986, when he was 23, he had an ERA+ above 180 twice; in the 10 years from age 35 to 44, he had two more. Compare that to other Hall of Fame pitchers from this era like Greg Maddux, who had four years with an ERA+ of 180 or higher before age 35 and none afterwards, or Tom Glavine, whose five best years all came before age 35. Heck, compare it to Tom Seaver, the guy who was voted into the Hall with the highest percentage ever: his six best years all came before age 34. [...] […] Let’s drill down a little more. Cole and Stigler write, “The Roger Clemens is a case in point: a great pitcher before 1998, a great (if increasingly fragile) pitcher after he is supposed to have received treatment. But when we compared Clemens’s E.R.A. through 1997 with his E.R.A. from 1998 on, it was worse by 0.32 in the later period.” As I pointed out last year, the salient point here is how Clemens performed in his late 30s compared to his mid 20s. In the 12 years from Clemens’ breakout year in 1986, when he was 23, he had an ERA+ above 180 twice; in the 10 years from age 35 to 44, he had two more. Compare that to other Hall of Fame pitchers from this era like Greg Maddux, who had four years with an ERA+ of 180 or higher before age 35 and none afterwards, or Tom Glavine, whose five best years all came before age 35. Heck, compare it to Tom Seaver, the guy who was voted into the Hall with the highest percentage ever: his six best years all came before age 34. […]

]]> by: The Feeding the Monster Blog — In which the author discusses Boston, the Red Sox, the media, and very occasionally popular music. » Day Three: The situation’s looking worse all the time for Roger http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-324045 Sun, 16 Dec 2007 16:41:49 +0000 http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-324045 [...] Roger Clemens, through his lawyer, has been sticking with his Casablanca-evoking outrage that he was fingered as a ‘roids user. He shouldn’t be surprised, and neither should anyone else. (Compare this picture of a middle-aged Clemens to this one when he was in Boston. It certainly looks like his body went through a Bonds-like transformation.) I’ve been curious as to why more people weren’t asking questions about Clemens since last January, when Boston was in the hunt for his services. [...] […] Roger Clemens, through his lawyer, has been sticking with his Casablanca-evoking outrage that he was fingered as a ‘roids user. He shouldn’t be surprised, and neither should anyone else. (Compare this picture of a middle-aged Clemens to this one when he was in Boston. It certainly looks like his body went through a Bonds-like transformation.) I’ve been curious as to why more people weren’t asking questions about Clemens since last January, when Boston was in the hunt for his services. […]

]]> by: The Feeding the Monster Blog — In which the author discusses Boston, the Red Sox, the media, and very occasionally popular music. » What - you want more on the Mitchell Report? http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-321114 Thu, 13 Dec 2007 22:46:39 +0000 http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-321114 [...] That’s all for now. I’ve written plenty about steroids in the past, including last August, when I wondered why no one was wondering about Roger, and way back in October ‘06, when I mocked the press’s surprise that Clemens had been fingered in he Grimsley affidavit. I also tagged Jason Giambi a gutless punk, ripped into the Players Union for defending the players’ right to destroy their livers, lamented the fact that Jose Canseco seemed to be the only honest guy around, and talked about how Bill James compared steroids to going through a divorce. (Sort of, anyway.) [...] […] That’s all for now. I’ve written plenty about steroids in the past, including last August, when I wondered why no one was wondering about Roger, and way back in October ‘06, when I mocked the press’s surprise that Clemens had been fingered in he Grimsley affidavit. I also tagged Jason Giambi a gutless punk, ripped into the Players Union for defending the players’ right to destroy their livers, lamented the fact that Jose Canseco seemed to be the only honest guy around, and talked about how Bill James compared steroids to going through a divorce. (Sort of, anyway.) […]

