THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Well, I saw it, too--heard the whole tape and all of the commentary. I’ve been around a long time, but unlike MGL, I simply can’t say who is telling the truth. I realize that (apparently) Clemens knew it was being taped and was advised by his lawyers beforehand how to approach it (avoiding entrapment or whatever)--and that McNamee perhaps suspected it was being taped, and tried to go as far as he could to apologise to Clemens without admitting guilt. That could mean that he lied in his Mitchell statement, or that he told the truth but is sorry for ratting Roger out when he felt he was forced to, and didn’t want to rat him out further on a tape…

Given all of the differences in the way people express themselves, especially under duress, plus the perceived legal motivations they may have had, I fail to see how MGL can be so sure about the truth. If you listen to the tape, and try to discern any underlying dynamics, it’s hard to go one way or the other. If that tape was all I had to go in in a court of law, I would easily vote Clemens ‘not guilty’ ( not the same as ‘innocent’.

I too felt that as I was listening, I was trying to think “How would a lawyer tell Clemens to respond”.  And it was always the same thing: never say the words drugs or steroids.  All he said “I want someone to tell the truth”, without specifying what the truth is.  It’s the “what the definition of is is”.  Truth = drugs?  Truth = not drugs?  Instead of saying that he did or didn’t do drugs, he said “Truth”.  Just like a lawyer would say.

That McNamee didn’t respond when Clemens said “truth”, was rather bizarre.  It’s almost like HIS lawyer told him not to respond when Clemens used the worth “truth”.  Just let Clemens say it, but don’t respond to it.

It’s rather incredible really.

But, I feel for Clemens because if he was a linebacker, we’d appreciate his efforts at the ten hours a day he puts into his regimen.  Whatever advantage he has or has not pales in comparison to his work ethic.

I’d put up Clemens’ drug-free work ethic against anyone’s drug-filled, passe work ethic.

Honestly, I overstated my case, which is why I prefaced the thread by saying that, “I normally hate to get...”

I would also vote him “not guilty” in a court of law (so maybe I will have to modify my 99% down to 90%).

There really is no legal implication for the tape.  Clemens did not have to worry about “entrapping” McNamee.  This was not a police official talking to a suspect.  All he had to do was make it obvious that he was telling the truth and that his trainer was not.  He did NOT do that in any way, shape or form (other than in some bizzare, roundabout, vague sort of way).

He simply should have asked McNamee why he lied and said that he took steroids when they both know that he didn’t.  The worst that could have happened was that McNamee, suspecting that he was being taped or not wanting to incriminate himself, would say, “What are you talking about, I did not lie.” However, it seemed to me that McNamee still wanted to be friends with Clemens and possibly wanted him to help financially with his son, and in general was sorry for what was happening to Clemens. I am pretty sure that was a good chance that McNamee would have said, “I am sorry I lied Roger.  The Feds told me that unless I incriminated someone famous (or Clemens himself), I would be going to jail.”

I have some experience in these types of situations and it was a classic, “Why did you rat me out conversation,” and when McNamee said (repeatedly), “What do you want me to do?” it sounded obvious to me that he meant, “Do you want me to lie and retract my statements?” And Clemens non-response to that question ("What do you want me to do?") makes no sense whatsoever.  No sense.  The whole point of the phone call and taping it was to show the world (and possibly a jury in a trial) that McNamee was a liar.  Clemens made no attempt (or a feeble one at best) to show that in the conversation. All he had to do was say, “What I want you to do is to tell the world that you lied, and that you did not inject me with steroids or HGH, because that is the truth - isn’t it?”

My ONLY conclusion is that Clemens was scared to death of what McNamee might have said on the phone and that is why his (Clemens) comments were so bizarre.  Any time McNamee tried to talk about the situation, Clemens would interrupt him with some irrelevant comments or questions.

When I heard on the news that Clemens had taped a conversation with McNamee and then I heard the beginning of the tape, which sounded like two old friends talking, I thought to myself, “Gosh darn it, Clemens must have been telling the truth all along.  Why else would he tape a conversation and play it at a news conference.”

Then when it was over, I said to myself, “You have got to be kidding me.  Clemens wants us to believe that he actually made a good faith effort to show that he was telling the truth and that McNamee was lying?  Clemens and his lwyers can’t possibly think we are so naive.” That tape sounded like two mafia guys being taped by the Feds in which no one really admits anything and there is a lot of “wink, wink” going on.

It really was a joke.

