Conspiracy theories abound in sports. There was the one about Cal Ripken and a power outage at the stadium rigged to protect his consecutive games streak, but that?s been fairly debunked over the years.
Michael Jordan?s secret suspension? Curt Schilling?s bloody sock? The frozen envelope in the 1985 NBA Draft lottery? If only the shape-shifting lizard people would emerge from the grassy knoll near Area 51 and enlighten the clueless masses on what is true and what is not.
Now that Roger Clemens? perjury trial has been shockingly declared over in the bottom of the first inning, sports fans have a fresh, steaming pile of intrigue to sort through.
Did federal prosecutors deliberately try to bring before the jury evidence that the judge had specifically barred in a pretrial ruling? Or are we to believe that distinguished, respected lawyers Steven Durham and Daniel Butler and their capable staff made a rookie mistake that would cause first-year law students to blush and forced a mistrial?
It?s all so very Roswellian. Clemens remains charged with six felony counts involving perjury, false statements and obstruction of Congress, but for how long? U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton, furious at the government?s bungling of evidence, scheduled a Sept. 2 hearing to decide if a new trial is appropriate.
If it is determined that double jeopardy applies ? an unlikely event, according to many legal experts, since it is the defendant who pushed for the mistrial ? Clemens can revert to convincing doubters he?s worthy of the Hall of Fame. Funny enough, his obsession with his battered image is what got him in this pickle in the first place.
Ending what had been roughly Seven Days in July, Walton declared he couldn?t ?unring the bell? after the government showed jurors a videotape in which Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) referenced information the judge had explicitly excluded from the proceedings.
This is the part where truth-seekers got chills. Before Walton said Clemens ?is entitled to fair trial (and) he cannot get that now,? he said, rather ominously, ?If this man got convicted, knowing how I sentence, he goes to jail.?
Was the judge not-so-subtly suggesting the parties get together and make a deal that would A) keep one of America?s most celebrated athletes out of the prison yard and B) stop the government from spending millions of dollars that could be better used elsewhere? The tinfoil hats were all a tingle.
For a number of reasons, this amateur skeptic hopes the trial proceeds. For one, it sends a wrong message when we allow the rich and famous to lie to Congress. Clemens wasn?t subpoenaed to appear on Capitol Hill in February of 2008. He insisted on going there voluntarily, to use the stage as his personal platform to protect his legacy and persuade the public that a baseball career already approaching legendary status wasn?t enhanced in its latter years by regular cocktails of illegal performance enhancing drugs.
He figured the politicians would fawn over his awesomeness (they did), just as fans and a large segment of the media had when he was the Rocket from Texas who swore he came by his prodigious talent through hard work and B-12 shots. Clemens? outsized ego can?t abide much of the public believing he cheated along with so many other players of his era.
And yet, if he lied to Congress for the most narcissistic of reasons, he should get away with it? Our justice system and the freedom it protects depend on the citizens? basic respect for, and adherence to, the rule of law. Walton is the judge who presided over the perjury conviction of Lewis ?Scooter? Libby, former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney. Clemens should be treated no better or worse than a high-ranking White House staffer or a low-level thief who perjures himself.
For another, even though the trial was barely a week old (including jury selection), it already had proven highly entertaining. A rescheduled trial could fall splat in the middle of the baseball playoffs, which sort of discredits the conspirators who swear Bud Selig used his magical wizard powers to make this one go poof. How fun would it be to watch his head spin should he be called to testify on Game 7 of the World Series?
But back to the notion that the government did more than bobble this like a ball bouncing off Jose Canseco?s head. What would be their insidious motive? Some point to the prosecutor?s supposed worry over the overwhelmingly female jury.
One of the 10 women selected to serve said in the voir dire stage that she believed Michael Vick was ?done wrong? when he was sent to prison on dog-fighting charges. Another woman, a yoga instructor, said she believed some U.S. drug laws ?are a bit heavy-handed.? Were prosecutors regretting the way they helped pick the jury?
Such conspiratorial rumblings seem ludicrous but they?re out there, pushed along probably by the same folks who point to the absence of shadows during the fake moon landing.
Thursday?s monumental gaffe has been likened to the ball trickling between Bill Buckner?s legs, a moment in time that caused the sports world to go nuts with disbelief. (Managerial errors of epic portions by John McNamara sadly don?t cut as deep in baseball lore.) There remain pockets of Red Sox fans who continue to insist the 1986 World Series games were as fixed as the NBA?s Western Conference Finals in 2002.
The government still has trainer Brian McNamee?s bloody syringes and what it claims to be Clemens? DNA on needles and cotton balls, should a retrial be granted. But as Rusty Hardin, Clemens? crafty lawyer, repeatedly reminded prospective jurors during the selection process, the ?U.S. government can be wrong.?
It can also be mind-numbingly stupid and sometimes very devious.
Beyond that absolute truth, the sports world craves another great conspiracy. So here?s hoping Clemens is exposed as a shape-shifting lizard person who knows who collaborated with Lee Harvey Oswald.
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