Clemens Hints at Return??????

[Brando2101]

In that commercial for HEB Roger tells Koby to hurry and get to the big leagues so he can retire. Is he trying to imply he's coming back for a chance to see his son fielding hits from 3rd base next September? Obviously a HEB commercial is hardly a contract but at least it's a good sign.

[DaDakota]

My guess is he ain't retiring anymore.....my guess is we got him for a couple more years now.

DD

[Svpernaut]

My guess is he ain't retiring anymore.....my guess is we got him for a couple more years now.

DD

Yup, he loves the game and as long as he's doing well he'll play. If we win the series this year I bet her retires though, and he should.

[Brando2101]

did anyone catch the Roger and Andy commerical? it was halarious

[geeimsobored]

very much so...

and rather accurate, that makeup crew around carr is pretty much equivalent to his offensive line.

[Creepy Crawl]

very much so...

and rather accurate, that makeup crew around carr is pretty much equivalent to his offensive line.
:D

No doubt !

[tigermission1]

Clemens will definitely be back, you can count on it.

[Rocket Fan]

how should i phrase this..


when he was talking about retiring.. were there any major reasons besides his mom? she seemed like the main reason he wanted to retire..

[leehoang]

He makes so much money to do what he loves and only pitches like 40+ games a year... I think, something like that.

[geeimsobored]

He'll be back. He's already on record as saying that this was the most fun team and season he's ever had. He'll milk us for some money but he'll be back.

[xiki]

Why wouldn't/shouldn't he (re)retire after winning a Ring in a few weeks?

[No Worries]

ERA 1.87

Clemens aint ready. I bet he wants to play with his son in a MLB game.

[No Worries]

Why wouldn't/shouldn't he (re)retire after winning a Ring in a few weeks?
Cuz he has already got like 6 of them from when he was a Yank. He keeps playing because of the home town fans and because he can without embarassing himself. Oh, and I suspect he does not mind making an extra $18 million.

[bottlerocket]

Rocket cannot cook burgers on the grill. You aren't suppose the mash the meat on the grill. That will dry out your burger.

[chuichuitrain]

Rocket cannot cook burgers on the grill. You aren't suppose the mash the meat on the grill. That will dry out your burger.

hahaha

[tigermission1]

Rocket cannot cook burgers on the grill. You aren't suppose the mash the meat on the grill. That will dry out your burger.

LOL! Yah I noticed that in his commercials (what is it, HEB?)

[JunkyardDwg]

how should i phrase this..


when he was talking about retiring.. were there any major reasons besides his mom? she seemed like the main reason he wanted to retire..

That and to be able to spend time w/ his family. But then it was his family that helped convince him to come back. I would hope that even if the Astros win this year he would come back. Because if he did and we could add another bat in the offseason, we'd have another great ride to enjoy.

[MONON]

Rocket cannot cook burgers on the grill. You aren't suppose the mash the meat on the grill. That will dry out your burger.


That's the only thing he can't do!

[desihooper]

Who cares about burgers?!? Let's just hope he can BBQ a Cardinal or nine.

[Harrisment]

Reading this article, especially towards the end, I get the feeling this will probably be his last season.
-------------------------------------------------


http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/sports/3397482



Oct. 15, 2005, 1:56AM

Rocket simply is the greatest
By JOHN P. LOPEZ
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle


Mama called and Roger Clemens had to listen — that's just how Houston boys are brought up.

Mama was the city he called home. And Mama was the woman whose warm hug and spitfire inspiration helped carry Clemens to places he never imagined.

It was because of a mother who inspired him, a family that encouraged him and a friend named Andy Pettitte who prodded him that Clemens decided to pull on the hometown jersey two years ago.

The game was talking to Clemens, too. It was chattering in his ear and stoking his competitive fire.

Baseball told him, like Debbie Clemens told her husband and Bess Booher-Clemens told her son, it was not yet time. There was still more to do. There were goals that were important in this game — as much for baseball as for him.

And there was a circle to close. He had won at Boston, Toronto and New York. He had won his 300th game in his 20th season. He had won the championships that for years eluded him.

He had done just about everything there was to do and walked off a steamy Miami ballfield on Oct. 24, 2003, thinking those flashes popping in his face would be the lasting memory of a sweet goodbye.

But he hadn't done what he always dreamed about as a kid, what his family always wanted and what could finally be the sweet goodbye for him, his home, his family, the Astros. Everything he ever loved.

"I didn't want to come home to wave and tip my cap and just be there," Clemens said. "Those were my concerns. Do I want to go out and run these laps on those back fields in Kissimmee (in spring training)? Can I be a power pitcher still? Will my body hold up?

