The Clemens circus continues

So Roger Clemens and his former trainer, Brian McNamee, both have appeared before a House committee to argue their sides of this "did-Roger-take-steroids?" case.

He said-he said.

According to this story on espn.com, it's going to get very interesting next week when the two will appear at a public hearing (along with Clemens' former teammate, Andy Pettitte) at which they'll be under oath.

What amazes me about this week's developments is that McNamee's lawyers showed two pictures of syringes and other paraphernalia that they say are evidence of Clemens taking steroids.

Seriously?!? Pictures of this stuff and not of Clemens actually being injected is part of your evidence ... seriously?!?

Look, I've said it once and I'll say it again, I'm not here to defend Clemens. But, I have to say that I can't see why he would be fighting so hard against these allegations if they weren't true. I mean, he's not stupid and if he even thought a scintilla of evidence existed that could link him to steroid use, why would he be putting himself in the spotlight like this? It just doesn't make sense.

On the other side of the isle, though, is McNamee who (on the surface) doesn't seem to have anything to lose by pressing this case and therefore one could argue that he's not lying because of that very fact ... he doesn't have anything to lose so why would he be doing this?

Either way, if these two are under oath next week and stick to their stories, one of them is lying and, again, as I've said before, that's frowned upon just a bit by the Feds. The whole thing is just mind boggling.

Of course, the wild card here is Pettitte. I can't imagine that in the course of the hearing next week someone's not going to ask him if he ever saw Clemens get injected. His answer, or rather, the way he answers is going to be very telling. I see it going one of several ways:

• "No, I did not see him get injected."
  
• "If he ever was injected, I never saw it."
  
• "On the advice of Counsel, I plead the Fifth."

If Pettitte pleads the Fifth, that's as good as him saying Clemens took steroids, IMO. If his answers are in any way ambiguous and the panel can't get him to be more clear, then that's not going to look good for Rocket, either.

As a baseball fan, I'm still astounded by the fact that the man who could be considered the greatest pitcher in the history of the game may not be so if it's definitively proven that Clemens used steroids. Once a lock for the MLB HOF, Clemens' stats and accomplishments on the diamond may be but a footnote to his legacy ... as a steroid user.