Roger Clemens rocketing toward immortality

By Shawn Krest

As a crew of sluggers makes 500 home runs about as exclusive a club as Sam’s, Book of the Month and Columbia CD, along comes Roger Clemens to remind us what immortality looks like. The Rocket entered the season seven wins shy of 300 and 91 strikeouts short of 4000. After starting the season 5-2, Clemens may reach the victory landmark before Memorial Day. With 50 K’s, he may hit four grand by the time the kids are on summer break. He’ll be the 21st pitcher in the 300 club and only the third to strike out as many.

And what will the milestones mean to baseball history? Absolutely nothing. If Clemens is hit by a bus while sitting on 299 and 3999—and if he is, check that the driver’s license doesn’t read "Duquette"—the only number that will matter is five, the number of years before he enters Cooperstown. Despite the talk-radio debates on Rafael Palmeiro and Fred McGriff, numbers don’t make a player a legend. Clemens, like the Ruths, Aarons, and Ryans before him, was a legend long before he reached the numbers.

And what will the milestones mean to Clemens? Absolutely nothing. Milestones and ceremonies aren’t Clemens’ style. Despite giving them plenty of material, he’s also not a talk radio type of guy. In a sport constantly cramming more and more "entertainment value" to supplement the game on the field, Clemens is more interested in what goes on in between the promotions—the game itself.

Opening Day, 2003: In a pregame scene more appropriate for an NBA game or Rolling Stones concert, Toronto’s Skydome goes dark for a fifteen minute laser show featuring loud music and knee-high smoke pumped onto the field. The scene earned high marks from all observers save one: the starting pitcher trying to warm up in the bullpen.

With the lights off, Clemens, making the thirteenth Opening Day start of his career, was having a little trouble seeing his catcher. More importantly, the Yankees’ bullpen catcher was having trouble seeing Clemens’ fastball, still Rocket fast at age 41.

"It was a little unusual to turn the lights out," said Clemens, "so my warm-up was against the wall. It was hard to see in the pen, so I really couldn’t throw full speed until the lights went on. I get my work done somehow."

A few hours later, Clemens raised his Opening Day record to 6-3. He’s also 3-0 with a 1.56 ERA in the World Series—not bad for a pitcher who has been criticized as playing poorly in "big games."

"You’re programmed to get the job done," Clemens says of his big game approach. "Throw strikes, get people out. Keep the ball in the ballpark. Don’t get too many guys on base."

His robotic focus is fueled by adrenaline, which, as Mike Piazza and umpire Terry Cooney will attest, creates a volatile combination.

"I probably hated him more than anybody else when he pitched for the other team," says Yankee manager Joe Torre. "He was such an intimidator. He reminded me of Bob Gibson. I couldn’t stand the guy until he became my teammate, and then we became close friends. You have Roger come here a few years ago, you realize he was a lot more human going on in him than you’d anticipated."

Clemens and Gibson, the Hall of Fame Cardinals pitcher, may have had a comparable mound presence, but only one was able to brush back Father Time. In Gibson’s last two seasons, he went 11-13 and 3-10, retiring at age 40. His pinpoint control deserted him and his strikeout totals plummeted. Clemens, on the other hand, won his sixth Cy Young Award at age 39, with a 20-3 record and three times as many strikeouts as walks.

"He’s still a power pitcher when he’s talking about this possibly being his last year," says Torre. "That’s really incredible. Nolan Ryan is the only other one I think has gone this far agewise and continued to be a power pitcher. Steve Carlton sort of approached it but then had some physical breakdowns."

There are almost as many ways to describe Clemens’ longevity as there are Clemens’ wins. He has won Cy Young Awards during four different presidential administrations (Reagan, Bush the Elder, Clinton, and Bush the Younger). He’s won back-to-back Cy’s on two occasions, more than a decade apart. He struck out twenty in a game twice, also separated by more than a decade. But perhaps the best demonstration of Clemens’ longevity is that by pitching into an era of instant messages and high-speed, online transmissions, Clemens has managed to outlast his nickname. When he started his run, rockets were the fastest thing around. Now the moniker seems as quaint and outdated as Walter "Big Train" Johnson. In a few years, maybe a hot young flame-thrower will be nicknamed "Broadband,"and pick up the mantle passed from Johnson to Feller to Ryan to Clemens. Until then, we’ll have to make due with the Rocket Man a while longer.

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