"I thought with Roy (Oswalt), Andy and I, we had a better chance. I wasn't coming home to a sub-.500 team. My focus about coming home was, I wanted to come home and play and do something that mattered."

Today, the circle is sweetly closing.

When Clemens takes the hill today in a game that could carry the Astros halfway to their first National League championship and World Series berth, he takes it as the greatest sports figure this team and this city has known.

"The guy is a gift from God," teammate and Houston icon Jeff Bagwell said. "To be able to get a Cy Young at 42 years old, to have an ERA under two at 43 years old, that's mind-boggling. It's ridiculous, really."

Something else has happened in Clemens' two seasons in Houston, each of which have been unprecedented in the organization's history and spectacular for Clemens.

When he walked off that field in Miami two years ago, Clemens undoubtedly was in the conversation of greatest pitcher of all time. Now, that conversation is over.

There will always be numbers and eras to compare. The Dead Ball era versus the Live Ball era. Ballparks then versus ballparks now. Advances in technology, or hindrances for lack of it.

Any such arguments are a sabermetrician's dream. Numbers are made for crunching into convenient little piles of evidence that this guy or that guy is better, or worse.

'The ultimate warrior'
It's numbers, sure, that put Clemens among the likes of Walter Johnson and Christy Mathewson. Numbers like his 341 wins, seven Cy Young awards and a career ERA of 3.12 over a 22-year career, which is 1.23 runs lower than the league average over the span of his career.

But it's more. It's changing the way a club looks at itself and how others look at it. It's doing the seemingly impossible, leading the league in ERA (1.87) at age 43 and striking out 403 batters the past two years.

It's knowing the Astros were shut out in nine of Clemens' starts this season and squandered at least a dozen more chances to win for him over the past two years.

It is moments and drama like Game 4 of the NLDS, when Clemens pitched three innings of relief, his first relief appearance since 1984, in the clinching 18-inning game. It is etching his name on another plaque for Cooperstown.

"The example of what Roger is, is Game 4," said Astros president Tal Smith, who has worked in Major League Baseball for nearly 50 years. "What he did was epic. He showed that he's not just the ultimate pitcher, he's the ultimate warrior."

Hamstrings tell the tale
Clemens avoids most of the best-ever talk, but acknowledges that he would have missed something had the decision not been made to come back first in 2004 and again this season.

"I'm glad being home hasn't been just about me," he said. "It's my teammates and what they've done. They've made it fun for me. They don't miss a chance to give me some havoc and get on me about my age, but it makes you feel like you fit right in and I want those guys to feel the same way.

"Individual-wise, I think it's awesome to be mentioned with these guys. Being ranked one or 10, to me, it's pretty amazing just being in there."

And these could be the days a sweet goodbye really would be the last one.

In a news conference Friday, Clemens was asked, as always, about plans beyond this Astros' playoff run. As always, he couldn't say.

But there are moments Clemens looks back at everything that has happened this year, notably his mother's death, and hears the game talking to him, again.

This has been a tough year physically as well. In his hotel room in Atlanta the night before his Division Series start last week, both of Clemens' hamstrings began tightening from soreness.

"I've got guys getting the laundry bag out of my closet to go down and keep filling it with ice," Clemens said. "There's no way I should be icing down the night before I pitch.

"I try to stay as young as I can around these guys. But when you're sitting on ice bags, both hamstrings, you're getting close (to the end)."

End of discussion
Messages are being sent at Clemens from every direction.

"There's a big part of my heart that's missing now with my mother gone," Clemens said. "I knew I pitched for her, but I didn't realize how much I did that."

Earlier, away from the media lights, Clemens seemed more reflective and resigned to this being a sweet and final goodbye, especially if the Astros advance to the World Series.

"Factor in everything that went on with my mom and my family and I have a whole different outlook," he said. "I'm still programmed to do what I do, but ... I stand out there and I see her face. It doesn't diminish my fire. I'm trying to not let it do that.

"But some days, when you lose a game, it doesn't mean as much to me anymore for some reason."

Maybe he will surprise us, again. Maybe there will be another season, more marvels and another Astros run. Maybe Mama will call, again.

The only certainty is coming home to end his career ended the discussion. The greatest of all time.

[Fegwu]

Three words.....

Bradley David Ausmus.

[Major]

I think if we win a World Series, both Clemens and Bagwell are done. If not, Clemens come back - Bagwell, too, if he's healthy enough to throw.

