Pedro on PEDs: 'I know I was clean'

PUNTA CANA, Dominican Republic -- Speaking at the David Ortiz Celebrity Golf Tournament Friday afternoon, former Red Sox pitcher Pedro Martinez talked about the upcoming candidacy of Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds for the Hall of Fame.

Martinez discussed both the allegations regarding performance enhancing drugs involving each player, while reiterating he never was aided by such a thing.

"It's really difficult to choose either one," Martinez said. "I would have loved to face Roger Clemens when he was Roger Clemens with nothing. I would have loved to face him all the time, like I did with [Greg] Maddux, [Tom] Glavine. I learned so much just from watching them.

"And I was clean. I know I was clean. That's all I can say. I was clean and I was out there. They got the best out of me. Beat me or not, that was the best I had, and clean. I wish it was the same way for every one of them."

When asked if he would endorse the pair for the Hall of Fame, Martinez chose to talk about the difficulty that comes with being a major league player while vaguely talking about the PED perception involving Bonds and Clemens.

"I don't really, in my heart … pitching is so difficult. Just like Barry Bonds. You look at Barry Bonds and you say, 'Hey' …I remember Barry Bonds growing up and I was still a kid when Barry Bonds was hitting 30 jacks in the big leagues. I don't know how his numbers were before. But I think they both had really, really good numbers right before everything exploded," Martinez said.

"It's not that anybody is going to let them free from everything they did, or whatever. But at the same time, if you acknowledge baseball, you acknowledge that it's really difficult to do. And I respect that. I respect baseball. Even though it was the steroid era, I never had a complaint, I don't have it. I think I did the best way possible for as long as I could. What would have happened if I had a level ground field? It's only to be guessed. This is the same body you saw, except a couple of bodies, maybe a couple of more pounds. But doing it is really difficult. I can tell you from my own experience and feeling my own body that it's not easy to do. Anything they did deserves credit. I'm not along with cheating the game or doing stuff like that, but just to be in the big leagues is so special. You had to be so special that you have to be really be careful how you say anything about baseball, especially pitching. Pitching is so physical, it's so mental. It's really difficult to explain."

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