Originally Posted by Bill Simmons
Blue Jays, OK, but Yankees ...
Now ...
When Clemens ultimately jumped at a $28 million offer to play for the Blue Jays, we were jolted ... but deep down, we understood. Sometimes you just have to move on.
So what happened? Why the sudden change of heart? Why did the Rocket practically become the modern-day Sirhan Sirhan of New England? Five things happened over the ensuing three-year span that turned Boston fans against Clemens for life; if any of them had unfolded differently, the bad blood could have been averted:
1. The Slap in the Face
When Clemens signed with Toronto and held his first press conference with the Blue Jays, he only needed to take one minute out of the afternoon -- just one -- to say something like this:
"I want to say something to the Boston fans who stuck with me over the past 12 years: Thanks for all your support. I'll always remember the time I spent in Boston and I'll always be a Red Sox fan at heart. I hope you guys finally win a Series some day and I'm just sorry I'm not going to be a part of it when it happens. I wish things didn't deteriorate with the front office, but they did, and I didn't fell like they wanted me around anymore. And Toronto makes me feel like they want me, and they did everything they could to make me a Blue Jay. For that, I'm grateful, and I'm happy to be here. But I hope the Boston fans realize that I'll always remember them and I'll miss pitching in front of them at Fenway. Thanks for 12 great years. You guys are truly special."
That's it. Would have taken about 45 seconds. That's all.
Instead, Clemens spent much of the press conference stroking his new Blue Jays hat and showing about as much emotion as Mr. Spock. His only concern seemed to be making everyone aware -- repeatedly, painfully, flagrantly -- of how "excited I am to be a Blue Jay" and "how grateful I am that the Blue Jays have treated me so well." It was like they offered him an extra 50 bucks every time he praised the Jays. The members of the Boston media kept giving him chances to rectify the mistake, repeatedly asking him about his stint in Boston, but Clemens stubbornly stuck to his guns. He was moving forward. He was a Blue Jay. And so he brushed off every question about Boston fans, while we watched in disbelief, our anger mounting. That wasn't just an oversight, it was a hanging curveball right over the plate.
(And when we found out that Toronto had offered him the most money -- about $2 million to $3 million more than the defending champion Yankees -- and yet Clemens kept maintaining that he signed with the Blue Jays because he wanted to win a championship ... well, that made him a liar, too. Let the record show that Toronto finished 24 games under .500 in Clemens' two seasons above the border.)
2. The Kick in the Gonads
Suddenly and mysteriously motivated by the slight from Boston's front office, Clemens embarked on a rigorous conditioning program during the offseason, determined to prove Team Duquette wrong. He arrived for spring training in superb shape for the first time in eons, repeatedly telling reporters that he had never been better prepared to start a season. Of course, that revelation should have prompted questions like, "If you're so motivated this season, why weren't you as motivated from 1993-96 after signing the most lucrative deal in Red Sox history?" and "Will you be training with a feedbag and a vat of chicken wings like you did in '95?" but that's a story for another time. Apparently star athletes aren't obligated to get themselves in shape until they feel slighted.
Anyway, we watched in horror as Clemens rolled off consecutive Cy Young seasons for the Blue Jays. Here were his average stats from '93-'96 in Boston, followed by the '97 and '98 seasons in Toronto:
YR W-L ERA G IP H SO BB
93-96 10-10 3.90 26 186.1 164 204 76
1997 21-7 2.05 34 264.0 204 292 68
1998 20-6 2.65 33 234.2 169 271 88
Put it this way: Watching Clemens lighting it up in Canada was like breaking up with your girlfriend, then watching her hire a personal trainer, shed 15 pounds, spend 10 Gs on a boob job and join the cast of "Baywatch." If that wasn't tough enough to swallow, Clemens thrived against his former team, going 2-0 with a 1.73 ERA in four starts (including a memorable "f-you" start in Fenway in '97, when he glared at the owner's box after leaving the game) and dropping hints in the papers that Mo Vaughn should join him in Canada. Now it was becoming personal, and when the Boston media started hammering him (with longtime Boston Globe hatchet man Will McDonough leading the pack), the tide shifted against Clemens for good. We felt jilted, we felt used and we started rooting against him. Vehemently.
3. The Revelation
As luck would have it, at the exact same time Clemens was sparkling for a sub-.500 team in a foreign country, Boston fans were falling for two new heroes: Pedro Martinez and Nomar Garciaparra. Both of them were blessed with an innate understanding about Boston fans -- what baseball means to us, how we value players who play hard, how we revere players with a sense of The Moment, how we love when our heroes acknowledge us and say things like "The fans were great today" or "Nothing beats playing in Boston in front of these fans." Sounds stupid? It's not. That's Boston. We eat that stuff up.
The double-barreled emergence of Nomar and Pedro (coupled with Clemens being hooked up to the Rejuvenation Machine in Canada) made us realize that the loss of Clemens wasn't as important as we thought. If anything, the new guys were more fun to watch. And since Clemens was a self-serving, greedy jerk who didn't care about us when he played here ... well, this was war.
(If baseball were wrestling, this would be the point where Clemens came into the ring carrying the Canadian flag, shouting epithets about Nomar and Pedro, making unflattering jokes about Boston and forcing everyone to stand for the playing of the Canadian anthem. In other words, all ties had been severed -- he was an official "Bad Guy.")
4. The Ultimate Violation
After two losing seasons in Toronto, a disenchanted Clemens eventually forced a trade to the Yankees in the spring of '99, with help from an illegal "You can ask for a trade two years into this deal if you're not happy" handshake clause from his contract that drew the ire of the commissioner's office. It wasn't bad enough that the winningest pitcher in Red Sox history wanted to play in New York -- he actually cheated to get there. Even the staunchest Clemens sympathizers in New England couldn't defend him anymore. He had crossed over to the dark side. He was Darth Vader with a Texas accent. He was the enemy.
(By the way, if you're keeping track, Clemens was officially a quitter, a cheater, a fibber and a traitor at this point).
5. The Final Straw
During the All-Star Game ceremonies at Fenway that same summer, Clemens took part in the "Greatest Players of the 20th Century" introductions, where every living legend wore the cap of the team with whom they were most prominently associated. Of course, Clemens wore a Yankees hat because he had been playing in New York for a whopping three months. Here was his last chance -- I mean, ever -- to salvage his ties with Boston fans. And he blew it. At this point, we were like Michael Corleone in "Godfather 2" after finding out that Fredo knew Johnny Ola: "Fredo, you're nothing to me now. I don't want to see you. I don't want to know you. If you visit our mother, I want to know a day in advance. You're dead to me."
Or something like that.
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