Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Rockin' Roger

So...

Just the other day the New York Daily News reported that our favorite boy of baseball, Roger Clemens, had a decade-long relationship with country music "star" Mindy McCready beginning back when he was pitching for the Boston Red Sox and was 28 years old. She, at the time, was 15 years old.

This got me thinking on a lot of different levels and at the end of it all I just have a feeling that this is not going to come off well for The Rocket.

First, forget the fact that Clemens' lawyer, Rusty Hardin (which HAS to be a made-up name), said that Clemens "flatly denies having had any kind of an inappropriate relationship with her." We're not going to even touch that one. I'm not in the business of deciding what is appropriate or inappropriate. All I know is that my boy Goin used to constantly preach that "15 will get you 20." What I am perplexed about, however, is why Clemens had ANY KIND of relationship with a 15-year old.

I am 27 years old, almost the same age as Clemens when this alleged relationship began. I don't know ANY 15-year-old kids. None!...That includes family. So where did Roger even meet this girl?! You can't possibly tell me that Clemens had family friends that said, "Hey, Roger, come over here and meet Mindy. She's going to be huge in country music one day." And even if they did, what could he have possibly had in common with her that would have constituted a "relationship"?

After realizing that I had no friends that fell into the actuall category of what we would refer to as a "teenager," I began to think about how many friends I have that are actually girls. Now, I have many female friends that, in a social setting, I feel perfectly comfortable walking up to, giving a hug to and sharing a drink and converation with. That being said, I think that I might have one, maybe two, that I would actually feel somewhat comfortable hanging out with in a one-on-one situation...and I use "somewhat" for a reason. So, I can only imagine one female friend that I could hang out with that wouldn't yield a tremendously awkward situation and I'm not even putting an age restriction on it.

Now, I've decided that I don't know any teenagers and I have very few female friends that I could hang out with in a one-on-one setting. That makes me wonder what 28-year-old Roger Clemens did with 15-year-old Mindy McCready. Did they go out to dinner? To movies? Listen to music together? Not only that, but when did they do these things? Nights? Weekends?

Here's how I think things would go:
[On the phone]
Roger: Hi, Mindy. What's up?
Mindy: Not much just got home from school.
Roger: Cool. I'm getting ready for the game tonight. I'm pitching.
Mindy: Fun!
Roger: So, you want to go out later tongiht? Like, after the game?
Mindy: Sure, but I have to be in by 10 p.m. I have school tomorrow.
Roger: Oh, well the game probably won't be over before that...maybe we can hang out on Tuesday - we have an off-day.
Mindy: Okay. Want to go see a movie?
Roger: Great! That new movie "Total Recall" just came out and it looks AWESOME!!! Can you pick up the tickets?
Mindy: Well, I can't...it's Rated-R so you'll have to pick them up. But what about "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles"?
Roger: Ehhnnn...I don't know...
Mindy: Pleeeeeeease...
Roger [exasperated]: Fine.

There is one thing that I know will come out of this whole thing though. Roger Clemens will undoubtedly come off as being more of a sleazebag than ever before. I mean, people already didn't like him. Now, you're throwing a possible "scandal" out there? No way that he survives this.

The only other definite that I know about: I'm sure that my next post will be much more happy-go-lucky...unless I decide to write about the Braves pitching staff.