KC Confidential

Roger Clemens, NOT GUILTY…

Boy, you don’t hear those words often in federal court. They win nearly 95% of their trials. Which doesn’t mean the defendant is guilty, the Feds just have the power to always win. But not this time.

In fact, the government has now wasted millions of dollars and manpower to stage yet another public witch hunt that the public did not want to go along on.

Remember, Barry Bonds also walked.

Bonds was convicted of one minor charge but did no jail time. Clemens was cleared of everything. The government chose not to indict Lance Armstrong.

Did all three of them do steroids? No doubt.

The problem is, so did thousands of other baseball, basketball, football players just to name a few sports. "Roids" are now a common "vitamin" amongst not just pro and college athletes but Americans in general.

With the Clemens case over, it’s unlikely the government will ever again try a steroid/pro athlete case.

The public has spoken; "We don’t want to hear it."

For many reasons. For one, we love our superstars – even Bonds is loved in his city. Clemens is arguably the best baseball pitcher of all time. He’s won more Cy Young Awards than any other pitcher, including one at age 42 just seven years ago. Amazing. Even with steroids.

And you still have to be better than pretty good to do all that, huh?

Yes, steroids make you play better, especially in muscled up areas like home runs. However, it’s not fair to go after a chosen few when the entire NFL has to use them to not get KILLED out there.

So why slice and dice a few super star baseball players?

Simple, the government wants to slow down the use of steroids among young people.

Yet there is NO proven harm from the drugs when they are used correctly.

You can overdose on almost all legal drugs. The best examples of that being Arnold, Sly and Mickey Rourke – all movie stars who over used. Still they all seem to be in pretty good shape and healthy.. Stallone and Swartzenegger are now 70 and looking pretty good. 

That being said, we live in a dangerous world. Our nation has a high crime rate with the less educated Latino and Black groups.

Rampant steroid use would only grow young potential violent criminals to massive sizes.

It’s as simple as that.

Imagine 10 or 20 million thugs the size of Lebron James. Not a good thing.

So this is the major reason steroids are a no-no with the Feds. They don’t care about your health. Please.

Steroids are the new "fountain of youth." 

This is the only major way to slow down the aging process, look fit and young even into your 70’s. Nothing else can do that. Nothing. Sure it helps to eat right and work out, but again, PLEASE.

Testosterone and HGH are both legal today when doctor approved. So how bad can they be when used properly?

In generations to come these drugs and other steroids will allow people to live to be well over 100, maybe even 120. More importantly, they’ll look damn good even at 80, maybe 90.

Just think 80 will be the new 40. Damn. Sadly we won’t be here to see that.

Clemens and Bonds did pay a price.

Roger likely won’t go into the Hall of Fame for some time, and who knows if and when Bonds will ever be voted in? Plus they suffered great financial losses with lawyer bills and many sleepless nights. Most of all it hurt their families, their pride and their legacies.

Yes, they were all guilty of using steroids, but so were most of your pro heros.

My favorite Roger Clemens story – I’ve told it before but it bears repeating – was when Clemens and Red Sox pitcher Matt Young came into Stanford’s in Westport years ago. It was around 4 PM and they were in town to play the Royals. I walked up to Roger, introduced myself and we spoke for a bit. When I walked away he said, "Hey Craig, aren’t you gonna buy us a drink?" 

I turned and said, "Roger you make more money in a year than all the people in this restaurant put together, you should buy us a drink."  Roger smiled and said, "You’re right. Bartender, buy everyone in this joint a cocktail on me." 

And he did just that. Great guy.

But damn, I wish it had been later at night – we’d have been busier and made a killing!

Forty-seven year-old Rodney King died this weekend…

King drowned in his backyard pool – a pool paid for by a lawsuit from his 1991 beating by LAPD. It was a beating we’ll never forget, caught on video and which led to the LA riots that killed 55 people, injured 2,000 and caused millions of dollars in damages.

King became a "black leader" because of the incident but many white people had a problem with that.

Hey, there’s no doubt King was beaten and no doubt it was wrong. There’s also no doubt the police in LA and everywhere else in this country have no right to behave like animals.

