WASHINGTON - By nightfall today, one of them could be in big trouble, his untruthful testimony exposing him to possible federal criminal charges punishable by prison time.
Roger Clemens and Brian McNamee have spent two months calling each other liars through the media. This morning, each will stand before a congressional committee investigating baseball's steroids scandal, swear to tell nothing but the truth, then state his case, fully aware he could face life-altering consequences if he lies under oath.
Clemens, who has won more baseball games (354) than any other living pitcher, or McNamee, a former New York City police officer and personal trainer who helped Clemens excel well into his 40s, could find himself in the kind of legal jeopardy that has befallen track star Marion Jones and home run king Barry Bonds.
Jones is soon to begin serving six months in prison for lying to federal investigators, while Bonds awaits trial on federal charges of perjury and obstruction of justice.
"Unless someone blinks and takes the Fifth [Amendment protection against self-incrimination], there's a likelihood that one party or the other will be committing perjury," said Representative Stephen Lynch, of South Boston, who expects to question Clemens and McNamee today as a member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
In a made-for-television drama certain to spark a high-stakes verbal confrontation, Clemens and McNamee will sit together at the same table, the eyes of Congress and the sports world upon them as they meet for the first time since former Senator George Mitchell's report in December alleged that Clemens repeatedly used illegal performance-enhancing chemicals from 1998 to 2001 with McNamee's help.
The only other person at the table will be Charles Scheeler, the chief investigator for Mitchell's 21-month investigation into the proliferation of steroids in baseball.
"We put them under oath for a reason," Lynch said during a break from poring over more than 1,000 pages of depositions in the case. "There is a significant level of seriousness to these hearings and we expect people to testify truthfully."
So far, Clemens and McNamee have agreed on little more than this: The seven-time Cy Young Award winner allowed McNamee, despite his lack of medical expertise, to repeatedly thrust syringe needles into his flesh.
The question is, what did the syringes contain?
Illegal anabolic steroids and human growth hormone, as McNamee maintains?
Or vitamin B-12 and a local anesthetic, lidocaine, as Clemens insists?
The 40-member committee is expected to spend at least five hours digging for an answer, though the session could last much longer (the committee held a steroids hearing in 2005 that lasted more than 11 hours). Neither Clemens or McNamee appears poised to budge from his position.
Clemens "seems to be sticking to his guns," said Lynch, one of numerous committee members who met privately with the former Red Sox ace in recent days. "He was very forthright, as he has been in his press conferences."
Clemens continued meeting with individual committee members late yesterday, though it was unclear what advantage, if any, he would gain. A number of committee members who met with Clemens also invited McNamee to sit down with them separately, but he declined.
As for McNamee, Mitchell said the trainer has every reason to tell the truth. After federal investigators identified him as "a possible sub-distributor" of steroids and HGH through former Mets staffer Kirk Radomski, McNamee agreed to cooperate with prosecutors and signed a statement acknowledging he would face federal felony charges if his testimony was untruthful.
Clemens, according to McNamee, first asked McNamee to inject him with anabolic steroids soon after Clemens attended a party at former slugger Jose Canseco's house in Miami in 1998. Mitchell's report said Clemens had numerous conversations with Canseco about how steroids and HGH could improve a baseball player's performance.
Clemens has denied attending the party and is expected to hammer McNamee on his recollection of the episode as part of a broader attack on McNamee's credibility.
In a boost for Clemens, Canseco gave the committee a sworn affidavit that states he has played on three teams with Clemens and has "no reason to believe that he has ever used steroids, human growth hormone, or any other performance-enhancing drugs," according to the Associated Press. Canseco also states in the affidavit that Clemens did not attend the party in Miami and never expressed any interest to him in using steroids or HGH.
Clemens has filed a defamation suit against McNamee. The suit, originally filed in Harris County District Court in Houston, has been transferred to a federal court in Houston at the request of McNamee's lawyers.
Another major point of contention at the hearing could be the photos McNamee recently produced purporting to show syringes, gauze, and vials he used while injecting Clemens with steroids and HGH seven years ago. McNamee gave the photos to investigators after Clemens released to the media a tape of a conversation he had with McNamee after the Mitchell report was released.
McNamee was so offended by Clemens making public their private conversation that Richard Emery, one of McNamee's lawyers, said their relationship had entered a new phase.
"It's war now," Emery said.
The hearing could become the biggest battle yet. As Lynch observed, the scene is likely to present "an opportunity for conflict and crossfire" between the two.
Clemens, however, will not have to face his close friend, Andy Pettitte, who has admitted receiving HGH injections from McNamee. Pettitte, who was not expected to offer Clemens much support, originally was scheduled to appear at the hearing but was excused late Monday. So were Radomski and Chuck Knoblauch, who played with Clemens and Pettitte with the Yankees.
Still, Pettitte gave a deposition to the committee, which lawmakers are expected to use to test Clemens's veracity.
Citing a source familiar with the affidavit, the Associated Press reported yesterday that Pettitte's deposition claims he talked with Clemens in 1999 or 2000 about using human growth hormone.
According to the source, Pettitte said Clemens backtracked when the subject came up in 2005, before the same House committee held the first hearing on steroids.
The source also said that Pettitte claims in the affidavit that he asked Clemens in 2005 what he would do if asked by the media about HGH. According to the AP account, Clemens responded by saying Pettitte misunderstood the conversation in 1999 or 2000 and that, in fact, Clemens had been talking about HGH use by his wife.
Several committee members cautioned that Clemens and McNamee would lie at their peril.
"The risks for both parties are substantial," said Representative John Tierney, of Salem.
Just last month, for example, the committee asked the Justice Department to investigate whether Houston Astros shortstop Miguel Tejada lied to Congress.
Representative Danny Davis of Illinois said lawmakers would consider it "a serious offense" if Clemens or McNamee tried to intentionally deceive them.
"I think if we find that individuals deliberately lied to the committee, then we would seriously look at what kind of further action to take to make sure there are some consequences," Davis said.
As a prelude to the showdown, the committee held a hearing yesterday that focused largely on the effects of HGH. Dr. Thomas Perls, an associate professor at Boston University School of Medicine, testified that a $2 billion market has emerged for companies falsely advertising HGH as an anti-aging drug.
The specialists said HGH does little to enhance athletic performance unless it is used with anabolic steroids, as is commonly done by athletes who cheat to gain a competitive edge.
Bob Hohler can be reached at hohler@globe.com