And the bottom line is that there is NO DOUBT (as in 99.9%) in my mind that it is going to HURT and not HELP Clemens.  I knew that before I heard all the commentators say the same thing.  Has ANY commentator said, “Well, NOW I am convinced.  Clemens is surely telling the truth.” Everyone I saw on TV (admittedly not too many so far) were basically shaking their heads…

I have no problem with Clemens or anyone other player taking steroids.  I really don’t care.  And I admire and respect (and am jealous of) his work ethic with or without steroids.  But this is turning into an unnecessary circus.

I have known many people who were guilty of one thing or another but for whatever reasons they dug their heels in and acted as if they truly believed they were innocent.  Rep. Larry Craig is a good example.  Drew Peterson is probably another one.  Actually the list could go on and on.  Why should Clemens be any different?  Some people will admit their wrongdoings, accept the consequences and move on.  Some people will NEVER do that, regardless of the truth. Clemens appears to be one of the latter.  As I said, it is not so uncommon.  Frankly, I don’t believe it makes one person “better” than another (to admit their wrongdoings in public).

Basically, I agree with mgl.  What Clemens said during the phone conversation led me to believe that he was inferring to McNamee “why did you rat me out i’ve been good to you” instead of “i’m innocent so you should stop lying.” I’m sorry, but Clemens is a complete joke to me...as a Red Sox fan I thought he was all about money and fame when playing and now I think he’s even more of a piece of shit (pardon my language).  If every single person out there doesn’t believe he’s lying then they’re kidding themselves.  I just have two things to say: 1) Clemens did admit that he and Pettite “casually” had discussed the steroid stuff when there was news on the topic, and given that Pettite is his closest friend in MLB, how the hell did he not know Pettite was on HGH at some point?  I’m sorry, but we all have best friends, and some people may be able to keep better secrets than others, but someone ALWAYS knows what’s going on.  Plus, I work out quite a bit and my roomates and I are always sharing vitamins, protein stuff, etc. so Clemens HAD to know Pettite was on HGH or doing something else.  If not, he clearly would have seen Pettite do better in workouts, etc.  2) When people lie, they get DEFENSIVE.  In the 60 minutes interview, Clemens was doing more yelling and accusing than explaining why he was innoncent.  His body language clearly should show that he’s lying…

McNamee had NOTHING to gain by implementing Clemens and everything to lose by not telling the truth.  Clearly this guy doesn’t seem to be the intellect, and it seems to me that Clemens is using his power (money, powerful lawyers, etc.) to try and bully McNamee around.

MGl, what you said here describes the whole situation:
“I have known many people who were guilty of one thing or another but for whatever reasons they dug their heels in and acted as if they truly believed they were innocent.”

We have all been accused doing something we knew was wrong and didn’t want to get into trouble, so we lied and denied it to the fullest extent (even though we knew we were wrong) because we think to tell the truth would just be even worse. The accuser doesn’t have suffcicient evidence so it is possibly to deny such claims.  This is the EXACT situation with Clemens.  It’s quite clear.

I’m right with MGL here. Also, from strictly an ethical standpoint, what does it say about Clemens (and his legal team) that he would covertly tape a private conversation? That’s devious, slimy and a total betrayal of another’s trust. You’re trying to portray yourself as an honest, stand-up guy and you do that? From a public relation standpoint, that should definitely hurt him as well.

I’m with MGL all the way. The dynamics of the call really make Clemens look guilty.

A competent lawyer would have told him to get whatever he could from the trainer. Statements like, “Hey, man, we all got problems, but you gave me my problems because you lied,” seem like what to go with.

In another small data point, Clemens lied after throwing the bat at Piazza. I’m convinced he’s lying now. It’s not a conclusion I come to happily.

And, yeah, it does make him a worse human being. If I ever see Clemens competing again, I’ll boo him. (As for Pettitte, I have nothing against him at all. He took HGH, admitted it, and I believe Pettitte. Andy needs better friends.)

--JRM

I said “some” but I actually think that most people will lie (deny they did something) to protect their image or reputation if they think they can get away with it AND if what they did is a big deal (in their mind).  We certainly have that right in a court of law (to deny that we did something, at least implicitly by not testifying and by having our lawyer mount a defense which essentially says, “I didn’t do it.").  I’m not sure that we don’t have the same right in the court of public opinion.

It is easy for Andy to admit that he took HGH “one time” under a doctor’s prescription, not that that is necessarily true.

I saw some highlighted bits of the conversation again, and unless I’m crazy I DO remember Clemens saying somelike “why don’t you tell ‘em I never used steroids”.

