“And then in the strange way things happen
The roles were reversed from that day
The hunted became the huntress
The hunter became the prey”

—“Conquest”
By Corky Robbins


Just what good is a Rocket, anyhow? It is built to be destroyed — to traverse with great fury, and then to flame out and crash with generally evil instincts while delivering wanton destruction.

A rocket has not even the sentimental arc of a missile (nor its accuracy), the lingering pause of a grenade, or the utilitarian lurch and splat of the hunter's bullet. Save for the occasional space shot, very few rockets do any good at all, when you think about it. And so it is perhaps a telling nickname of ever-curious irony for former major league pitcher Roger Clemens.

What to make of the sad, deepening pit of lies and innuendo that has become of the formerly hallowed career and reputation of Roger Clemens? How does a solid legend tip over the brink of social acceptance so fast that all conceivable truth, hard data and statistics dutifully collected by men of reputed honor and professionalism become instantly tainted and cheap? How much yarn will unravel from his homespun sweater of deceit until the Rocket wears no clothes?

Clemens, whose magical life and esteemed reputation continued a painful slide into Dante's home plate with this past week’s (now confirmed) accusations that Clemens befriended and gave considerable support to 15-year-old country starlet Mindy McCready, eventually leading to a creepy affair of unknown age parameters.

This damning morsel, as potential statutory rape tends to be, is only one of several  revealed in response to a defamation lawsuit that is being brought by his council, Rusty Hardin, against steroid-era whistle blower and former trainer Brian McNamee. Other scraps revealed this week included Clemens’ piloting various women around the country for trysts aplenty, including strippers and John Daly's wife.

These recent rounds of un-peachy news come in addition to the dual insults of a suddenly grounded career and wayward Hall of Fame candidacy, casualties of the Mitchell Investigation and what is potentially the most transparently ridiculous denial campaign since Tobaccogate.

With the way things are going, I half expect to open today's paper to find out that Clemens had spent all of his considerable career earnings on snatching up entire countries awash in sweet crude, and is greedily and single handedly dragging society as we know it to the flashpoint of anarchy and despair in an apocalyptic energy war that will make Mad Max seem like a Tina Turner video in comparison to the cold dark fate he plans for us mortals.

The flight of the Rocket has gotten that bad. But how?

I have a theory. Wanna hear it? Here it goes … (apologies to Robert Johnson and all Voodooists anywhere).

Roger Clemens made a deal with the Devil. He took a look at himself post 30 years old and was ashamed at his mere greatness, and on some dark, dangerous night in what rightfully should have been the waning years of his remarkable career, he sauntered out of the fog shrouded bullpen of Crossroads Yards and faced the Devil down from 60 feet, 6 inches. And there in that thick Mississippi night, with only snarling hell hounds for witnesses and no umpire to speak of, Clemens struck out a grinning Satan with three burning fastballs of inhuman strength. Afterwards, there in foul territory, he signed his soul away with his own blood in a Louisville-Slugger shaped hypodermic pen.

And, as these arrangements tend to go, great fame and fortune followed. Hundreds of wins, thousands of strikeouts, Cy Young awards, World Series wins, contracts of incredible value and with unprecedented allowances for freedom. Just two years ago Clemens kept the baseball world choking in anticipation as he flirted with his various options for employment. Desperate teams in need of his destructive powers offered him the chance to sit out spring training, all of April and most of May, and then to pitch every fifth day before jetting off back to Texas to await his next miracle act of dominance and intimidation. Women. Fame. Fortune. Success. Legend.

In hindsight it is alarming that I didn't sniff this out earlier. Wasn't it obvious that his shady deal for baseball immortality was about to go, er, south? How else do you explain the irrational megalomania displayed in this last fevered pitch? How can you have it all, and lose so much, so fast?

Major League arrogance could be to blame. As could Texas-sized greed, chemical invincibility, outlandish conspiracy, or even, perhaps, the inevitable arc of American hero-worship.

But Pete Rose and I? We've got our money on a cause for the Rocket's red glare that is much hotter than those.

Corby Anderson writes Hang Time for the Aspen Daily News from quarantine of an undisclosed nature somewhere along the central California coast. There he hopes to learn to golf and avoid being sued by anyone named Rusty.