Roger Clemens couldn’t stand sitting around in his hotel room. Luckily for him, three of the four teams the seven-time Cy Young Award-winner played for allowed its pitchers to bring golf clubs on road trips.
Clemens took advantage, and hitting (golf) balls between games helped foster his love for the game. Now he’s a 5.2 handicap and plays in several big-time celebrity events.
“I’ve met some of the coolest guys on the professional tour, now on the Champions tour, and really I’ve met more business opportunities by learning and playing the game of golf than I ever have playing Major League Baseball,” said Clemens, the guest on this week’s Subpar podcast. “So many business opportunities have come my way on the golf course playing with guys, CEOs and stuff like that, and I love to get outdoors.”
The one team that didn’t let Clemens bring his clubs on the road? The Yankees.
“Mr. Steinbrenner didn’t want to see golf clubs coming out,” Clemens said of George Steinbrenner, then the Yankees owner. “The way I look at it, if I was managing, I wouldn’t want my guys out running around late all the time. Ya know, we got a tee time, we are shutting it down 40 minutes after we get back to the hotel from the team bus, and we are getting up and getting after it and getting the body moving.”
Playing golf didn’t seem to harm Clemens’ performance, either. There were a couple of instances when he played the day before he was scheduled to pitch.
“One time I played 27 holes, and the next time I played 18 holes,” he said. “The next night I pitched and I punched out 20 batters.”
For more from Clemens, including his thoughts on the best golfer in the house (not him), pre-game superstitions, the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry, his movie career and more, click here, or watch the YouTube video above.
As GOLF.com’s managing editor, Berhow handles the day-to-day and long-term planning of one of the sport’s most-read news and service websites. He spends most of his days writing, editing, planning and wondering if he’ll ever break 80. Before joining GOLF.com in 2015, he worked at newspapers in Minnesota and Iowa. A graduate of Minnesota State University in Mankato, Minn., he resides in the Twin Cities with his wife and two kids. You can reach him at joshua_berhow@golf.com.