I still think that 1) the only way to know for sure is if one of the players had slipped up and told the truth by mistake, and 2) that didn’t happen. I’ve seen too many cases where it seems obvious to many/most people that someone is (or isn’t) lying, and it turns out they weren’t (or were). For me, Clemens conversation falls into that category.

mgl must be on crack because it’s quite clear that MacNamee was either trying to set up Clemens for a witness tampering charge or was trying to shake him down for money.

David, Clemens never said “Why don’t you tell ‘em I never used steroids.” It was more like “I took care of you, why did you turn your back on me.”

G-Man, are you serious?  Right now, all we know is that Clemens knew it was being recorded.  If they both knew, then we might as well throw the recording out because it’s useless.

MacNamee probably knew it was recorded, but that didn’t stop him from trying to set up Clemens, presumably at the behest of his government handlers.

Clemens, and his team of lawyers, taped the conversation. How are we so sure of it’s authenticity, that it wasn’t edited in some way?

#14, I never thought of that.  McNamee may well have said something like, “I just told the truth.  What is the problem?” Or something like that.  Clemens lawyers could have edited that out or if something incriminating to Clemens was said, they simply did not have to play the tape.  Of course, I don’t think the lawyers would have taken the chance that something incriminating to Clemens was said, while McNamee or a government agency was taping the conversation.  OOTH, if Clemens has insisted to them that he is not lying (which he probably has), they might not think there is anything to lose by having that conversation.

I heard a local lawyer on XM radio say that it was almost for sure (or something like that) that a government agency was taping the conversation and/ or present on MacNamee’s end.  I don’t know why that would be the case.  As far as I know, MacNamee is not a witness in any proceeding, certainly not involving Clemens.  Where does “witness tampering” come into play?  (The guy on the radio said the same thing about witness tampering.) As far as I know, it is not illegal to tell someone to lie.  It might be illegal to tell someone to lie to an investigator (probably is conspiracy to give false information or what have you), but if Clemens were to tell McNamee to lie in a press conference or to the press in general, I don’t think that is a crime.

In any case, if G-Man or anyone is claiming that McNamee at the behest of the government was trying to get Clemens to get McNamee to lie, then the government must still believe that McNamee is telling the truth.

I don’t know that Clemens is “guilty” but I am 90% certain.  The error bars around that 90% are high.  Again, if any reasonable person was telling the truth and taped that conversation with the intention of proving (or at least attempting to prove) that McNamee was lying, the conversation would have gone completely differently.  The only reasonable thing to have said on the tape was, “I want you to tell everyone the truth - that you lied about injecting me with steroids.  We all know that isn’t true.” And, “Why did you lie about that?  Did they threaten you unless you somehow implicated me?” And if your response is that Clemens is not a reasonable or particularly smart person, my answer is that his lawyers would SURELY tell him to say exactly that, if he was telling the truth.

There is no plausible reason that I can think of why Clemens would have beaten around the bush in that phone conversation, which was made with the express purpose of exonerating him, unless he was lying.  If anyone has another explanation, please enlighten us.

For the record, I was not on, nor have I ever used, crack cocaine.

----"There is no plausible reason I can think of why Clemens would have beaten around the bush in that phone conversation...”

All that means, to me, is that you are not enough of an ‘insider’ in this matter to understand everything. Probably only Clemens and his lawyers are. And also, even if you are correct and it was ‘bad strategy’, it could well be that he is innocent but his lawyers’ analysis was faulty. Bad strategy does not necessarily indicate guilt.

For those who subscibe to BPro, there’s a worthwhile article up by D Jacques today on this topic…

I believe the article on BP is for free.

Right it is:

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=7032

McNamee said “what do you want me do” 21 times in 17 minutes. That’s a guy working an entrapment angle. He was hoping he could Roger to say that he (Clemens) wanted McNamee to change his testimony - perhaps in exchange for a little cash from Clemens.

----"For the record, I was not on, nor have I ever used, crack cocaine.”

Using the same standard that seems to be being applied to Clemens, this looks like a ‘lawyered-up’ way of obfuscating that you have used ‘regular’ snort cocaine every day for 20 years.

#20, if you believe that McNamee was trying to get Roger to “tamper” then you must believe that Roger is “guilty.” I don’t think it is witness tampering to tell someone to tell the truth.

IOW, if Roger says to Brian, “I want you to tell the prosecutors (or press) that you lied,” that is only “witness tampering” (I would assume) if you want the witness to now lie.