But the problem with the entire mess is Rodney King himself.

King had a lengthy criminal record, but so did Malcolm X.  However Malcolm X became an educated, powerful leader and role model for millions. And at the end of his career he spoke to people on non violence. And if nothing else, Malcolm X was a brilliant man, right or wrong.

King on the other hand was not sharp, not a good example, uneducated and a lifelong punk.

He was given the chance to lead and set an example but what did he do with it? He parlayed his beating into more than million bucks and ended up on "Drug Rehab" reality shows. A real genius.

Now the guy’s being mentioned alongside Whitney Houston, Donna Summer and hoody-wearing victim Bobby Trayvon.

Really? Does King deserve to be enshrined in THAT group? Hardly.

In 1991 Rodney King was running from the LAPD while driving over 100 miles an hour. In all likelihood he was leaving the scene of a crime, had dope on him and more. That he ran because he was dirty is almost a given. His excuse: "I thought the cops would kill me because I am black."

I guess several million black men who get pulled over in LA all the time are lucky. They all lived somehow and managed not to get beaten. Oh yeah, King was on parole for armed robbery.

We’ll probably never really know what may have set off the beating. And again, it was wrong, very wrong. Maybe King got out of the car, yelled something at the cops and was scary and aggressive. Maybe the high speed chase and his record made the cops crazy. Still that beating was too much.

In the end, three cops were acquitted in a trial by a jury of all whites. Hey OJ, see how that works? Later the Federal Government had to make an example so they gave the two main "beating cops" 30 months in prison.

King then half ass tried to be a black leader and celebrity.

However he didn’t do either very well. So in the end the pool killed him and TV had him on only as a joke. The stupid, dope addict angle. The guy was not much of a speaker. I know, "Can We All Get Along."  That was his one-and-only best moment.

Do I sound down on Rodney King?

Yes, but only because he proved to be such a bad example – an uneducated black man who managed to make whites feel guilty. That’s the truth, he had no talent.

A better example of a black hero during the LA riots was when white truck driver Reginald Denny was pulled from his cab and nearly beaten to death and a black man, Bobby Green, raced in, pushed him back into his cab, and drove him to the hospital, saving his life.

That’s a hero. That’s a good example of a real man.

I don’t hold it against King that he had a bad record, so did I. It’s what he did after the "beating."

Which was not much.

It was the best of times and the worst of times…

Stanford and Sons was probably the comedy spot here in the late 1990s and it seemed like every up and coming comedy star was on our stage at some point back then. The late 90’s launched so many multi-millionaire careers it’s hard to name them all.

One of the most notorious events there went down in 1996 with "That’s My Boy" star Adam Sandler.

A comic named Nick Swardson was doing a feature week at the Westport club. We had no idea his best pal and soon to be partner in many films was the hottest comedy star going, Adam Sandler. In fact Adam was playing a one night stand at Sandstone the same week. 

So Adam and his crew showed up at Stanford’s with no advance warning. Sandler and three of his producing/writing buds had come to a Swardson show on a weeknight I happened to be there and Adam introduced himself. He was very nice and we all sat down and talked about his newest film "Happy Gilmore" and his upcoming show at Sandstone. He told me Nick was his pal and they all had come to watch his shows. In fact, Adam even did a brief set on our stage, singing his hit, THE HANUKKAH SONG.

When word got out Adam was hanging nightly at Stanford’s it got pretty crazy.

It was common knowledge that Sandler was dating TV/film star Alicia Silverstone.

Which of course didn’t stop the guy from eyeing our hot little wait staffers. Adam had a thing for two of our cocktail babes, one was Lori King, the other I called Crazy Kari. King was my kinda gal friend and Kari had a crazy hot body. Both were blondes and both around 20 or 21. Remember, in Missouri you only have to be 19 to serve liquor.

So Adam wanted to meet them both.

Seems Kari was the one most willing. She had no boyfriend really and she and I would hang out at times.

Kari had a wicked body – just wicked – and Sandler was in lust.

They did a couple nights together and Hearne Christopher at the Star found out about it and spoke to Kari about her fun times with Sandler.

Oh boy.

