From our good friends at Hendricks Sports Management, where
billable hours is not just an accounting term but a way of life, comes the
third installment in the Roger Clemens defense strategy that has so far
produced a predictable interview and an uninformative, slime-covered, secretly
recorded phone conversation. The latest submission, the 49-page “Analysis of
the Career of Roger Clemens,” further shows Clemens’ defense team will leave no
dollar unturned in its half-assed approached to defending its client.
The report in itself is not bad. Chock full of colorful
graphs and tables, the crunch of numbers, categories and comparisons are enough
to drain the brain of any amateur sabermatrician. And that is exactly the
point. Innocence through confusion. Bury the opposition behind a mountain of
data. It worked for O.J., and it worked for Capitalist Records in its suit
against Chef over ownership of Stinky Britches.
Hendricks Sports Management has wisely employed the
Chewbacca defense. It is asking the members of the supposed jury in the court
of public opinion to deliberate and conjugate the Emancipation Proclamation to
determine if charges leveled against their client makes any sense. Johnny
Cochran would have been proud.
The first real good flood of information appears on Page 10
in the form of a table that breaks Roger’s seasonal ERA margins — a comparison
of the Rocket’s ERA to league averages — into six tiers. No explanation is
offered as to why the authors chose six categories instead of two, 12 or 24.
The text below the table states that Clemens produced nine “average-to-good”
years, nine years of “superior” performances and six years “at the highest
levels.” Below that is a three-#### line graph to better illustrate the ups
and downs of his career. It looks nice, in a high school term paper kind of
way.
According to the report, Clemens’ best years were over in
1999, and “While Clemens pitched at a high level of quality at different points
throughout his career, the quality of his pitching declined as he reached his
late 30s and early 40s.”
Not exactly a winning endorsement for a free-agent pitcher,
who at the end of the season still had not yet ruled out another return to the
game. But if any suitors were to call upon the still-unattached pitcher, it
would take no time for the boys at Hendricks to produce another report
extolling the virtues of the man who between the ages of 41-43 won 38 games
while posting a 2.40 ERA.
The report is correct in saying that Clemens’ career was
lengthened by his ability to learn new pitches and his adoption of a fitness
routine following his shoulder surgery in 1985. No matter what the level of
artificial help, if any, a pitcher uses, long-term success depends on
continually learning new ways to get a batter out and being in shape.
Nolan Ryan, Clemens’ friend and hero, whose career was
examined in the report and who is by far the best litmus test for Clemens,
stressed fitness and intelligence his entire career. Ryan survived 27 years of
big league punishment not through chemical help, but by changing his pitching
style and reducing the burden on his arm and shoulder by developing and
maintaining leg strength. The report uses that fact in support of Clemens. It
is the strongest argument in a paper that goes from viable to confusing to
flat-out wrong.
The confusion comes on the final page where a document
titled, Exhibit A, makes the claim that if Clemens pitched for the Rangers
instead of Houston in 2005, he would have finished the season with a 24-3
record and an eighth Cy Young. How this has any bearing on the Rocket’s case is
a complete mystery — especially with the authors’ disregard for wins as an
accurate measure of a pitcher’s individual ability.
Things go from weird to wrong at the end of the analysis of
the report, as the authors list 31 Hall of Famers who pitched into their 40s as
a way to show how unspectacular Clemens has been.
The problem is that not every pitcher mentioned actually
pitched into their 40s. According to baseball-reference.com and
baseball-almanac.com, Mordecai “Three Fingers” Brown, Jim Bunning, Bob Gibson,
Walter Johnson and Robin Roberts all finished their careers at the age of 39.
Four more (Chief Bender, Carl Hubbell, Ferguson Jenkins,
Herb Pennock) pitched only one year into their 40s. Three others (Dennis
Eckersley, Satchel Paige and Hoyt Wilhelm) were relievers and one, Cy Young,
pitched in an era so long past that any comparison is highly suspect. That
leaves a total of 26 pitchers to safely judge Clemens against. A nice number,
but hardly the landslide of evidence suggested in the report. But how does
Clemens compare to his earlier colleagues?
With a minimum number of four years pitched in their 40s,
(Clemens toiled for five) the list get narrowed down to Grover Cleveland
Alexander, Steve Carlton, Red Faber, Jesse Haines, Phil Niekro, ####lord Perry,
Nolan Ryan, Warren Spahn, Don Sutton, Dazzy Vance and Early Wynn as the only
“... noteworthy ... Hall of Fame pitchers (who) pitched into their 40s.”
The verdict? Clemens leads them all in winning percentage,
earned run average and WHIP.
Clemens is arguably the best of all time, a first ballot
Hall of Famer. But this report does nothing to support his claims of innocence.