If someone is planning on telling a lie about me in court, I think it is within my right to call him and tell him that I want him to tell the truth.  Now if I try and coerce him (with threats) or offer to pay him money, whether I want him to tell the truth or lie, that may be another story (although witnesses gets paid money all the time for telling the “truth” right?).

For Federal (each state is different of course) witness tampering, here is an interesting part of the statute:

In a prosecution for an offense under this section, it is an affirmative defense, as to which the defendant has the burden of proof by a preponderance of the evidence, that the conduct consisted solely of lawful conduct and that the defendant’s sole intention was to encourage, induce, or cause the other person to testify truthfully.

So I see no reason how Clemens could have “witness tampered” (and thus, would be careful about what he said) if he was telling the truth about not taking steroids.  It also appears that paying someone to tell the truth is lawful as well, at least under the federal statute.  So where is the possible tampering if Clemens is telling the truth?

As I have continually said, if I am telling the truth, I can call the person up who is lying and say anything I want short of threatening or intimidating him, or engaging in any unlawful conduct to get him to tell the truth.  Why did not Roger do that and why did not his lawyers tell him to do that?  Why would they (the lawyers) have Roger call the guy in the first place, tape the call, and then tell Roger not to say anything explicit.  Makes little sense unless Roger is lying.

The problem is that the Feds think their guy is telling the truth. So, it even if Clemens is telling the truth and wants McNamee to tell the truth, it’s not going to matter to the Feds because they have hitched their wagon to McNamee as the truth teller. Even if Hardin can prove that Clemens is telling the truth, the damage of the witness tampering charge will have already been done. Clemens was smart to be careful. McNamee was clearly on a fishing expedition of some kind, but Clemens didn’t take the bait.

G-man - I definitely agree that McNamee seemed to be “fishing” for something.

But under the assumption that Clemens has been telling the truth this whole time, and it was in fact McNamee that lied… what exactly would McNamee be fishing for?  How can Clemens possibly slip up if he’s been telling the truth this whole time?

In other words, what’s the “best case” result of that call for McNamee, if Clemens has been telling the truth and McNamee has been lying all along?

Another good article:
http://www.bizofbaseball.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1821&Itemid=41

G-Man, your logic escapes me.  If Clemens is telling the truth, then he does not have to be careful.  He simply needs to say, “You know and I know that I did not take steroids.  Why did you lie to the feds and to Mitchell?  I would like you to tell someone (everyone) that you lied and that I did not take steroids.”

My only contention is that since Clemens did not say anything remotely similar to that, he must be lying.

You seem to be saying that you think that Clemens is telling the truth AND that he needed to be careful in what he said.  Those two things cannot co-exist (him being truthful and having to be careful).

I do not know who is telling the truth.  Only that based on what Clemens did and did not say on the tape that it is unlikely that he is telling the truth.  It does not matter what McNamee’s motivation was or whether he or the feds were taping or listening in to the conversation at his end.  My logic is still the same - Clemens did not need to be “careful” about what he said IF he was telling the truth.  You keep saying that he was careful on the tape because he did not want to be accused of witness tampering.  O.K.  I agree exactly.  But he only needed to be careful and worry about witness tampering if he knew that he was lying.  If you think that he is NOT lying, then it invalidates your argument about him having to be careful.

Why would he need to be careful about what he said if he was telling the truth?  “Brian, I know and you know that you did not inject me with steroids!  You know what I want you to do (since you asked me that 22 times)?  I want you to tell everyone - at least the press - and preferably at my news conference - that you lied.  I want you to tell the truth.  Your lying is destroying my reputation and my family.  I thought we were friends and that I always took care of you.  Why DID you lie to the feds and to Mitchel?  Did they force you?  Did they threaten you?  Tell me and maybe I can understand, although I still want you to come clean and tell the truth.”

Why in the world would he have to have been careful about saying anything remotely similar to that, which would have completely exonerated him unless Brian said on the phone, “That isn’t true, I DID tell the truth,” IF HE WERE INNOCENT?  He has a lawyer standing next to him.  I am a lawyer as well.  That is exactly what I would tell my client to say if he were telling the truth, and that is exactly what any normal person would say if they were telling the truth.  There is no possible way that that or anything like it can be witness tampering if Clemens is telling the truth.

Even if his lawyer told him to be careful because the lawyer was not sure if Clemens was telling the truth, Clemens, if he knows that he WAS telling the truth, would simply say, “No, I don’t have to be careful.  I am telling the truth.”

The followup from Derek Jacques:

http://baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=7047