]]> by: Pedro00mvp http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-41673 Mon, 14 May 2007 22:18:50 +0000 http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-41673 great points! Bonds and Rocket are both pretty obvious users in my eyes and it is facinating and sad that one is getting off without a relative peep! The fact is we have seen Roger baloon in size too, and though he didn't smash a homerun record the fact that he has been pitching at the level he has since his last season in boston points to performance enhancement drug usage. It also points to a broader issue, that there is evidence that a large percentage of ballplayers are using steroids and growth hormones, not just these two high profile guys. It is possible that players from Trot Nixon, Johnny Damon, Vlad Guerrero, Jonathan Papelbon, Albert Pujols, Robinson Cano, to the more known folks like Giambi and Sheffield, are all cheating along with a majority of others. What then? The fact is I think that Bonds is cheating, but if everyone is cheating then it is clearly unfair to single him out. I mean the notion that when Arod or Pujols breaks bonds homerun record justice will be re-established is pitiful, b/c i think in all likelihood either guy could be cheating too! But from a sociological view it is interesting that Bonds gets raked through the coals, while Clemens is the greatest and warrior. Rocket is clearly juicing too. The fact that the media and popular society choose to pretend his accomplishments are natural is outrageous in the face of Bonds' treatment. The fact is we should be treating Roger exactly as we are treating Bonds. great points! Bonds and Rocket are both pretty obvious users in my eyes and it is facinating and sad that one is getting off without a relative peep! The fact is we have seen Roger baloon in size too, and though he didn’t smash a homerun record the fact that he has been pitching at the level he has since his last season in boston points to performance enhancement drug usage. It also points to a broader issue, that there is evidence that a large percentage of ballplayers are using steroids and growth hormones, not just these two high profile guys. It is possible that players from Trot Nixon, Johnny Damon, Vlad Guerrero, Jonathan Papelbon, Albert Pujols, Robinson Cano, to the more known folks like Giambi and Sheffield, are all cheating along with a majority of others. What then? The fact is I think that Bonds is cheating, but if everyone is cheating then it is clearly unfair to single him out. I mean the notion that when Arod or Pujols breaks bonds homerun record justice will be re-established is pitiful, b/c i think in all likelihood either guy could be cheating too!

But from a sociological view it is interesting that Bonds gets raked through the coals, while Clemens is the greatest and warrior. Rocket is clearly juicing too. The fact that the media and popular society choose to pretend his accomplishments are natural is outrageous in the face of Bonds’ treatment. The fact is we should be treating Roger exactly as we are treating Bonds.

]]> by: ygbluig http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-39179 Mon, 07 May 2007 15:28:21 +0000 http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-39179 "Right now, Clemens has 348 victories. I think he has an outside chance at being the first player in nearly 100 years to reach 400. Maybe then people will start to pay attention. Comment by Joe in NYC — April 11, 2007 @ 8:39 am " So, Joe in NYC, you're expecting him to play another 2 1/2 - 3 years, and win 20 games in each? That would be a way outside chance. “Right now, Clemens has 348 victories. I think he has an outside chance at being the first player in nearly 100 years to reach 400. Maybe then people will start to pay attention.

Comment by Joe in NYC — April 11, 2007 @ 8:39 am ”

So, Joe in NYC, you’re expecting him to play another 2 1/2 - 3 years, and win 20 games in each?
That would be a way outside chance.

]]> by: Detox Blog » Roger Clemens: only his metabolism knows for sure http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-33650 Wed, 18 Apr 2007 05:09:43 +0000 http://www.sethmnookin.com/blog/2007/04/10/the-most-undercovered-aspect-of-the-roger-clemens-love-in-2007-edition/#comment-33650 [...] Deadspin reinvigorates the Roger Clemens issue.  Does he or doesn’t he?  Use anabolics that is. As we prepare for the annual Somebody Ask Roger Clemens To The Prom sweepstakes, Seth Mnookin reminds everyone that Clemens is pretty much as tied to steroid rumors as Barry Bonds is… What’s notable (to me, anyway), is how few people actually asking whether Clemens’ remarkable endurance (some would say resurgence) is due to some kind of PED. After all, it’s not like there’s any shortage of red flags. Clemens is arguably one of two players — the second being Barry Bonds — whose Hall of Fame career was (is) capped (being capped) by his most dominant years coming after the age of 35. [...] […] Deadspin reinvigorates the Roger Clemens issue.  Does he or doesn’t he?  Use anabolics that is. As we prepare for the annual Somebody Ask Roger Clemens To The Prom sweepstakes, Seth Mnookin reminds everyone that Clemens is pretty much as tied to steroid rumors as Barry Bonds is… What’s notable (to me, anyway), is how few people actually asking whether Clemens’ remarkable endurance (some would say resurgence) is due to some kind of PED. After all, it’s not like there’s any shortage of red flags. Clemens is arguably one of two players — the second being Barry Bonds — whose Hall of Fame career was (is) capped (being capped) by his most dominant years coming after the age of 35. […]

]]>