from Newsday

October 30, 2001

To step into the batter's box against Roger Clemens is to take on a direct challenge. There is no trickery involved. Even at 39, Clemens is going to try to overpower you.

To step into a conversation with the Yankees' starter tonight in Game 3 of the World Series is a considerably different challenge. Ask him about his prior team, the Blue Jays, and he'll take an uncharted turnoff into an anecdote about his four sons. Bring up the subject of his alma mater, the University of Texas, and you'll wind up hearing about his sports memorabilia collection.

Ask him about a past matchup with Boston ace Pedro Martinez, and he'll take you across the country for free, somehow steering the conversation toward the San Francisco Giants' two-year-old stadium, Pac Bell Park. Shades of Casey Stengel, and Stengelese.

"You've got to follow him real closely, and sometimes, you've got to later on figure out what he means," Yankees pitching coach Mel Stottlemyre said with a smile. "He's got some different expressions for different things. He can lose you very easily."

One of the greatest pitchers in baseball history is also one of the more interesting talkers of his time, and the two are intertwined when it comes to his popularity with his teammates. When Clemens received widespread criticism for his behavior - his bat-throwing incident with Mike Piazza in last year's World Series, for example - his blind loyalists in the media tried to explain it away by saying that most reporters are out to get him, because he is uncooperative and uncommunicative.

The truth, however, is that Clemens is quite cooperative and that he is extra-communicative. He may not answer a question in the most direct manner, but he'll usually offer a lengthy response, and somewhere in there is both the essence of a thought and one or more of his patented phrases.

During yesterday's news conference at Yankee Stadium, for example, a reporter asked Clemens about his relationship with Diamondbacks starter Curt Schilling. He used 525 words to answer that - more than half the length of this story - and, like a politician giving his stump speech, hit on some recurring themes: 1) He takes his job seriously because there are people counting on him, and yet he knows how to have fun; 2) He keeps data on opposing hitters; 3) He appreciates Stottlemyre, and 4) He's always trying to get better.

"My answers to the media are always not very informing because they don't ask me the right questions," Clemens told the New York Times Magazine earlier this year. "They ask me, 'How'd you feel tonight? Well, I say, I struck out 15, how do you think I felt?"'

In reality, he is never so impolite. And unlike any of his teammates, he doesn't make himself over for the public. He speaks the same way in a closed clubhouse and in the heat of a game that he does when conducting a formal interview or speaking casually to a reporter.

Earlier this season, Clemens gave out T-shirts to all of his teammates. On the front, they read "Rocket Man" and displayed a cartoon likeness of the pitcher. The back was littered with folksy phrases and terms, mostly originated by the pitcher.

"Getyourmindright," an expression for straightening out one's head, is perhaps the best known.

That so many teammates gladly wear the shirts reflects Clemens' acceptance by the Yankees, a sentiment that took over a year and came only when he started pitching up to his reputation.

Clemens began his career in Boston more humble and quiet, according to Bill Fischer, the Red Sox's pitching coach from 1985-91. "At first, he was unsure of himself," Fischer said. "After '86 [when he was the MVP and Cy Young Award winner], he wasn't unsure of himself. Had that arm operation at the end of '85, and nobody knew how he was going to come back.

"From that point on, he's been his own man."

While Fischer insisted that he never had trouble understanding Clemens, his speech patterns became an unwelcome part of his legend. For a while, The Boston Herald ran his post-start comments word for word, including every use of "you know" and "again," which is one of his favorites words.

When he arrived in New York for the 1999 season, acquired in the controversial deal with Toronto for David Wells and two other players, Clemens mostly kept to himself. His only close friend on the team was fellow starter David Cone. He put up mediocre numbers - a 14-10 record and 4.60 ERA - and he spent time on the disabled list with a hamstring injury.

Though he picked up the wins in the clinching game of both the Division Series and World Series, his teammates considered him only their fourth-best starter, and his odd way of saying things was regarded by some as annoying and difficult to comprehend.

By hitting Piazza in the head in July, 2000, and then throwing the bat at him in October, Clemens forced his teammates to defend the indefensible, and he also turned them into hypocrites - many of them had criticized Clemens for similar actions while he was with the Blue Jays.

But he pitched superbly in the second half of 2000, and by doing so, he worked his way into the team's fabric. Clemens' success made it easier for them to accept his antics, even be inspired by them.

After his work this season, which could get him his sixth Cy Young Award, he is an unquestioned leader in the clubhouse. His unusual words and phrases have become part of who he is - someone who so fires up his teammates that they seem to raise their level of play when he pitches.

"I've kind of grown to hear his expressions," Stottlemyre said. "Now, 99 percent of them, I probably know what they mean. He speaks a little different language. He's entitled to do that."

Again - Adverb. Used to reiterate a point, even if, sometimes, that point has not yet been made.
Flip - Verb. To hit a home run without really connecting solidly on it.
Getyourmindright - Verb. To put oneself in a good mental state.
Middle-high, Middle-low, Middle-middle - Adjectives. A specific location for which a pitch was intended. The "Middle" before the hypen is the location within the width of the plate. The "high," "low" and "middle" after the hyphen are the heights within the strike zone.
Mr. Split - Noun. The formal name for Clemens' split-fingered fastball.