Roger Clemens's agent Randy Hendricks said Boston "made the most sense in terms of best team", but the TCM chose to return to Houston.
Thinking of Clemens's uniform number, the Red Sox offered a one-year deal of $21,000,021. The Astros did the same thing, pitching a total of $22,000,022.
Gordon Edes has a little more in his mailbag, including Red Sox chairman Tom Werner's statement to the Globe's Nick Cafardo: "I thought we had him."
9 comments:
do you think we should have offered him more? i mean, from the get-go obviously. should we have just cranked it up to 25m or something?
honestly, I don't. I think despite what he says about it all being about winning, Clemens just chose the Astros because they were closest to his home. No ammount of money would have drawn him away.
It really is kindof infuriating, since Boston made all these self-sacrificing, fantastic offers after the Astros dumped him, and then they come back into the running late, after everyone else has made their offer, and just snatch him out of our fingers. -mulceber
more? no. the sox offer was high enough.
... though if they had gone higher, whatever -- it was a one time deal and it's not my dough.
but while i know he would likely help, i really didn't want him. ... is that rational? maybe, maybe not. but it's me.
i'm torn too. it's like, it would have been so awesome on so many levels had he come to boston, but i feel like there would have been some kind of lurking presence of 'omg they totally overpaid him' in the collective baseball-watching subconscious that would have added alot of pressure on him to do well. pressure on all of us really.
why didn't you want him?
why didn't you want him?
he is a loathsome creature.
"awesome on so many levels"
Seriously, what are all you pro-Clemens people talking about? I guess I have to assume these are people that missed the 80s and 90s and only know him as "some guy who happens to be a really good pitcher," and not the slimebag I know him to be.
That guy rubbed it in OUR faces every time he kissed/fondled that Babe Ruth monument before pitching games for the yanks. After this final snub, I'm hoping even the people who wanted him back come around so we can all just hate him eternally, together, as one.
Oh, and beating him in game 7 of this year's WS would be nice, too.
"That guy rubbed it in OUR faces every time he kissed/fondled that Babe Ruth monument before pitching games for the yanks. After this final snub, I'm hoping even the people who wanted him back come around so we can all just hate him eternally, together, as one."
You have to understand, ballplayers don't really view the game the way the fans do. The rivalry isn't as intense for them, nor is their enmity towards certain players such as Ruth. To them, he is nothing more than a great player.
"Oh, and beating him in game 7 of this year's WS would be nice, too."
After the way he turned us down? Oh hell yeah!
I still can't help think about what might have been; Clemens, Schilling and Beckett all in the same rotation, and with Wells in there to boot.
They may not view it the way we do, but they know very well how we feel. And we're the ones that make their careers possible. As you recall, Babe Ruth was a bit of a sore spot for us Sox fans pre-04. He knew exactly what he was doing. I mean, I was pissed enough at him for going to the yanks, the Ruth thing was something a little extra he did to rub our faces in it.
Somehow I can't see a major league ballplayer caring what we think one way or another. The thought that they would pay homage to the Babe just to spite us is paranoid at best. -Mulceber
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