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Clemens putting Cooperstown on hold
By Jerry Crasnick
ESPN Insider
COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. -- Roger Clemens passed through Cooperstown for a visit during the All-Star break in 1999, when his son Koby was playing in a youth baseball tournament in town. Koby was 12 years old, and Roger, soon to be 37, was already wowing the baseball establishment with his longevity.
It had been more than two years since Dan Duquette's infamous "twilight of his career" quote -- a comment that has tormented Duquette far more than Clemens -- and the Rocket Man was fresh off back-to-back, 20-win seasons in Toronto.
Clemens had already established his Hall of Fame credentials. The only question was how long he could keep dominating hitters and reach the next level at Cooperstown -- the one that separates players who make it from those with the luminescent glow that turns heads and evokes whispers when they walk into a room.
The answer: He'll keep pitching for as long as he darn well pleases.
Six summers after touring the Hall and checking out the personal items he donated from two 20-strikeout performances, Clemens steadfastly resists becoming a museum piece in his own right. At an age when lots of guys are cultivating beer guts and contemplating regularly scheduled prostate exams, he's still destroying the morale of younger men coast to coast -- and prompting speculation that he'll hang around long enough to one day play alongside Koby, a recent Houston draft pick.
Each productive day at the ball park adds to an illustrious résumé. Clemens ranks ninth in major-league history with 338 wins, and needs six more to pass Tim Keefe and move into eighth place on the all-time list. He's reached the point where the men ahead of him are recognizable only through black-and-white photos. Cy Young. Walter Johnson. Pete Alexander. Christy Mathewson, Pud Galvin. Kid Nichols. Warren Spahn, who won 363 games and died two years ago at 82, is the closest that Clemens has to a contemporary on the list.
The Rocket ranks second all-time in strikeouts with 4,452, trailing only the uncatchable Nolan Ryan, and shows no sign of diminished skills. His .750 winning percentage (78-26) ties him with Pedro Martinez for the best in baseball since 2001.
Today Clemens celebrates his 43rd birthday, and who better to assess his legacy than the men he will ultimately join for an annual July weekend of golf, dinners and wall-to-wall autograph sessions in upstate New York?
ESPN Insider trolled the lobby of the Otesaga Hotel during induction weekend and asked several Hall of Famers for their take on the Rocket at 43. Baseball greats aren't easily impressed as a rule, but they are downright animated when the subject turns to Clemens. Although no one wants to touch the "greatest pitcher ever" debate, several Hall members conceded that Clemens definitely belongs in the conversation.
Just don't compare him with anyone who hurled during the Roosevelt administration. As in Teddy.
"All we're doing is batting hot air when we try to compare the guys we see with the guys we read about," said Don Sutton, a member of the 300-win club. "There's no foundation for the comparison."
But Sutton doesn't hesitate to put Clemens on the list with Tom Seaver, Steve Carlton, Bob Gibson and Sandy Koufax as an "A" list Hall of Fame pitcher of more recent vintage.
"There's a ledge of greatness for guys like that, and he's earned the right to be in that group," Sutton said.
At the risk of stating the obvious, Clemens' success is the result of a marriage of talent and uncommon desire. In his book, "The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty," Buster Olney writes of Clemens' obsessive preparation and unwillingness to yield an inch on the mound. Biting down on his mouth guard and sporting a two-day growth, Clemens is a classic throwback in the Nolan Ryan mold.
"It's that Texas spirit, I guess," said Gaylord Perry. "You can see it in the pride they have and the way they compete."
Clemens is a different pitcher from the kid who won the first of his seven Cy Young Awards in 1986. Dennis Eckersley spent two weeks as Clemens' teammate in Boston before leaving for the Cubs in May 1984 in a trade for Bill Buckner. But he saw more than enough to understand what makes Clemens tick.
"He's always been aggressive," Eckersley said. "He'll knock you down in a heartbeat, even today. And physically, he's different from some other great pitchers. Jim Palmer had the body type that everybody thought you were supposed to have, right? But Roger showed you need that stocky lower side. Big legs. Maybe that's what got him so far. Big legs and that split finger."
Al Kaline agrees that Clemens' strong, Seaveresque lower half has taken considerable strain off his arm and helped him last more than two decades.
"You could see the tremendous drive he had with his legs," Kaline said. "That's really important, particularly for someone who's going to be pitching for a long time, to have that good, strong leg base."
With each year that passes, another hitter or two with first-hand experience against Clemens makes it to Cooperstown. Two recent inductees, Paul Molitor and Dave Winfield, both hit a career .308 against Clemens. According to Retrosheet's Dave Smith, Winfield had three homers in 65 at-bats and a .538 slugging percentage against the Rocket. Molitor hit only one homer in 107 at-bats against Clemens and had a .411 slugging percentage.
As a hitter who liked to stand close to the plate, Molitor knew he was tempting fate against a pitcher with Clemens' compe ive streak.
"More times than not, as the leadoff man, I would see a pitch from Roger that would move my feet in my first at-bat," Molitor said. "But I enjoyed that. I think it was out of respect that he did that, to let me know, 'Hey, the game's on.' "
As Clemens turns 43, he has the luxury of being immune from the same grind that his teammates endure. The Astros, in an effort to lure Clemens from retirement last season, let him carve out a schedule that allows him to miss entire series on the road when he's not pitching. That special treatment -- as well as Clemens' $18 million annual salary -- evokes a sense of wistfulness in former Yankee great Whitey Ford, who never earned more than $78,000 in a season.
But no one would dare accuse Clemens of failing to earn his money or abusing his perks. When he's not with the club, it's usually because he is traveling to watch his four sons play in tournaments. And it's quite common, when Clemens is in Houston and the Astros are away, for team employees to look out their office windows at Minute Maid Park and see the Rocket running sprints or throwing off the bullpen mound early in the morning.
"That goes to show you he has this appe e for success," Eckersley said. "How could you want something so badly after doing as many things as he's done? It's incredible. Beyond all the physical stuff, that in itself sets him apart."
In his early years Clemens was pure power, but he has long since made the transformation from natural talent to pitcher supreme. He added the splitter, learned to sink the ball, and continued to improve his control. Ever the perfectionist, he's been able to stay relevant by constantly adding to his repertoire, honing it and making adjustments.
"First of all, he does have overwhelming ability, but he continues to refine that," Sutton said. "And now everything is not a flat-out effort. He's not snapping the strings of his jock with every pitch. He's learned how to pace and take what the hitter will give him, and then to reach back.
"I love watching him pitch, and I've seen the transition. I pitched against him in '86. It's a less complicated delivery now. He's smoothed it out. He's learned applied effort and applied mechanics rather than squeezing the blood out of the ball and throwing it as hard as you can with maximum effort every time. He's mastered his craft."
Every victory and strikeout merely add to the Hall of Fame portfolio. The game's elite are waiting to welcome Roger Clemens. But judging from the way he's pitching, it might be a while before he joins the club.
Jerry Crasnick covers baseball for ESPN Insider. His book "License To Deal" has been published by Rodale. Click here to order a copy. Jerry can be reached via e-mail.
