Published: February 20, 2008 12:01 pm         

The rite of renewal and coming clean

It's the first full week of spring training and everybody's coming clean when it comes to having used performance-enhancing drugs. Well, obviously, not everybody is coming clean, and let's not forget that those who are coming clean are only doing so because they've already been caught. But you take your small victories wherever you can get them.

Pitcher Andy Pettitte came clean to the support of the Steinbrenners and his Yankee teammates, holding a one-hour press conference Monday in Tampa. Andy said he told the whole truth and nothing but the truth ... once Congress had him under oath. Funny, though, just prior to that, after his name had been mentioned in the Mitchell Report, Andy said the only time in his life he ever used hgH was in 2002. Yet, somehow, that pesky Congress got him to remember that other time he used in 2004 when his father served as the supplier.

But Andy didn't use the drug to gain an edge on anybody, mind you. He came clean with that again on Monday. The only reason he used was because he was making a lot of money and felt obligated only to get healthy and give his employer their money's worth. Besides, when Andy did use hgH, it wasn't even on baseball's banned substance list.

I think Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said it best after Andy's press conference when he said, "Tough toenails," or something to that effect. Without a prescription, hgH has been illegal in the United States, so let's not try to create gray areas here. If Andy didn't think he was doing anything wrong, why didn't he just tell his employer, "Look, I'm taking hgH, not to get an edge on anybody, but to try to get healthy so I can earn all the money you're paying me?"

Of course, in that Bud Selig see-no-evil, hear-no-evil era of Major League Baseball, Andy's employer just might have said something along the lines of, "Andy, nice to hear from you! Did you say something?"

Down in Fort Lauderdale, the Orioles' Brian Roberts and Jay Gibbons are coming clean again. Gibbons, whose past physical appearances changed more often than Johnny Carson married a woman by the name of Joan, Joanne or Joanna, said he's learned from his past transgressions, because he's learned to look in the mirror, which I would think, given the whole concept of steroid use, is something he learned how to do a long time ago.

Jay-Bird says he has no excuses. He's embarrassed. He's disappointed. But, "You know," he said, "it's just one of those things ..."

Yes, it really is just one of those things. So were his adamant denials through the years, and the way he would become annoyed with having the "Have you used?" question asked of him. In fact, I can remember one time when Jay-Bird was asked about steroids in baseball, he said, "You know, I've said all I'm going to say about that. I have no interest in the subject at all."

Funny how our interests can change.

Then there is B-Rob, who has had just a horrible offseason in having to put up with all of this unwanted attention. But he said he told the truth. He said he made his statement, so, "We'll move on from there."

It's life, B-Rob said, and in life you make bad decisions and then you pay the price. But, the good news is, "It's not the end of the world," he said. "It's not the biggest thing in the world to me. It's really not."

I would hope it's not. I mean, he only used the stuff once.

Two folks who are admitting nothing these days are Roger Clemens, of course, and Miguel Tejada, the shortstop traded by the Orioles to the Astros one day before his name saw daylight in the Mitchell Report.

Miggy reported to Astros spring training on Tuesday and said he's been advised by attorneys not to comment on the Mitchell Report or an FBI investigation concerning his link to steroids - perhaps by the same attorneys who advised Sammy Sosa that fateful day on Capitol Hill that the language he had been speaking all of these years really was not English, and since the only language spoken in the United States is American, perhaps the Congressmen firing the questions that day wouldn't be able to understand him. Thus, it might be better to just say nothing at all.

"I can't really talk about that," Miggy said. "It's not my position to talk about that. Right now, my mind is really focused on just playing baseball."

In fairness, Pettitte, Gibbons and Roberts, and any other player who has come clean - regardless of the reasons - will be better served for having done so. We are a forgiving people, and we are more of an understanding people than we are given credit for being.

Like everybody, though, I wonder what's running through the minds of the implicated ballplayers who choose to say nothing, or who go to great insistences to proclaim their innocence. In this regard, I do wonder about Clemens more than I thought I would be, and I wonder if Rafael Palmeiro's case is being re-examined, because of all of them, that one still smells the fishiest to me.

What I really wonder is what runs through Commissioner Bud Selig's mind these days, because he has to wonder himself what he's going to say when Congress recalls him and says, "Forget what's running through your mind now. What was running through your mind then?"

Contact Mike Burke at mburke@times-news.com.