To certain kinds of fans, and I'm one of them, the steroid crowd trashed one of the most enduring appeals of baseball - the ability to make statistical comparisons across different eras. Baseball is the only team sport where the statistics convey most of the story about a player.
The golf analogy is to the technology: modern equipment trashed traditional architecture in the same way that steroids trashed the baseball record book.
That's pretty astute, Phil. I agree with you, but I'm also happy to point out that even with technological advances, Oakmont and WF played to +5 285. (Note: yes I know that Oakmont NORMALLY is par-71 and that by all rights it shhoud read +1 285...but the point is that Oakmont and Winged Foot, IMO through great green contours, leveled the playing field.)
Anyway, back to Clemens, I spoke with some of his defenders and apologists, even some that are journalists, and even they say they just dont have an answer to the question of "How can macnamee being lying about clemens but telling the truth about Pettitte" and all I get back is "You're right, I dont have a good answer to that and neither does he."
Of course I follow that up with "well then why do you believe him and I get "because I want to" (never underestimate the power of denial) or "because he's a sports hero and I don't like seeing them fall from grace.