[OT] Clemens to Astros

[sports.espn.go.com]

3pm press conference

1 year
5 million

Now they have Clemens AND Pettitte. Interesting.

I LOVE IT!! Too bad Zim already signed with the Devil Rays.

Let the plunking begin.

As a Sox gal, my ...shall we say, "dislike"... for Roger Clemens is... shall we say, "large." I've no major issues with Pettitte -- I've found him to be quite genuine.

Clemens reneging his retirement only reinforces my feeling that he's only in it for himself, the money, and is a general... shall we say, "schmuck."

The Sports Guy says it better than I could, even on my best day (for those who are interested/haven't seen this article): [espn.go.com]

[Q]... he's only in it for himself, the money...[/Q]

I disagree. Even though I'm a Yanks fan, I've never been much more than ambivalent about Clemens... But it's clear that he's doing the Astros thing not for the money, but for the fun of it. He wants to join his friend Pettitte and see what they can do, closer to home. Clemens could have stayed in New York and gotten just as much money, if not more.

Is he signing on because he believes in something in particular about the Astros organization? No. But he's done his service for the Yanks organization and has earned the right to have a little fun. After all, isn't the main point of sports to have fun?

And plus, it's always fun to see someone stick it to Gerogie Porgie.

What a wonderful day.

Well, the point of professional sports is not really to have fun. It's to win and make money. Anyway, I think it's clear that he's not doing this for the money - the Yanks would likely have paid him $10 million for this season. The whole retirement thing does rub me the wrong way as a Yankees fan, but whatever. I'll bet he won't get to strike out his last batter in the World Series now...

Skip this one - I meant to edit my post and ended up replying to it instead. See below...



Post Edited (01-12-04 15:53)

I just can't wait until he has to bat against the Mets... or anyone, for that matter.

So if anyone's scoring at home, he's now turned his back on the Red Sox, the Blue Jays, and the Yankees in his career. I couldn't hate him any more if he'd played his undergrad ball at Harvard.



Post Edited (01-12-04 15:54)

A statement from the General Georgie M. "Porgie" Steinbrenner:

"Roger clemens was a great warrior for the Yankees, a teacher, and a leader. He told the world he was retiring, and we had no choice but to believe him."

Great stuff!

Even though I swore off eLF baseball topics after the ALCS threads, I'll make an exception:

As a Yankee fan who hated every minute that crybaby whore was dressed in pinstripes (19 years of hating him and counting...), I don't care where he goes, as long as he's off my team. My only regret is that he didn't take Steinbrenner with him.

I said it before: the only reason Clemens said he was retiring was so he could pitch in the Olympics. Team USA failed to qualify, so back he goes to his love-muffin Pettitte. Maybe they can double date and be cowboys together, while talking about their 4+ ERAs in Minute Maid Park.

Roger "coming out" of retirement in the same offseason reeks of disrespect to the Yankee organization. As a Yankee fan, I'm tickled pink seeing Steinbrenner take one up the wazoo.

I love my Yankees despite them being the evil empire, not because of it. Anyone see ticket prices recently, or try shopping for official merchandise? It's outrageous!

Personally, I am just looking forward to a season of him having to bat in most every game he pitches. No, more hiding behind the DH. Interesting to see how teams pitch him. I really think the Mets/Piazza thing needs to be put to rest but we know the media will make a big deal when the Astros come to Shea. It will be an interesting season to be sure. Too bad the Mets have no frigging clue! To not go full fledge after Guerrero was assinine.

The Mets visit Clemens and the (newly renamed in my mind) Asstros May 14th-16th... I wonder if Jimy will "conveniently" rearrange his rotation so he doesn't Roger doesn't have to hit against the Mets.

[Q]So if anyone's scoring at home, he's now turned his back on the Red Sox, the Blue Jays, and the Yankees in his career. I couldn't hate him any more if he'd played his undergrad ball at Harvard.[/Q]

I definitely agree.

I fully concede that it may just be a bitter and biased Sox fan speaking, but I see him as the Judas of Baseball.

(Edit: added the quote)



Post Edited (01-12-04 19:33)

Pettite, Clemens...on the same team again......at least it's in the NL this time.
Although I do think it will be fun when he comes to town to play the Mets--they better let him play.....

Is it not possible that he retired and then Pettitte, as he said he was going to try to do, convinced him to come and pitch? Granted that Pettitte was alot more open because he wanted to be traded closer to home, but frankly, I don't think Clemens would have pitched again unless a special situation like this arose.

It seems to me that there are alot of bitter people out there, and I have three words, get over it. This is professional sports, people move around all the time for many different reasons. Most of the time it's for money, like that certain other player from Texas, that Boston was trying to get. Since that was not his first team, would you also say those same things about him, if he were able to go to your beloved Red Soxs.

Frankly, I find it refreshing when someone chooses to go somewhere because they want to live there. Enough said .

Jim, I do agree with you, but it was Clemens's (is that the proper grammar?) complete disregard for his fans that ticked a lot of people off... he pitched for the Red Sox for 12 years and didn't so much as say, "Thanks for your support throughout the years." Had he done that, it would have been a different story.

