The Final Score

Here's this week's installment of everyone's favorite feature on Newsday.com, "Where Are They Now?" Former Mets manager Davey Johnson talks to Newsday about leading the United States baseball team to the Beijing Olympics this summer.

And here's our invitation list to our Where-Are-They-Now one-year anniversary party that I hope to host next December: Davey Johnson, Brian Mahoney, Mike Stanley, Matt Bahr, Jeff Hostetler, Leonard Marshall, Y.A. Tittle, Ottis Anderson, Barry Lyons, Bruce Harper, Mackey Sasser, Ken Phelps and Kenny "Sky" Walker.

*Programming note: I'm taking this weekend off. So unless Roger Clemens announces that he did take steroids, the blog will be silent until Monday morning. See ya.

Here's our stories:

While walking through the hallway of the Rayburn building this afternoon, I heard someone say, "See ya later, Mr. Towns." I stopped short. The name immediately hit a chord with me.

Edolphus Towns, the Democrat from NY, met with Roger Clemens while Clemens was on his Rocket Does Congress tour a few days before his hearing. And Towns and Clemens even held a joint news conference that day in which Towns expressed support for The Rocket and denounced Brian McNamee.

So, naturally, I chased Towns down to see what he thinks about Clemens now. Towns, without blinking, said, "I think Clemens is guilty, of course I do. I think he was lying."

You gotta love politicians.

WASHINGTON - I'll be spending the day in Washington for the Congressional hearing on drugs in sports. The House Committee on Energy and Commerce has graciously provided power strips for reporters, but they are restricting us from accessing their wireless network. So I will send updates from my Blackberry as often as I can. Stay tuned ...

12:29 p.m.: Standing outside the hearing room, chairman Rush said, "There might be a possibility that legislation might not be required."

And going back to the SpyGate question, the New York Congressman who made a mockery of himself went right up to Stern after the hearing and said, "I just want to thank you for your testimony." Stern whispered, "I'm a Giants fan." And they both laughed and went their merry ways.

12:24 p.m.: We're getting out of hand here, thanks to New York's own Vito Fossella. After he was done asking the witnesses for their feelings on testing high school athletes for steroids, Fossella turned his attention to Goodell and asked about SpyGate. "There's a lot of unhappy Jets fans." Goodell said, "We dealt with that very effectively." And this hearing ended on that note.

12:01 p.m.: Rep. Cliff Stearns (Fla.) asked the witnesses whether they would be willing to adopt the Olympic testing program, which is what Stearns endorses. Upshaw spoke first and said: "We feel our program is better than the Olympics in many ways." He later admitted that the Olympic drug testing program would look different if the Olympic athletes had a union. So when Upshaw said the football test is better, does he mean it is better for the athletes and not the sport? Sterns then pointed the same question to Fehr, who said, "We have an obligation to bargain standards," not to accept the Olympic program without negotiation. Stearns shot back, "That's not the question." Finally, Fehr said his problem with the Olympic drug testing policy is that it bans drugs that he said are legal for common folk to take, but not athletes. The baseball program, Fehr said, "Is pegged to U.S. law."

I'll be spending all day in the Islanders blog box at Nassau Coliseum to cover the trade deadline festivities with Islanders bloggers. Craziness surely will ensue...

4:21 p.m.

Okay, I'm going to send some videos I shot of Garth Snow and then call it a day. I had fun. I hope the bloggers had fun. And no one has thrown anything at me for that Al Arbour column. (Not yet, at least.) Hope to do this again, sometime...

4:14 p.m.

Garth Snow just met with reporters (and bloggers). Said there was one big trade he was really close to doing but it fell through. He would only add that the player he was trying to get never was traded. So go ahead and start your guessing.

3:31 p.m.

We're wanted in room 6. News????

3:26 p.m.

ANOTHER ISLANDERS TRADE!

Marc-Andre Bergeron to the Ducks for a third-rounder.

Reaction from bloggers:

"He kind of dropped off this year, as opposed to when he was picked up last year," B.D. Gallof of the The Bouncing Puck says. "He and Berard are a lot alike, and it seemed like one of them would be expendable. Bergeron had more value, so they probably got good value from someone who was more valuable. Makes sense that they got the stay-at-home defenseman from San Jose now that we know they were trading one of defensively unreliable players."

"Either him or Berard were going, and there's been a lot of frustration with Bergeron's game," Tom Liodice of The Tiger Track says. "What he had on offense he lacked on defense."