"Collectibles? These days most anything will pass. In the case of comic Adam Sandler, a pair of his size 36 Polo boxer shorts fit the bill for Kari Stevens, a part-time data entry clerk for a local tire company and an on-again, off-again waitress at Stanford & Sons," it began.

Stevens told me she had no illusions about seeing Sandler again.

“I’m not depending on it. But I gave him my picture and my phone number,’ she said.’

As for the undies Stevens Sandler gave her as a souvenir, “I asked him if I could have them, and he said no, they were his lucky underwear,” she said.

But on a couple days later, Stevens asked Sandler: “ ‘So where’s my lucky shorts? ‘ And he said, ‘You can have these (instead)… ‘ I roll ’em down and they fit perfect. ”

She was telling everyone about it.

She was so proud of the fact that she’d done Sandler, and then Kari and the pair of signed boxer shorts ended up on the FRONT PAGE OF FYI in Hearne’s section which caught everyone’s eye.

"Hey isn’t he with Silverstone?" people wondered. Well, not anymore.

The story got picked up in LA and Adam and Alicia broke up shortly after that.

To be fair, it likely would have happened anyway, this just spead up the ending some. 

Naturally, I got the complaint calls from Sandler’s people. In the end it was forgotten, but comedy stars and sex seem to go hand in hand.

Adam Sander went on to become one of the most successful comedy stars and movie producers of our generation. Nick Swardson went on to a big career as well with TV shows like Pretend Time and writing movies, including "Benchwarmers" and "Malibu’s Most Wanted."

So Nick is still a Sandler guy and has made millions himself. Kari, well she went out to LA to be a star and became a porn star if there is such a thing. You can catch her in movies like "Wanda Play" or see some of her body of work online if you dig.

Today she’s back in KC, still a handful and still has the memories her time with Sandler.

Oh yeah, along with her signed boxer shorts from her nights with Pauley Shore.

By the way, Sandler gave me tickets to his show at Sandstone. He was not as big a star then so the crowd was maybe 4,000. Today it would be the Sprint Center, but with Adam’s bank account in the hundreds of millions, I guess that’s not likely.

Like I said, those CRAZY times.

Let’s be blunt, we have the nation’s most boring airport…

It’s all wrong for the most part. The best thing about our KCI dead zone is you can get on and off flights quickly. And that, in and of itself, does matter. Rarely are there lines or waits, even on holidays. However, the main reason for that is quite simple.

NOBODY COMES HERE MUCH.

We pretend to be a large, major city, but in so many important ways we just are not.

A city’s airport is kinda like a business card. Ours is boring, slow and all but blank. There’s nothing to do or see at our airport. You can’t even see much, if any, of what our city looks like. Not even as you land. The town looks dead coming into our airport – just like KCI.

Don’t you love it? There are no real restaurants or bars. NONE.

Yes, we have a dump off fast food place here and there…barely. and of course one Starbucks, which is always 500 yards from wherever you might have landed or come in at.

And there’s ONE bookstore that also sells gum and candy. ONE. For the love of….are you kidding me?

I recently flew in from Charlotte, not a city I expected to have much of an airport.

My God, it was hopping! Tons of places to eat, drink, shop – a mini mall. Nowdays most airports have all of this in some way or another. Except ours. People were actually in the airport bars in Charlotte watching the NBA playoffs, laughing, drinking and having some fun while waiting for their flights. And this was at nearly 11 PM on a Monday.

I picked up my friend at KCI this past Friday at 10:30 PM. The TV’s – at least the one I could find – was on, but only in the security area waiting for incoming or outgoing flights. So nobody from the public could sit and watch anything.

AND THERE WAS NOTHING OPEN ON A FRIDAY NIGHT.

Except for a small, self-serve pie and bread shop it looked like Zombie Land. No people.

Five years ago I said Kansas City was the slowest growing of all major cities in the top 30.

I was wrong. Buffalo, New York has us  beat, but just by a hair.

Now KCI is getting a much needed facelift and will be redone into one big, new terminal.

Unfortunately, it’s more about security and the congestion of planes than making our airport modern like the others. I do understand. We’ve lost tons of airlines, routes – and hell – didn’t we used to be a hub for TWA and Braniff?

