Nitkowski -- tempted but clean -- deserves your respect

It's all right if you're skeptical, but this is a true story.

His name is C.J. Nitkowski. He is a longtime major league baseball player just finishing a season in Japan. Nitkowski once trained and worked out with New York Yankees pitchers Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte, two of the players named in the report from George Mitchell. Nitkowski is a former Yankee and Met.

C.J. Nitkowski spent part of 2004 with the Yanks, the seventh of his eight MLB teams. (Getty Images)

Nitkowski's trainer for seven years was the now infamous former Yankees strength and conditioning coach, Brian McNamee. Yes, that McNamee, the one who told Mitchell he provided performance-enhancing drugs to Clemens, Pettitte and others. Nitkowski started training with McNamee in 2001.

Nitkowski's career is similar to that of other players. He worked hard, he trained hard, he did the same agility drills and pitching drills and wind sprints that Clemens and Pettitte and other baseball players did.

Then came an important moment. He wondered, like probably hundreds, if not thousands, of professional baseball players over the past two decades, if he should try steroids.

"I first thought about it around the 2001 season," said Nitkowski, who that season played for the Mets and Detroit Tigers, in a telephone interview. "The rumors were flying about Sosa and McGwire. I had over five years in the major leagues. That year I was coming off a horrible season. I just wondered if I needed to keep up with other guys using them.

"I knew guys who were using steroids," he said. "I played with guys who were using. It wasn't a secret. Most players knew who was using and who was not using. Management played dumb but they knew. Everyone knew. We all just kept it quiet."

The telltale signs, Nitkowski said, of a juiced up player? The guys who grew massive amounts of muscle almost overnight. Or the guys who were frequently injured.

"If a guy's shoulder fell apart all of a sudden," said Nitkowski, "it was a red flag."

As for Nitkowski, he had reached that one moment so many major leaguers faced: to use or not to use.

The drug Nitkowski was considering: a steroid called Winstrol.

This is where the story diverges from players like McGwire and Bonds and, if you believe the Mitchell report, Clemens. Nitkowski didn't try them, he says, and I believe him. And it's not just that I believe him; others with knowledge of the situation say Nitkowski didn't use them either.

Thus Nitkowski is one of the good guys, a legion of good guys, who probably considered using steroids but for various reasons did not.