"I felt his play had come around as of late, and while he was inconsistent at best I feel the Islanders got good value for him because of their mistrust," Mike Schuerlein of IslesBlogger says.

This is a team made up of the most notable players who remain free agents today, two weeks into spring training:

LF: Barry Bonds
CF: Kenny Lofton
RF: Sammy Sosa
3B: Tony Graffanino*
SS: Royce Clayton
2B: Jerry Hairston Jr.
1B: Ryan Klesko
C: Mike Piazza

Bench: Corey Patterson, Neifi Perez, Julio Franco, Preston Wilson

Rotation: Roger Clemens, Kyle Lohse, Jeff Weaver, David Wells, Freddy Garcia*

Bullpen: Armando Benitez, Rodrigo Lopez*, Antonio Alfonseca, Jose Mesa, Bob Wickman, Eric Milton, Akinori Otsuka*.

* (currently injured)

My explanation is listed here in today's Web column.

Yes, I'm working well ahead this week. Thanks for noticing.

Anyway, this week's person is a former manager in the majors with ties to New York.

I know that's not much for you to go on, but you've got remember today is Monday and I need to keep this going until Friday!!! Anyway, I'll give more hints as the week goes on.

After visiting the Islanders blog box tomorrow, I'm going to Capitol Hill Wednesday. I'll be attending the Congressional hearing in which the commissioners from all four major sports are expected to attended. It is called, "Drugs in Sports: Compromising the Health of Athletes and Undermining the Integrity of Competition," and it begins at 9:30 a.m.

And as I type this, I'm awaiting a call from this week's where-are-they-now.

Sorry to boast, but this is a pretty neat job I have.

Just made plans for tomorrow's NHL trade deadline. I'm going to cover the happenings - or non-happenings - from the Islanders' blog box all day. I'll even bring my video camera.

Here's how it's going down: The team is opening its blog box at 10:30 a.m. - many, many hours earlier than normal - so they can blog about the Islanders' activity (or inactivity) from inside Nassau Coliseum. And I'll be there with them, blogging away.

(FYI: No, that's not me in the picture, thank you. It's just something I found on Google. Just wanted to point that out.)

Koby Clemens, Roger's son, reported to Astros minor-league mini-camp this morning and apparently was not asked (a) if he ever used HGH or (b) for his thoughts of his father saying his mother had Brian McNamee inject HGH in her behind his back.

Koby, however, did say he had a hard time watching the Congressional hearings, according to a story posted on the Houston Chronicle Web site.

“I turned it on at the beginning and they started hammering him and I couldn’t watch it,” he said. “I was getting so ticked off so I turned it off. And apparently right when I turned it off it kind of went better for my dad and so I’m kind of mad I missed that.”

Click here for the whole story.

After watching the Oscars last night, I decided it would be a timely Monday morning Web column to do a New York sports version of the Academy Awards. Apparently, I wasn't the only one who felt this way.

Just clicked on colleague Ken Davidoff's blog, and he did a baseball version of the Academy Awards. D'oh! So, time to think of something else.

Oh by the way, I have something in common with Harrison Ford: we both were once given a ride in the Goodyear blimp "Spirit of America."

How's this for thinking ahead? An enterprising Yankee fan has sold the rights to his ticket stubs for every Yankee home game this season on eBay for $202.49.

Now here's the real interesting part.

He doesn't claim to be a season-ticket holder.

According to his eBay listing: "ALL MY HISTORIC GAME TICKETS ARE DIRECTLY FROM TICKET HOLDERS OR STADIUM SALES ... NOT THE FLOOR WHERE THE GET STAINED AND STEPPED ON."

So how exactly will he get the ticket stubs? And what if he fails to get a ticket to one of the 81 games? Does that void the sale? I e-mailed him to see what he says.

(Thanks to Norm, my Sunday editor, for this great find.)

I've always been interested in the JFK assassination. Two years ago while on the road with the Yankees, I visited Dealey Plaza, toured the museum in the old book depository, and sat in awe on the grassy knoll and just watched cars drive by. I was amazed and somewhat disturbed that there was an X marked on the street where JFK was shot.

Anyway, if you read the news section, you probably saw that the Dallas DA found documents about the JFK assassination in his office, which he said were compiled by the DA at the time of the assassination, and released them to the public. The Dallas Morning News posted them in pdf form on its Web site. Check it out here.

Pretty interesting stuff, if you're a history buff.

