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Report: Baseball Steroids Congressional Hearing Postponed

Associated Press
Published | Updated

WASHINGTON – The congressional hearing involving Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte and former trainer Brian McNamee was postponed Wednesday until Feb. 13 so lawmakers can gather evidence and coordinate their investigation with the Justice Department.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform was informing witnesses that the Jan. 16 session is being pushed back.

Plans are still in place for the Jan. 15 hearing before the same committee about the Mitchell Report on baseball's Steroids Era. The witnesses that day are commissioner Bud Selig, union leader Donald Fehr and former Senate majority leader George Mitchell, the report's author.

At the end of last week, Congress asked seven-time Cy Young Award winner Clemens, teammate and friend Pettitte and their trainer, McNamee, to testify under oath. Also invited were former Yankee Chuck Knoblauch and Kirk Radomski, the former New York Mets clubhouse attendant who was one of the main sources of evidence for the Mitchell Report.

Radomski pleaded guilty in April to federal felony charges of distributing steroids and laundering money, and he is scheduled to be sentenced Feb. 8.

"The Justice Department told the committee it would be helpful if we waited until after Radomski is sentenced," the committee's minority staff director, David Marin, wrote in an e-mail to The Associated Press. "This also gives us more time to delve into more recent developments, gather more information, and depose all witnesses before they testify in public."

Plenty has happened since the committee arranged the second hearing.

Clemens filed a defamation lawsuit Sunday against McNamee, who told Mitchell he injected Clemens with steroids and human growth hormone in 1998, 2000 and 2001. A TV interview with Clemens aired, and the pitcher also held a news conference and played a recording of a 17-minute telephone conversation he had with McNamee.

That tape could be among the items requested by the committee, the same House panel that brought sluggers Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Rafael Palmeiro to Capitol Hill in March 2005. One of McNamee's lawyers also said the committee should obtain a recording of a conversation between his client and investigators of Clemens' law firm. That meeting took place Dec. 12, a day before the Mitchell Report was released.