Houston Rocket

A very good question, posed by KB, about Roger Clemens unretiring and going to the Houston Astros: What happens to the Humvee his Yankees teammates bought him as a going–away gift? Gothamist knows that a Houston radio station was trying to get him another late last year, but isn't it in bad taste, to the guys he played with for a couple years, to keep the car as a retirement gift when he's not retiring? Isn't the etiquette, if a wedding/engagement is called off, to return the gifts?

The Post calls him a turncoat AND an "Asstro." Yankee fans are angry. The embarrassment continues on for George Steinbrenner.

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By Jen Chung on January 13, 2004 11:33 AM

Comments [rss]

alli

Houston loves our faithful "Andy" & "Roger". Thanks for being the good guys and showing that it is not always about the money. New York couldn't buy these guys. They loved us enough to come home. HOUSTON LOVES YOU ANDY & ROGER!!!!!

P.S. Congrats on the 7th CY Yound Award Rog!

P.P.S. You deserve the $18 Million (record setting) salary that you are getting Roger!

Jay Smooth

Oh please! Yankee fans have noone to be mad at but their own fearless leader Steinbrenner. If he hadn't basically chased Pettite out of town, Clemens wouldn't have suddenly had his best friend playing in his hometown, and Clemens most likely would not have made this move. In fact, he may well have returned to the Yankees later in the season.

The Yankee dynasty is over now, and George's failure to make re-signing Pettite a priority will be remembered as the beginning of the end. Mark my words!

Greg

The Hummer was for his 300th win, not a going-away present. Shit. Yankees rape and pillage lesser teams all the time, looks like karma's biting big george in the ass. Go Astros.

GW

Howard

We're justifiably ticked off that Clemens didn't give the Yankees a chance to change his mind. On the other hand, Steinbrenner is impossible to work for so can anyone blame Pettit and Clemens for wanting to leave NY and play baseball for great money in the place they eventually plan to retire to?

Athletes have to get while the getting's good so I say make as much $ as fast as you can wherever you can.

U-nanimous

When Clemens made his brief stop in Toronto in the mid-nineties, he pitched great, and was known as a jerk and a notorious cheapskate. Forget about returning the Humvee, the guy would pinch a penny until it screamed.

michael

some insider trading from the team that plays in a stadium formerly known as enron field. huh. clemens and pettite are still no match for wood and prior in the NL central.

janelle

yankees fans should agonize less about clemens changing his mind about retirement and signing with another team, and more about the fact that he left new york for a baking-hot landlocked (a bayou is more ditch than river) smoggy sprawly swampland laced with spaghetti-string freeways... then again, maybe he just wanted in on that plethora of excellent mexican food

Mase

ala Jack, it would be somewhat poetic justice if Clemens was hit by Houston's new light rail train making an illegal left turn in front of it (like all the other morons who have been hit by the train).

edith

Had the US team made the Olympics, I think he would have stayed retired.

Personally, I'm looking forward to seeing him hit on a regular basis. Watch your head, Rocket.

evan

You know, this really doesn't upset me that much. I never really thought of Clemens as a genuine Yankee; he was always a Red Sock in my mind. Just like Wade Boggs. I'm not trying to say Clemens is a crap pitcher or anything, just that this doesn't hurt at all compared to Pettitte.

larrycvm

My year-long pro-Texas campaign is working! Go west, New Yorkers! Texas is the promised land! Don't get left behind!

Jen

Anthony, re: the other Yankees rewarding Clemens for his pitching work, I think, had they known he was hightailing it to Houston, they would have just given him a bottle of wine (nice wine, though) versus a Humvee.

Chris

Houston does not have Clemens for just a year. According to ESPN -

"Clemens has agreed to a 10-year personal services contract with Houston."

Awkward phrasing aside, it means he will not be returning to Yankee events on old timer days or during spring training. So much for Yankee loyalty. People in Boston call him the Texas Con Man. Hard to disagree.

tien

ahh, now the yankee fans feel how it's like to lose a player to another team. wait, two players to the same team. suckers.

same disclaimer as anthony's.

Anthony

Sure Yankees fans are right to be upset by this, but Clemens deserves his going-away present, since he did technically go away from the Yanks.

They were rewarding him for his great pitching work (but not for that incident with Mike Piazza).

It sucks, but that's life.

(Disclaimer: Anthony is a lifetime Mets fan.)

Kristen

hehe...

Mase

down here in Houston (and, in fact, all of Texas), the burnt orange color is very popular among University of Texas graduates (as it is the team's color). Personally, I wish Clemens had not only returned the Hummer, but said he will be driving a Cooper Mini or VW Beetle instead. C'est la vie.

Matt

"burnt orange"? thats not a gift

Jim

Clemens said in his press conference yesterday he's keeping the burnt orange Hummer he got from the Yankees, and a dealer in Houston is getting his wife one in white.