No one guessed it right, though in fairness I didn't give people much time. I only posted the question yesterday afternoon, after I spoke with former SJU coach Brian Mahoney over the phone.

Anyway, Mahoney is employed at St. John's as a fundraiser, and he's currently working with Lou Carnesecca and Ron Rutledge trying to raise money for a "major renovation" to Carnesecca Arena, aka The Arena Formerly Known As Alumni Hall.

Maybe one day Newsday will publish a book of where-are-they-nows and pay me a huge sum. Here's my list: Brian Mahoney, Mike Stanley, Matt Bahr, Jeff Hostetler, Leonard Marshall, Y.A. Tittle, Ottis Anderson, Barry Lyons, Bruce Harper, Mackey Sasser, Ken Phelps and Kenny "Sky" Walker.

If you have any suggestions for future where-are-they-nows, post here...

With all this snow still falling, I assume many of you are sitting inside your homes drinking hot chocolate and trying to figure out who is this week's where-are-they-now.

My hints:
former college hoops coach with strong ties to NYC and Long Island.

Your incorrect guesses:
Lou Carnesecca
Mike Jarvis

Just spoke with this week's subject of everyone's favorite Newsday feature, Where Are They Now?

This week we talk to a former college basketball coach who has very strong New York City and Long Island ties.

Start your guessing.

And here's our Where-Are-They-Now roll call: Mike Stanley, Matt Bahr, Jeff Hostetler, Leonard Marshall, Y.A. Tittle, Ottis Anderson, Barry Lyons, Bruce Harper, Mackey Sasser, Ken Phelps and Kenny "Sky" Walker.

Now that most teams have officially kicked off spring training, many players who have remained in hiding since the release of the Mitchell Report have been asked to defend themselves.

Here's an updated list of responses from players (active and retired) who were named in the report.

Among those who we haven't heard from -- or, at least I couldn't find through nexis or old friend Google -- are Matt Franco, Todd Hundley, Todd Pratt, Mo Vaughn and Rondell White.

I've been impressed with Phil Hughes' blog entries thus far. He's posted daily, talked about his life away from the field, posted what appear to be cell-phone photos and has given away free stuff.

If you're into this type of thing, you should definitely check out C.J. Nitkowski's blog, which is all about the life of a pro baseball player in Japan. He posts diary-like entries - his current post is about his newborn son - along with YouTube videos, pictures, etc. (C.J.'s posts are even translated into Japanese for his Japanese fans.)

Minnesota Twins reliever Pat Neshek also has a blog that he dedicates mostly to his baseball card hobby. He communicates with fans on his message board.

My biggest pet peeve in life is vomiting. Thankfully I have a Jerry Seinfeld-like streak going -- it's 18 years this week, actually. Anyway, forgive me for talking about this subject, but I just had to pass this link along. It falls under the category 'unfortunate timing to get sick.' I won't hold it against you if you choose not to click on it.

Pretty funny that Jason Kidd's first game away from the Nets was against his former Nets coach, Byron Scott. I think we can assume these two don't exchange Christmas cards.

Anyway, Scott's New Orleans Hornets - who somehow have become one of the elite teams in the absolutely stacked Western Conference - ruined Kidd's celebrated return to the Dallas Mavericks.

I didn't see the game, but it sure seems from the boxscore that Kidd was wildly outplayed by Scott's point guard, the talented Chris Paul.

Here's one example of why Tony Clark is on my short list of nicest pro athletes I've ever met.

According to this story, he's spent the past seven seasons as an assistant coach of a high school basketball team in his hometown of Phoenix. This Saturday they're playing in the state finals.

So Tony is going to his Padres' spring-training workout early so he can be back in time for the big game. Good for him.

BTW, imagine how things would have been different in the 2004 ALCS if Clark's shot to rightfield didn't bounce into the stands at Fenway...

Seriously, how cool would it have been if Eva Longoria married Tampa Bay (not Devil) Rays prospect Evan Longoria?

That's almost as funny as if Alyssa Milano had married (and then divorced) her ex-boyfriends Carl Pavano and then Barry Zito and been known as Alyssa Milano Pavano Zito.

Anyway, I really like the Rays this season. Maybe I have a soft spot for woeful franchises that can't get out of their own way, but I think (a) they're definitely headed in the right direction, and (b) they have a legitimate shot to win 80 games this season. The most they've ever won is 70 in 2004.

Here's what happened, in the simplest of terms.