(see the Bill Simmons article I linked above -- it's a bit long, so if you don't want to sit through a lot of stuff, just scroll down until you see the numbered sections: 1. The Slap in the Face 2. The Kick in the Gonads 3. The Revelation 4. The Ultimate Violation 5. The Final Straw. That sums it all up quite nicely.)

I'm impressed: Clemens has actually managed to give Yankee and Red Sox fans something to agree on. What a beautiful day.

His purpose in life is now revealed.

Sully '00 wrote:



I just can't wait until he has to bat against the Mets... or anyone, for that matter.

So if anyone's scoring at home, he's now turned his back on the Red Sox, the Blue Jays, and the Yankees in his career. I couldn't hate him any more if he'd played his undergrad ball at Harvard.



Post Edited (01-12-04 15:54)

How about if he played as a frosh for Cornell and then sat out a year so he could play for the Crimson.

Hm... about that Simmons article (http://espn.go.com/page2/s/simmons/010531.html):

"As luck would have it, at the exact same time Clemens was sparkling for a sub-.500 team in a foreign country, Boston fans were falling for two new heroes: Pedro Martinez and Nomar Garciaparra. Both of them were blessed with an innate understanding about Boston fans -- what baseball means to us, how we value players who play hard, how we revere players with a sense of The Moment, how we love when our heroes acknowledge us and say things like "The fans were great today" or "Nothing beats playing in Boston in front of these fans." Sounds stupid? It's not. That's Boston. We eat that stuff up. " -Simmons

Pedro? Innate understanding of (and attention to) the needs of fans?

Nearly every time a passionate Boston fans rails on what separates their team from the "evil Yankees," and even sometimes when they go on about how Clemens lacks every decent quality in the world, I feel like there's some sort of crazy alternate universe in which this sort of argument makes sense, and where somehow none of its terms apply to the current Sox (like...say... Manny... or Lowe... or...)

I suppose all I'm saying is that Clemens is such an easy target, and partly it's because one can use him to deny that any of one's own team's players have anything in common with him.

heh... I put the Neely comment as a new discussion since, well, it's a new discussion topic and all.

tolya '04 wrote:

Nearly every time a passionate Boston fans rails on what separates their team from the "evil Yankees," and even sometimes when they go on about how Clemens lacks every decent quality in the world, I feel like there's some sort of crazy alternate universe in which this sort of argument makes sense, and where somehow none of its terms apply to the current Sox (like...say... Manny... or Lowe... or...)

How the hell can you even mention Manny Ramirez and Derek Lowe in the same breath? Manny's a headcase who got his money and now doesn't care about anything else, including running out ground balls, showing up for huge games in the middle of a playoff race, faking illness... etc.

I understand your larger point, but just because Miguel Tejada got miffed about Lowe's celebration after his team came back from being down 2-0 (after Tejada himself made a similar gesture in game 2) does not merit Lowe being cast as a degenerate.

Rich H '96 wrote:
I said it before: the only reason Clemens said he was retiring was so he could pitch in the Olympics. Team USA failed to qualify, so back he goes to his love-muffin Pettitte. Maybe they can double date and be cowboys together, while talking about their 4+ ERAs in Minute Maid Park.

Interesting point about the Olympics. With Roger, it's always about Roger. And Pettitte's ERA in Minute Maid could be 5+...

dss28 wrote:
I definitely agree.

I fully concede that it may just be a bitter and biased Sox fan speaking, but I see him as the Judas of Baseball.

I'll concede that I'm bitter, but I don't think I'm biased here. Everyone who wasn't wearing pinstriped glasses could see before this happened that he was a scumbag... and now that he's turned his back on them, they can all see it too. How long until Yankee fans start remembering the times when Clemens was a Blue Jay and threw at Jeter's head? They were screaming about it at the time, but all was forgiven when he jumped to the Bronx.



Post Edited (01-13-04 11:22)

Did Yankee fans truly "accept" him?



Post Edited (01-13-04 11:56)

dss28 wrote:

Did Yankee fans truly "accept" him?

Personally, I did. Great ball player, did his job day in and day out. I certainly "accepted" him more than Weaver, Mondesi, or (going a few years back) Kenny Rogers.

I don't feel personally slighted by this move, although I hope it gives Steinbrenner ulcers.

Sorry - last post on this thread for me, but I figured people might want to see a view from the other side instead of just from a Red Sox fan. Naturally, I agree, but I do think that the author (and others) is making a little too big a deal out of this...

[www.nypost.com]

Page 2 has something similar, written by Jim Caple: [espn.go.com]

Maybe each one's talent is commensurate to how much of a bum they are.... so, no, Lowe is certainly not in the same breath as Manny.

but Clemens isn't the only person whose brain sometimes freezes out on the mound, so if we're going to hold him up as the "antichrist," it'd be good to have a measure of scrutiny for everyone else.

From a 1050 ESPN interview...

Clemens: "And I feel kinda bad about how people are taking it up there --"

Michael Kay: "You know why, Roger. Because everybody loved you. They fell in love with Roger Clemens"

Let's see...we could go with a , or a , or a , or a or a or maybe a

It's just too difficult to choose when you're dealing with a buffoon like Michael Kay.