All-Stars of Steroids?

Roger Clemens’ lawyer, for one, is already fighting back.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

NEW YORK — Roger Clemens turned out to be Exhibit A in the long-awaited Mitchell Report, an All-Star roster linked to steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs that put a question mark — if not an asterisk — next to some of baseball’s biggest moments.

Barry Bonds, already under indictment on charges of lying to a federal grand jury about steroids, Miguel Tejada and Andy Pettitte also showed up Thursday in the game’s most infamous lineup since the Black Sox scandal.

The report culminated a 20-month investigation by former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell, hired by commissioner Bud Selig to examine the Steroids Era.

Seven MVPs showed up and in all, 80-some players were fingered, enough to put an All-Star at every position.

No one was hit harder than Clemens, who denied the allegations through his lawyer. The seven-time Cy Young Award winner was singled out in nearly nine pages, 82 references by name. Much of the information on Clemens came from former New York Yankees major league strength and conditioning coach Brian McNamee.

“The illegal use of performance-enhancing substances poses a serious threat to the integrity of the game,” the report said. “Widespread use by players of such substances unfairly disadvantages the honest athletes who refuse to use them and raises questions about the validity of baseball records.”

While the records will surely stand, several stars could pay the price in Cooperstown, much the way Mark McGwire was kept out of the Hall of Fame this year merely because of steroids suspicion.

“If there are problems, I wanted them revealed,” Selig said. “His report is a call to action, and I will act.”

The report was unlikely to trigger a wave of discipline. While a few players, such as Bonds, are subjects of ongoing legal proceedings, most of the instances cited by Mitchell were before drug testing began in 2003.

Mitchell said punishment was inappropriate in all but the most egregious cases, and Selig said decisions on any action would come “swiftly” on a case-by-case basis.

Mitchell said the problems didn’t develop overnight and there was plenty of blame to go around.

“Everyone involved in baseball over the past two decades — commissioners, club officials, the players’ association and players — shares to some extent the responsibility for the Steroids Era,” Mitchell said. “There was a collective failure to recognize the problem as it emerged and to deal with it early on.”

Mitchell recommended that the drug-testing program be made independent, that a list of the substances players test positive for be listed periodically and that the timing of testing be more unpredictable.

Eric Gagne, Gary Sheffield, Jason Giambi, Troy Glaus, Gary Matthews Jr., Paul Byrd, Jose Guillen, Brian Roberts, Paul Lo Duca and Rick Ankiel were among other current players named in the report — in fact, there’s an All-Star at every position. Some were linked to human growth hormone, others to steroids.

Only Bonds was mentioned more than Clemens, 103 times, most of it recounting previous reports.

“It is very unfair to include Roger’s name in this report,” said Clemens’ lawyer, Rusty Hardin. “He is left with no meaningful way to combat what he strongly contends are totally false allegations. He has not been charged with anything, he will not be charged with anything and yet he is being tried in the court of public opinion with no recourse. That is totally wrong.”

Former Mets clubhouse attendant Kirk Radomski also provided information as part of his plea agreement in a federal steroids case. Jose Canseco’s book “Juiced” also was cited.

The report took issue with assertions that steroids were not banned before the 2002 collective bargaining agreement.

They had been covered, it said, since the 1971 drug policy prohibited using any prescription medication without a valid prescription, and were expressly included in the drug policy in 1991.

“Steroids have been listed as a prohibited substance under the Major League Baseball drug policy since then,” the report said, although no player was disciplined for them until the 2002 labor agreement provided for testing.

Giambi, under threat of discipline from Selig, was the only current player known to have cooperated with the Mitchell investigation.

“The players’ union was largely uncooperative for reasons that I thought were largely understandable,” Mitchell said.

About two hours after the report was released, two congressmen at the forefront of Capitol Hill’s involvement in the steroids issue asked Mitchell, Selig and Fehr to testify at a House committee hearing next Tuesday.

California Democrat Henry Waxman and Virginia Republican Tom Davis — the leaders of the panel that held the March 17, 2005, hearing at which McGwire, Palmeiro and Sammy Sosa testified — want to know “whether the Mitchell report’s recommendations will be adopted and whether additional measures are needed,” they said.

Also, it was announced another Congressional subcommittee will hold a hearing Jan. 23 relating to steroid use in professional sports, including the findings of the Mitchell report.