40 Acres Sports

Roger Clemens swears in interview he’s never used banned substances. Claims it was just lidocaine and B-12.

Trenton NJ paper headline: Clemens Took It in the Butt. Can’t believe a non-college paper would run with that. Funny though.

ESPN is reporting that a source has told them that [tag]Roger Clemens[/tag] will be named in the MLB steroid investigation headed up by former US Senator George Mitchell. Former Yankees trainer Brian McNamee reportedly provided information to the investigation on Clemens, Andy Pettitte, and several other big name Yankees.

From ESPN…

A former New York Yankees strength trainer says information he provided to the George Mitchell investigation regarding supplying Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte with steroids is included in the Mitchell report scheduled to be released later today, a source close to the trainer told ESPN The Magazine’s Shaun Assael.

Brian McNamee, who worked for the Yankees and as a personal trainer for Clemens and Pettitte, also told investigators that on at least one occasion, Clemens was in possession of steroids from another supplier, the source said.

The source said McNamee told investigators he supplied Clemens with steroids while Clemens was with the Yankees, and prior to Clemens joining the team.

The rumors aren’t new but this is certainly disappointing news. We’ll have more reaction when all the details of the Mitchell report are released this afternoon.

Update: As had been rumored Clemens’ name was in fact in the report. The trainer McNamee claims that he personally injected Clemens, Pettitte, and former Aggie Chuck Knoblauch. Through his lawyer Clemens denied ever using steroids or human growth hormone, but Pettitte admitted to using HGH in 2002 to recover from an arm injury. (12/15/2007)

Roger Clemens pulled off Yankees’ postseason roster due to injured hamstring. May not matter since NYY might be knocked out tonight.

The Statesman is reporting that [tag]Bradley Suttle[/tag] signed with the Yankees over the weekend. I went looking for specifics but couldn’t find anything official. This alt.sports.baseball.ny-yankees post says that Kevin Goldstein is reporting a $1M deal. I’ll post more if I see it.

The Statesman post also says that Kyle Russell and Preston Clark have both indicated that they’ll be back. They still have two days to sign, though. The deadline is August 15th.

UPDATE. As of 2pm (Eastern) on Aug. 15th, the Yankees are saying that they have not signed Bradley to a deal. FYI. (Link.)

UPDATE #2. According to the Baseball America Draft Blog, Bradley and the Yankees have come to terms. Bonus: $1.3M (a record for a 4th round draft pick). Good for him. And, good luck to him. I’ll miss watching him play at Disch-Falk.

[Cross-posted to my baseball page.]

[tag]James Russell[/tag] signed with the Cubs (Statesman link) for a $350K bonus. And, the Cubs will pay for 5 semesters of college. My guess is that the $350K is at least $250K more than the slot bonus guidelines set forth by Major League Baseball.

I have not heard any definitive news on Kyle Russell or Bradley Suttle. But, Bradley was drafted by the Yankees and it’s very likely they will offer him a bonus close to what he was hoping for before the draft (that is: 1st round money). The situation is not as clear regarding Kyle Russell. The fact that the Cubs went so far over the guidelines makes me rather nervous about Kyle’s chances of sticking around, though. To this point, the highest reported signing bonus for a 4th rounder is $225K. That’s $125 below James Russell’s bonus (and he was drafted in the 14th) so…

Who knows? I guess it all depends on how much the Cardinals really want him, eh?

UPDATE. I just did a little bit more research on slot signing bonus guidelines and found out that the MLB does not want anyone in post 5th-round positions to get more than an estimated $123K. All of the lower rounds (6th through 50th) fall in the same group. I thought it kept going down as you got further along but it doesn’t. So, James Russell’s bonus was about $227K over slot.

Rangers promote Taylor Teagarden to Double-A Frisco. He was tearing up Class A pitching.

NCAA ejects reporter for liveblogging game. Sounds like yet another case of old people scared of the interwebs.

Adam Dunn to the Astros? Love to see him back home hitting homers (and striking out a ton) for Houston.

[tag]Augie Garrido[/tag] appeared on KVET 1300 this morning and had plenty to say. Among the highlights:

• He agrees that Texas should be the best college baseball team in America and that, at times, this team was that this year. We did have a very good team that did a very good job. He’s not offering excuses. Accepting not getting to the CWS is very difficult. He was bitterly surprised at the role that fate played in the Regionals.
• The team GPA was 2.9 in the Fall and over 3.0 (the highest ever) in the Spring.
• He gave full credit to UCI for the series they had and noted that UCI hasn’t lost a championship game yet and he won’t be surprised to see them do well at the CWS because they are fundamentally extremely sound.
• When asked about his exit interviews with the team, he said the three comments he got most about what impacted the team going into the Regional were: (1) The players really felt the impact of losing Preston Clark behind the plate before the Regional tourney…more than Coach Garrido would’ve imagined. Brett Lewis is very capable and the players had confidence in his ability. But, Preston’s leadership and interactions with the team all year provided more of the glue that held the team’s spirit together than Coach Garrido had imagined. (2) Losing Nick Peoples was also huge. (3) He was surprised to hear that the players were disappointed that they didn’t play at Disch-Falk and that they felt they would’ve won if they’d been playing at home. He thought that since they’d played 11 games at Dell Diamond early in the year, it wouldn’t have as much of an affect as it seemed to have. He thought they were past all that so that was surprising to him.
• Regarding the draft, he thinks there’s a decent possibility that Kyle Russell will be back (he wants 1st round money but was drafted in the 4th), no clear idea about Bradley Suttle (also wanting 1st round money and drafted in the 4th; but the drafting team was the Yankees and you never know what they’ll do), and a good chance that both James Russell and Preston Clark will return.
• Asked about Coach Johnson’s contribution in his first year and as they look forward: he thinks Coach Johnson is absolutely the right man at the right time for this job. He knows Texas baseball at every level inside and out.
• He thinks we’ll have a real good team next year but added that he hesitates and stutters a little bit making that statement because he was so surprised to lose the Regional.
• Regarding the construction at Disch-Falk: they’re not on schedule but they’re not behind, either. He explained that the team doesn’t need to be back out on the field until September and they should be able to do that. Prior to the first game on February 22nd, everything’s supposed to be completely finished. So, they’re behind schedule due to the recent rains but the delay won’t cause problems because things will still be completed before the team and fans actually need access.
• He made a comment about ESPN being the only entity that has the power to force the changes that would bring a higher level of consistency and quality to college baseball. The implication, clearly, was that the best way to influence the NCAA was with money and ESPN holds the purse strings.

For more detail, please check out the report I filed on my site.