Step 1: ESPN reports in a news story on its Web site that the Knicks, Nets and Heat have had preliminary discussions about a three-way deal in which Eddy Curry goes to Miami and Vince Carter goes to the Knicks.

Step 2: Pat Riley, Heat coach, responds this morning by saying, "Wrong. Wrong. That's a blog b.s. Not that I don't have respect for him, but that's blog b.s." Here's the story, courtesy of our Zell teammates (Zellmates?) at South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

Tell me, how exactly is this 'blog b.s.'? What do blogs have to do with this?

Edgardo Alfonzo's Little Neck home is, yes, still on the market, with the asking price of only $6.1 million. (I remember reading about this listing in Newsday a long time ago, maybe even two years ago. So maybe he should think about eBay.)

Here's the MLSLI Web listing of the Alfonzo estate. Make sure to click on the "Additional Photos" link. It's like an Web episode of Cribs.

BTW, according to the MLSLI calculater, if you put no money down and take out a 30-year mortgage at a 6-percent rate, the monthly mortgage payment is...... $36,572.58.

And that's not including property tax and homeowner's insurance.

They're all non-roster invites in various spring training camps.

One of my favorite spring-training activities, as I wrote in my Web column today, is looking through each team's roster of non-roster invites to see what long-lost players are holding on for one last shot at the majors. There are always some interesting names.

After the jump, if you're interested, is a list of non-roster invites.

A totally random thought just came to me: I wonder if Gary Sheffield will take the bait and go off on Roger Clemens and steroids...

The Tigers' first full-squad workout is Wednesday, so Sheffield will presumably be asked to weigh in. I bet he does.

My favorite Sheffield quote of all-time remains: "His brother did my pool." Two points if you can name who Sheffield was talking about.

Check out this chilling story from The Boston Globe. If you know any high school athletes whom you suspect take steroids, get them to read this real-life story.

In my previous life as a sports fan, the Nets were my hands-down favorite team. So what if throughout the '90s a good season for them was eclipsing 30 wins. I still rooted for players such as Sam Bowie, Chris Childs, Armon Gilliam, Tony Massenburg, Benoit Benjamin and Yinka Dare thinking that some day this team would produce a winner.

Then, in 2001, along came Jason Kidd.

The 2001-02 NBA season will forever be my favorite (and my last) as a fan. The Nets were such a surprising success, and the ride to the top was so much fun. I even drove with a friend to Boston for Game 6 of the Eastern Conference finals, bought tickets outside the stadium from a scalper and celebrated the Nets' NBA Finals berth in person.

I haven't rooted for a team since, my primary reason being I'm an objective journalist. But in the years since I've also come to the conclusion that that season was as good as it could get for me, even if they didn't win it all. It was that much fun.

Say what you want about Kidd, and his many off-the-court issues, but I'm going to choose to remember him for the year he made the woeful Nets a winner.

I'm technically still on comp time today, so I'm 'underground,' as Brian Cashman used to say when he'd stop returning phone calls. But I'm breaking rank and blogging, anyway.

Watched the Andy Pettitte news conference yesterday on ESPNews and, like everyone else, thought he came across well in his apology.

I also thought it was telling that he said he had only spoken to Clemens once in passing, admitted their friendship was strained and wouldn't discuss how Clemens has dealt with the Mitchell Report. (Pettitte said he "obviously has feelings" on that, but he kept them to himself.)

It also was interesting to hear him speak highly of Brian McNamee, whom it's clear he still considers a friend (even if it's hard to imagine they'll ever train together again).

Lastly, watching Jorge Posada, Mariano Rivera and Derek Jeter sit on the side, is it wrong that I wondered to myself whether they ever took HGH or steroids? I know they've said no. But you just wonder about anyone and everyone these days.

At least I do.

Just wanted to explain my sudden absence -- and that's absence, not abscess -- I'm taking a brief break to recharge after working several weeks without a day off.

Yes, I know, it's tough work going to the Super Bowl, the parade and then covering the Roger Clemens vs Brian McNamee no-holds-barred steel-cage match...

Nevertheless, I'll be back soon.

Former Yankee pitcher Mike Stanton refused to comment about whether he witnessed blood on Roger Clemens' pants in 2001 and made a comment about it, as Brian McNamee testified under oath in his deposition.

"I've been advised to no comment," Stanton said when reached on his cell phone. "Sorry about that."

According to McNamee's deposition, the former trainer injected Clemens with steroids once at Yankee Stadium in 2001. It took place in the jacuzzi room by the clubhouse.