[DaDakota]

I think if we win a World Series, both Clemens and Bagwell are done. If not, Clemens come back - Bagwell, too, if he's healthy enough to throw.

Ditto !

[arkoe]

'Charged' Clemens to start Game 3 (http://houston.astros.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/news/article.jsp?ymd=20051014&content_id=1249912&vkey=news_hou&fext=.jsp&c_id=hou)

Rocket continues to mourn the loss of his mother
By Barry M. Bloom / MLB.com

HOUSTON -- When it comes to this time of year, the question always has to be asked: At 43-years-old now, how much time does the venerable Roger Clemens have left?

He'll be on the mound for the Astros on Saturday against the Cardinals' Matt Morris in a Game 3 National League Championship Series battle of right-handers at Minute Maid Park. And just as it has been since he first announced his retirement in 2003, his last year with the Yankees, every game and every pitch in the postseason has the potential of being The Rocket's last.

"Things have changed for me over the last couple of weeks," said Clemens, who finished his 21st big-league season with 341 wins, ninth on the all-time list and only one behind Tim Keefe, a 19th century right-hander. "There's a big part of my heart missing now with my mother [gone], but that's just the way it is. I knew that I pitched for her, but I didn't realize how much I did."

Clemens' mother, Bess, died on Sept. 15 from complications of emphysema. He started that night at home and defeated the Marlins, but the remainder of the season has been a quagmire of Clemens dealing with his emotions, plus a strained left hamstring, which he said during Friday's workout is fine now, but had been "frustrating" and "disappointing."

"That's why I start getting upset, because I do the work and try and keep up with the Joneses," said Clemens, who is still obviously mourning the loss of his mom. "You have to have pride in what you do, or you wouldn't be doing it."

Still, Clemens wouldn't answer the question. If something has changed inside him, does that diminish the possibility of him returning next season for his third go-around with the Astros? After he left the Yankees and pitched what seemed like his final game in the 2003 World Series against the Marlins, Clemens said he was 99 percent sure he wasn't coming back. He did come back, following friend and teammate Andy Pettitte to Houston as a free agent.

"I'm not going to address that," he said. "I've been trying to shut it down for two years and I still can't answer that now. I'm glad I left that percentage point open."

Clemens said he still gets a charge out of the big events -- like pitching the last three innings in relief this past Sunday as the Astros ousted the Braves from the NL Division Series for the second consecutive season, this time in 18 innings on Chris Burke's walk-off home run.

It was Clemens' between-starts throw day coming after a blowout, 7-1, loss at Atlanta in Game 2 of that series. And Astros manager Phil Garner surmised that Clemens would have kept going that afternoon as long as he was needed.

"He never ceases to amaze me," Garner said on Friday. "And I don't say that jokingly. I say that in all sincerity. The look I saw on his face when he came off after both of the last two innings he pitched was total resolve. It didn't matter how long it was going to take, he was going to do what it took. I don't think I could've gotten the ball out of his hand anyway. It was his game."

Clemens cites games like that as the reason he continues to pitch.

"Those memories are enough," he said. "Worth the decision for me to get up off my couch and do this."

But in the next breath, Clemens said he can't explain the change of feeling in his gut since his mother died. She was there every step of the way two years ago, when Clemens ultimately tossed his 300th career win and 4,000th strikeout against the Cardinals at Yankee Stadium.

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Last offseason, he explained that his only reason for not returning in 2005 was the fact that he wanted his mother to be present when he's inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. That will happen as swiftly as Clemens cuts the heart of the plate with a fastball, five years after he plays his last game.

But Clemens returned this season to record a 13-8 mark with 185 strikeouts and a Major League-leading 1.87 ERA. He now has 4,502 whiffs, second on the all-time list behind Nolan Ryan's seemingly unapproachable 5,714.

His ERA was the lowest to lead the NL since Greg Maddux -- then with the Braves, who had a 1.65 mark in 1995 -- and the lowest to lead either league since Pedro Martinez, then with Boston, who led the American League and the Majors with a 1.74 ERA in 2000.

Clemens has suffered through hamstring strains in both legs, plus groin and back injuries this season. But he can overcome the physical. It's the mental he seems more concerned about.

"Make no mistake about it," Clemens said. "Some of my will is gone, but not all of it. You just look at things differently. Every time I hear the anthem I think about her. I think about seeing her face for the last time and that's where I'm trying to draw my strength from. I owe that to my teammates. I still recognize and understand that the most important thing is to go out there and win. But you know, some things have changed for me now."

Barry M. Bloom is a national reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.