Obligatory Roger Clemens Post

As Mike Pelfrey struggles in the first inning, the return of Roger Clemens is eminent. He announced it during the Yankee game, from George Steinbrenner's box. Can this guy do anything without drama? In his YES interview shortly after he's talking about things like how some of the Yankees don't have World Series rings yet, about the parade after they win, and about how he's been pushing himself and will push himself hard to return quickly. He says he's going to try for the end of May, or June 1st as his return date. June 1st just happens to be a Friday night game in Fenway Park.

One of these years the wheels are going to come off, and he's just not going to be that good. Note that he's switching back to the American League and this very well could be the year. A lot of the moves George Steinbrenner makes to 'fix' the Yankees on his own don't always work out quite the way a Yankee fan would hope. Could the idea of Roger Clemens being around keep Cashman from signing someone else around the trade deadline that could help them more?

On a clubhouse cohesion note, Clemens will supposedly be afforded the same travel schedule he enjoyed in Houston. There is often talk of the drawbacks of a 24 and 1 clubhouse, but with the Yankees it seems to be a lot of 22 and 1 and 1 and 1. Will him not being present for big road series, or being in Houston for big home games, keep him from really meshing with his teammates? There are a lot of Yankees that weren't around the last time he was, and what kind of example does it set? Does this motivate any free agents the Yankees try to sign in the off season to not only try to get more money out of the Yankees, but other perks as well? Roger Clemens claims his return is all about his new teammates and winning a World Series, but that's probably a lot of public relations bullshit.

Only time can truly tell, but I'm going to predict that Roger goes 4-3 with a 4.52 ERA. I will probably be way off, but predicting he's going to go 8-1 with a 2.3 ERA and win the World Series MVP just isn't as satisfying, and goes against my Optimistic Mets standpoint.