Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
June 03, 2007
Clemens Injured

Roger Clemens won't start Monday against the White Sox.

Roger Clemens was scratched from Monday's start against the Chicago White Sox because of a fatigued right groin.

As source told FOXSports.com's Ken Rosenthal that Clemens feels he needs another 4-5 days to prepare and is aiming to make his start against the Pirates next weekend.

Clemens first experienced the pain during his last minor league outing, for Triple-A Scranton on Monday. Rather than risk additional injury, he decided to be cautious, the Yankees confirmed during Saturday's game against the Boston Red Sox.

I don't know quite how Rogers Clemens' contract works, but it is prorated to his time in the majors. That makes me wonder if the Yankees and Roger have an out here. At this point, Clemens doesn't help that much, especially when you don't have the relievers to get a team from the sixth to the ninth inning. And Roger may not want to play for an also ran. I wonder if both sides just walk away from the contract and blame an injury? We'll see if he actually just misses one start, or if the injury starts to drag out.


Posted by David Pinto at 09:57 AM | Injuries | TrackBack (0)
Comments

Good point, David.

But if Roger only misses the one start, I'd say it's a case of Roger saying, "I'd much rather debut against the Pirates' offense than the White Sox offense. Yup, I think my groin will feel better vs. crappy Pirates hitters."

There will be a ton of scrutiny on Roger's first start. He'd rather break himself in against a weak lineup, get to 1-0 with a nice ERA, and THEN face some tough AL lineups. (I realize the White Sox lineup has struggled, but it undeniably has some strong hitters).

That sounds amazingly selfish/narcissistic...but this is a guy who holds teams hostage every year in anticipation of his "announcements" and doesn't come to the park when he doesn't play.

I wouldn't put it past him to schedule his first start against a patsy.

Posted by: notsellingjeans at June 3, 2007 03:04 PM

Jeans,

Excpet the White Sox have a poor lineup also.

Posted by: David Pinto at June 3, 2007 03:13 PM

The Yankees aren't quite to also ran status yet and there's nothing that Clemens would like more than to come in and be the savoir of the Yankees. If Clemens doesn't play for the Yankees this year I believe we've seen the last of him. If it's just a one week deal then he'll just pitch the Pittsburg game. If it's something that goes from one week to two weeks to three weeks then at that point it behooves the Yankees to walk away.

At this point it behooves the Yankees to walk away.

Posted by: Jason at June 3, 2007 06:58 PM
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