Those guys are done.

Today we’re a shell airport – empty, usually very slow, more of a stop off to change flights than a place to go.

We do have all those nice photos on the walls of the KC Zoo, 18th and Vine and more.

Wow, that’s exciting.

But Lord help you if you’re looking to get a bite or a drink anytime soon. Something halfway decent.

Pray that your next flight isn’t three or four hours late. The bathrooms are decent. You can hang out there, I suppose.

We have a beautiful city and there are many things to see and do. We just don’t promote it, never have.

Nobody knows much about Kansas City, unless they live here.

So an airport is important. It’s the first thing you people see when you come to our city and the last place they go when they say goodbye.

We can do better, much better.

Like most of you I think almost daily about how much more I can do and accomplish in my life…

It never seems good enough, does it? All those dream we had as children that faded into life’s reality at age 30 or 40 or 50. Too often we think of what might have been. Trouble is, we don’t take the time to respect and examine what we’ve really done with our lives.

It was only yesterday, it seems, we were hoping to graduate from high school, have a girlfriend, be liked by others and leave our hometown for college and a life adventure.

Well, most of us did just that or something close, right?

I mean, had the Future Fairy told you at age 12 you’d own your own home, have a family, friends, good paying job, trips to exciting cities and enjoy ballgames, theatre – even pick up a few personal awards along the way – let alone just own a smoking hot, brand new car, wow, that would have sounded so COOL.

But that’s never enough, is it?

My gosh, had I been told at age 12, I was going to go away to Arizona, live in Los Angeles, be part of the film and TV industry, date and bed boatloads of beautiful women, become friends with worldwide, well-known celebrities and athletes, own one of America’s best known comedy clubs, a restaurant, be in the media – and oh yeah, write a book about myself, a good one – I wouldn’t have believed it.

Hey Craig, you will drive Porsches, Ferraris, and a Lotus. Damn, I would have been so excited I wouldn’t have been able to sleep.

Of course, there are bad things too; prison, family death, a broken marriage and many, many scary times.

Guess what? That kinda stuff happens to all of us in our own way, right?

I don’t mention me to try and sound cool, only as an example. Yet like most of you, it’s never enough, never good enough. In my case, if only my movie gets made and I becomes nationally known. Or the best one, I make enough money to be on easy street.

It just never ends.

We don’t know most of our readers here, obviously. I don’t anyway. But I have the feeling from the comments section that this mindset is in most of us. That we are the chosen few in the world. That we live in the greatest country ever, America. We are the top one percent earners or there abouts.

Sure, we have bills to pay but so do multi millionaires. We have our headaches and our heartaches, but so do Johnny Depp and Johnny Dare.

It’s the human condition. It’s never good enough.

We have trouble telling ourselves, "You did good, kid. In fact, you did great." 

Few of us show much emotion – maybe it wasn’t shown enough to us as kids (or adults). I sure know that feeling and I bet many of you do as well.

We all think, "Boy, if I had it all to do over." Even though we did better than O.K.

I’m trying harder now to enjoy life and not worry so much about the future. Why? Because the future for me and many of you is NOW. We’ve lived better than half of our lives – maybe two thirds – and as we grow older we begin to lose much of what being young gave us. We become more and more limited. Even when things are going well you hear, "Yeah, well you’re old. What do you know?"

And hey, that starts in your 30’s.

I just looked out my window this morning and saw how nice a day it was. How nice our city can look. Even how nice people can be to one another at times.

No, I didn’t grow up to quarterback the Chiefs, win best actor in Hollywood, or be elected to Congress.

Maybe that’s just as well. I know many of those people and Lord knows they don’t seem very happy. My favorite line has always been, "I don’t know the answer to being happy, but I know if you live to try and please others you won’t be."

Please yourself.

Hell, I think most of you have already won – you’re still here. And if read this site and comment sometimes, you must be fairly bright, so enjoy what you have – what the luck of the draw gave you.

It may be brief; it may be scary, exciting, boring but make it enjoyable. It’s your life. You and I have won, even if it ends sooner rather than later.

So just smile baby, smile.