VERO BEACH, Fla. -- Monday morning dawned muggy and gray and brought with it a choice:

Drive nearly four hours across the state of Florida and maybe listen to Andy Pettitte sneak in a few more lies while stretching the truth like taffy?

'I know there are people I'll never be able to win back," Andy Pettitte says. (AP)

Easy choice. At least from the press room here in Dodgertown, you don't need a gas mask and hip boots to wade into this crap yet again ...

We've discussed, analyzed, hypothesized and theorized the Pettitte/Roger Clemens/Brian McNamee Web of Deceit to death. All we've learned, this winter more than ever, is that these guys' words don't mean squat. Not anymore. Unfortunately.

Pettitte reported to Tampa with a tardy slip approved by the Yankees, dumped his stuff and stepped on a podium to take his medicine. He was earnest. He was emotional.

I'd like to say he was honest.

I'd like to.

"In my case, I'd hope anybody who knows me or has been a fan of mine would believe what I'm saying today," Pettitte said. "I know there are people I'll never be able to win back, and I hate that, because I care."

Bingo.

He answered questions for an hour, attempting to round up every one of those horses that long ago left the barn (to put it in the language of a man who enjoys disappearing into the solitude of his Texas ranch), but words mean very little now.

From here on out, the only important things remaining for Pettitte are what he does on the field, how the Yankees respond to him in the clubhouse and whether the two become intertwined.

That franchise icons Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera and Jorge Posada attended Pettitte's Legends Field soiree pretty much put an end to questions surrounding whether the Yanks would have his back.

As for the upcoming season, he admitted concern that he's behind in his conditioning because time spent on airplanes traveling to meet with his new friends in Washington, D.C., and time spent on the telephone with lawyers sort of interfered with his training.

He couldn't express enough chagrin for taking human growth hormone. He said he was stupid and desperate. He said he thought it would help heal his ailing elbow, and that he really didn't take it to gain competitive advantage.

"That's it," Pettitte said. "There are no other surprises out there."

Again, the bottom line: Too many words already have been uttered on these subjects, enough lies have been told, and the only true lie detector test is unavailable. Baseball still doesn't test for HGH.

So can we cut through all the crap and move along to the season already?

Pettitte is 36 and has worked more than 200 innings in each of the past three seasons since his elbow injury in 2004 -- and, as he's now admitted, since pumping HGH into that elbow in '04.

He won 15 games for the Yankees last year, made 34 starts and compiled a 4.05 ERA, just a few ticks above his lifetime mark of 3.83.

Based on last year, the reasonable expectation is that he will be a productive member of the rotation.

Based on the events of this winter, it is not unreasonable to believe that Pettitte's mind will be so screwed up that he will chuck it all and retire sometime soon.

"I'd be lying if I said that didn't cross my mind," Pettitte said. "But not over the last couple of days.

"It's been a hard offseason."

I don't know where things go from here, but I do know this: Any player who obtains HGH from his daddy and probably will be called to testify in Clemens' defamation lawsuit against McNamee has a very rocky future awaiting.

"I'm hoping and praying I don't have to do anything else to be involved with this," Pettitte said.

His apology notwithstanding, there are no sympathetic figures here.

Pettitte was a grown man facing the demons of temptation, and God-fearing or no, he made a choice that hundreds of other players didn't. Believe it or not, there are players who chose not to go on the juice in these scandal-ridden times.

The Yankees have sent subtle indications that they felt duped by Pettitte, who signed a one-year, $16 million deal in December. But this is the club that showered a gazillion dollars on then-free agent Jason Giambi before the 2002 season when the mountain of circumstantial evidence that he was a user was bigger than Giambi himself.

We now know from the Mitchell Report that at the peak of their 1996-2001 dynasty, on their third consecutive world champion team in 2000, the Yankees were fielding eight players linked to steroids or HGH, according to the Mitchell Report: Clemens, Pettitte, Jason Grimsley, Mike Stanton, Chuck Knoblauch, David Justice, Glenallen Hill and Jose Canseco.

It's a little late for either the Yankees or Pettitte to get religion on this subject.

"All I can tell you is, from the bottom of my heart, I know why I did this," Pettitte said. "I didn't do it to gain an edge on anyone. I didn't do it to become faster, stronger or throw harder. ... If people think I'm a liar, they should call me a cheater."

The most important part of Happy Hour with Andy Pettitte in Tampa on Monday? The only important part?

By far, when he was talking about a serious injury one of his sons suffered this winter while riding a four-wheel all-terrain vehicle.

"Kids, please wear helmets when riding four-wheelers," he pleaded.

Not long after, he also told kids not to use HGH because it's against the law.

Now there are a couple of statements everybody can take as gospel.