Hearing featuring Clemens, McNamee, Pettitte postponed until Feb. 13

Updated: January 9, 2008, 7:04 PM ET

WASHINGTON -- Congress wants to be prepared when Roger Clemens and his former trainer, Brian McNamee, head to Capitol Hill.

The House hearing involving Clemens, McNamee and Andy Pettitte was postponed Wednesday from Jan. 16 until Feb. 13, giving lawmakers more time to gather evidence and to coordinate their investigation with the Justice Department.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform was to begin meeting with lawyers for the witnesses Thursday.

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 will be commissioner Bud Selig, union leader Donald Fehr and former Senate majority leader George Mitchell, the report's author.

Questioned by federal prosecutors last year, McNamee said he injected Clemens with steroids and human growth hormone in 1998, 2000 and 2001. Prosecutors had him repeat those charges to Mitchell, and since the report was issued last month, Clemens has repeatedly and vehemently denied the allegations.

A lawyer for McNamee said Wednesday his client wants immunity from the House committee. McNamee likely will meet Thursday with federal prosecutors.

At the end of last week, Congress asked seven-time Cy Young Award winner Clemens, teammate and friend Pettitte and their ex-trainer, McNamee, to testify under oath. Also invited were former Yankees player 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 Clemens-Pettitte-McNamee hearing.

Clemens, who ranks eighth in major league history with 354 career wins, filed a defamation lawsuit Sunday against McNamee. Also Sunday, a TV interview with Clemens aired in which he said McNamee injected him only with vitamin B-12 and the painkiller lidocaine. The pitcher also held a news conference Monday, when he said, "I'm going to Congress, and I'm going to tell the truth," 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.

Two attorneys for McNamee urged the committee to obtain a recording of a conversation between his client and investigators who work for Clemens' law firm. That meeting took place Dec. 12, a day before the Mitchell Report was released.

A congressional source familiar with the investigation offered reasons to ESPN.com for the delay: "For example, we now know of taped conversations that the committee wants to hear in their entirety, and wants to ask questions about before a public hearing."

One of McNamee's lawyers, Richard Emery, said the postponement makes this a different type of hearing than past steroid investigations.

"It's an act of respect for their former colleague, Sen. Mitchell, who didn't want this congressional hearing to become a circus," he said. "He wanted it to be focused on steroids issues and the larger policy issues instead of everyone waiting with bated breath for the professional wrestler to get up there and make a statement. Roger became the main attraction. Usually Congress loves those kind of shows. I have a feeling Sen. Mitchell's integrity and reputation commanded a different process."

Pettitte acknowledged McNamee injected him twice with HGH. Radomski is alleged to have supplied McNamee with performance-enhancing drugs.

"I'll be very interested to see the order of the depositions, whether we will be provided with other people's depositions when they are taken," Emery said.

McNamee was likely to meet Thursday with Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Parrella and IRS Special Agent Jeff Novitzky, part of the prosecution in the BALCO cases. McNamee reached an agreement in which he would not be prosecuted as long as he was truthful in what he told federal investigators and Mitchell. His lawyers will seek a similar agreement with the committee, Emery said.

Two Major League Baseball sources, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said baseball was not happy the hearings will overshadow the start of spring training but that the hearing really only involves one active player. The hope was that the league could move on, but they knew spring training would mean many questions about Mitchell even without the hearings, so they're resigned to it.

The 45-year-old Clemens put off retirement yet again in 2007, returning to the Yankees in June and going 6-6 with a 4.18 ERA. The right-hander hasn't said whether he will pitch in the majors in 2008.

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