When Did Baseball Take a Turn for the Worse?

News Flash: Jason Kidd is a Dallas Maverick! After months of speculation about where he would wind up following requests to be traded from the New Jersey Nets, it appears to be official. Nets General Manager Rod Thorn has reportedly traded Kidd to the Dallas Mavericks for Devean George, Devin Harris, Jerry Stackhouse, DeSagana Diop and Maurice Ager, as well as two draft picks and cash for Kidd and Malik Allen.

The guy known for the triple-double is no longer a Net and is not heading to Los Angeles as many hoped -- including Mr. Kobe Bryant, whom I recently interviewed. Sorry Lakers! Good deal for the Nets! Looks like the Mavericks gave up a fair amount but they get the guy they need! Leave it to Cuban.

Getting back to business...

I'm sorry! Since I arrived back from the Super Bowl, I have failed to write in my blog. I'm sorry because I set out to share some of these fun memories and inside scoops with you but I'm also sorry because one of the great pleasures that I've experienced writing this blog is the feedback and chronological look back at the amazing things that I have been able to witness and share with friends, colleagues and family members. As Jeff Misenti and Ray Hennessey, our respective heads of the Internet will admit, I had a lot to do with building our Web site and Internet business but I'm a novice in many ways. This is one of them. As I understand it, the reason people blog is to stay connected to one another on a minute to minute, hourly or daily basis. I think that sounds fantastic.

Our own Greta Van Susteren on Fox News is my hero in the blogging world. She devotes much of her day and commercial breaks to her blog and as a result she has a tremendous following. While I wish I could do the same, I would be lying if I thought I could come close to her. I need to get into a rhythm and find a time to write daily so that I can be accountable to both you and myself. Maybe early in the morning before my shows?

Anyhow I'm now sitting in Newark Airport in N.J. with my husband, babysitter Olivia and my three boys. We are on our way to Disney World for the long weekend. We are so excited to go! It's hard to describe or properly put it into words. We haven't had a vacation since the baby was born a year ago and we so desperately need one. Desperately!!!! The bad news is that the weather on the east coast is terrible and our flight is delayed three hours. So this is the moment that I've been searching for in the past week to recap what has happened since the Giants parade and the Kobe interview.

Where do I begin? There is so much I want to tell you or that I'd like for you to share with me. Remember this is a blog. I welcome your feedback, advice or opinion on many of the issues and / or subjects that I discuss.

On our way to the airport we listened to Fox News on XM satellite in our car. You ask what we listened to? Roger Clemens and Brian McNamee's testimony in front of the House Oversight Committee. I am outraged! We didn't get to hear the entire proceedings but what I did hear angers me even more. As a lifelong New York Yankees fan and a lifelong baseball fan, I am truly disheartened to see what is happening to baseball. As a little girl I used to watch games with my grandfather in the country (Chichester, New York). It's in upstate New York in a very remote town north of Woodstock. He was an avid Mets fan and so was I. We used to watch games together and score them as we watched. I still remember scoring the double plays, watching George Brett (of the Kansas City Royals) hit the home run that ignited the pine tar controversy and watching the Mets take the Boston Red Soxs in game seven to win the World Series after my grandfather had just died. What he would have done to be there to see that happen!!!!

I mention these memories because when I think about baseball, perhaps too optimistically, I think about Coopertown and meeting Willi Mayes as a little girl. I still remember when I walked up to him and he kissed me on the cheek. Every woman in the room looked at me with envy. Here was one of the greatest players and role models to ever play the game! Today we have many brilliant players and many terrific role models. Teams are full of All-Star caliber players. Salaries are unimaginable, baseball teams are making more money than ever, the league (MLB) is now a $6 billion plus business and fan attendance is the best in history. Not bad! So why the scandal? Where did baseball take a turn for the worse? Why are we now questioning the honesty and intentions of the people we call All Stars? Have they betrayed us? Have they betrayed themselves? Did they do what they did because baseball needed them to break home run records? Did they forget their values? Integrity? Humanity? Did they forget that they thrive in this game called baseball for the children and that it's the kids who are buying the sold out jersey's?

Roger Clemens is doing what the press expected Barry Bonds to do when the BALCO case and the Mitchell Report were first discussed and released. He is defending his honor, his integrity and his record. As my dad rightly points out, the press attacked Barry for not speaking out in his defense if in fact he was not guilty. He did not and the press took that as a sign of guilt. So what does Roger do when he sees the Mitchell Report and list of names on it? He denies, denies, denies not to one reporter or two but to the world. On 60 Minutes, in a press conference and on every network that will listen. The problem: Every piece of evidence, whether from Brian McNamee himself, or his friends and colleagues like Andy Pettite, point to his guilt. When he called a press conference and admitted to injections of B12, replayed a phone conversation that he taped with McNamee that did nothing to resolve the allegations against him, hired an attorney that had the audacity to threaten the federal agent investigating steroids and the hubris to walk the halls of Congress lobbying before he was about to testify, I lost my faith in him. Innocent until proven guilty right? Did you hear Pettite's sworn affidavit? His wife's sworn affidavit? The inconsistencies in his testimony about his discussions with McNamee about HGH and his wife's injections? I am left thinking WHY....WHY IS THIS HAPPENING! Why did he ask to testify in a public hearing? All of these people cannot be lying! Why couldn't he just say I made a mistake and leave it at that?

Does he honestly believe that we believe him? I tried in the beginning but hope is lost. I told my husband listening to the hearing that it reminded me of sitting on the trading floor at Morgan Stanley when the OJ Simpson trial was the main attraction in 1995. We were riveted! Somehow I feel like we are just as riveted this time and yet the crime, the accused, the repercussions are not the same. Why do we care? Why are we riveted? Is it because we want to see some ounce of HUMILITY? Is it because we want to see our All Star vindicated? From what I have seen and heard this might be the worst day in Clemens’ life. It's also a day where I was able to teach my sons a valuable but sad lesson. When you cheat, you pay the consequences! When you lie, sometimes you go jail! Always be honest! Know when to say you're wrong and never, ever, think you are above the law!!!