Clemens From The School Of Deny-Deny-Deny And Other Stories

• Clemens's Unraveling Life:

    Roger Clemens didn't approach the level of Kobe Bryant in terms of silliness with his press release/public apology, but he did manage to enter the Bill Clinton level of ambiguity while acknowledging "mistakes" in his personal life. When he was on Mike and Mike in the Morning last week, Peter Gammons said something very insightful about Clemens as he dismissed the idea of Clemens receiving bad advice and postulated that Clemens just doesn't listen to anyone who gives him what would likely be good advice. The best advice regarding everything that's been revealed in the past six months would have been to keep his mouth shut; but Clemens's behavior, from his steadfast denials to the allegations in the Mitchell Report; to the interview with Mike Wallace; to the appearance in front of congress; to this latest press conference indicate someone who is trying to take his gunslinger approach from it's appropriate place on the field and transferring it to other venues and it's not even coming close to working.

•  Red Sox 7-Rays 3:

    This doesn't look like a similar type of dominant, inevitable roll to the playoffs for the Red Sox as it was last season, but more of a methodical chopping away at their opponents. With two young, inexperienced starting pitchers in Jon Lester and Clay Buchholz and David Ortiz still trying to bust out, there's less of an aura about the team; but that can be a positive thing. Young players like Lester, Buchholz and Jacoby Ellsbury are probably better off in the playoffs having had that experience if the regular season wasn't a cakewalk. They've become the obvious class of the division. Unless he's playing with some undisclosed injury, Ortiz is going to start hitting eventually.

• Yankees Demote Ian Kennedy:

    It's likely more pronounced since I'm in New York and hear and see it first hand, but there's an inherent attempt to portray the Yankees as "smarter" than other teams, but the principles that have been in place for all of baseball history seem to trump any kind of new discoveries or different strategies in procuring and developing players. The number of young pitchers who arrive in the major leagues and automatically have grand success is quite small. For every Dwight Gooden there are numerous young pitchers who arrive amid great fanfare and cannot handle the big leagues immediately. Sometimes they make it to the majors, fail, go back to the minors and come back to be successful big leaguers; other times they make a big splash, receive great press and accolades, and suddenly run into reality and have to relearn their craft in a less pressurized atmosphere. Simply because Ian Kennedy has been sent to the minors and was awful over the first month of the season doesn't mean his career isn't going to be a successful one. He does need to refine his mental approach in the minor leagues and regain his confidence, which must be shot at this point; there must also be a level of embarrassment that he has to overcome.
    In regards to the self-aggrandizing atmosphere around the Yankees, we hear it again and again with their "finds". Guys like Brian Bruney, Edwar Ramirez and now Chad Moeller are considered to be stunning discoveries of the Yankees brilliant talent evaluators, but Bruney, despite his ability, has done little since joining the team; Ramirez is a back of the bullpen journeyman; and Moeller is a catcher who is a defensive specialist who happened to have a hot streak at the plate and benefited from Jorge Posada's injury. By season's end, his numbers at the plate will be back to his career norms, and that ain't good. Occasionally a star can be uncovered when scouring the bargain bins, but it's not as prevalent as Yankees apologists try to portray it. (Mets apologists have done the same thing with Angel Pagan and Endy Chavez suggesting that the team would be better off with those players in left field over Moises Alou; other teams do it as well and it ignores reality and history.)

     Speaking of Kennedy, here's a quote from my book:

    Ian Kennedy is the third of the Yankees young starters and the one that the team was most willing to trade in deals for a veteran starter the likes of Santana or Haren. I don't think Kennedy is as good as the other two starters and is the most likely to either not make the team out of spring training, or make the team, get pounded and sent back down. He looks to be a finesse pitcher who has been built up by the Yankee propaganda machine and apparently other organizations feel the same way with their reluctance to take him as the centerpiece of any deal for one of their veteran starters.

     Please check out and purchase the book----The Prince Of New York's 2008 Baseball Guide also available on Amazon.com and BN.com.