Searching for Illicit Behavior through Changes in Productivity: The Case of Roger Clemens and Performance-enhancing Drugs

Major League Baseball pitcher Roger Clemens has been accused of using performanceenhancing drugs to boost his performance. If Clemens used ergogenic aids consistent with the accusations of use, then unusual changes in productivity may be evident in his performance record. Two previous studies have examined Clemens’s career and reached conflicting conclusions: Bradlow et al. (2008) declares Clemens’s career to be “atypical” while Albert (2009) finds Clemens’s productivity to be unusually strong but similar to other pitchers who have not been linked with performance-enhancing drugs. This study examines Clemens’s performance at times of alleged use and over his career and finds that changes in productivity are not indicative of performance-enhancing drug use. Draft: January 24, 2017 1 Contact: Department of Economics, Finance, and Quantitative Analysis, Kennesaw State University, 560 Parliament Garden Way NE, Kennesaw, Georgia 30144, jcbradbury@kennesaw.edu. Disclosure of Interest: Author previously served as a paid consultant to attorneys representing Roger Clemens relating to legal matters regarding the subject of this paper. The author received no compensation for producing this manuscript, and the manuscript was not vetted by, or written at the direction of, any representative of Roger Clemens or associated legal counsel. The views expressed in the paper are solely those of the author.