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Roger Clemens

I wouldn’t be sitting here talking to you if Andy Pettitte hadn’t signed. I had my schedule already set for April, where I was going to maybe do some TV.

I think anybody in their field of work should love what they do and try and be great at it. That’s the only way I know.

My mom played both roles for me. She was that stern of a lady. That’s where I got my will and my desire. She was able to raise six of us once my father passed away at a young age.

When a general calls you and says, “We’d like you to come to the Middle East and see the troops five days before Christmas,” I look at my wife and say it’s something you can’t turn down. I wanted to take the kids, but they’re not of age. By far, it was the neatest thing I’ve ever done. The World Series pales in comparison to that.

I think it was a good experience for my boys to know what’s important and what’s really not important.

When I got up there, I told them about 9/11 and I was pitching that night, trying for my 20th when the world changed, and got them all pumped up. Then Drew Carey came on and started busting on them. A couple guys re-enlisted, and he said, “What were you thinking? You could be in San Diego on a beach in two weeks.”

One of the neatest gifts I got was from John Valentin, who played shortstop and third for me in Boston. After I left there, he sent me a baseball with my number on it and about a two-paragraph thing about what he thought it was like to be my teammate for Christmas. It was the neatest gift I ever got.

I think my boys are the toughest graders. First phone call I got one night was, “Daddy, you should’ve hit that hanging curveball out of there.” Yeah, son. Thanks.

There’s been times where I’ve been in there eating some cereal and the boys have new kids come over, so Koby would say, “Yeah, there’s my dad. Now let’s go play.”

It’s not nasty as in hated.(1) You have to go to Burleson, Remy, Randolph, Fisk; you have to go back to those guys because I think they really hated each other.

I expect to win. Or we’re wasting our time.

I enjoyed the Kennedys. Eveything happened there in Texas like it did. My wife was a young baby in my mother-in-law’s arms two miles up the route before he was assassinated.

I always vote for the Bushes because they’re home.

I asked people to clear out of the manager’s office for about five minutes to get my thoughts so I didn’t break down.(2) I sat there for a while, and it was like a deck of cards, and I just saw my 20 years. It was pretty emotional. Then I got it together and went back for the game.

The thing that probably gave me more incentive to get to 300 was two years before I was there, all the talk was, “You know, you might be one of the last ones to 300. You and Maddux.”

I superseded anything I could’ve imagined. They put on the scoreboard that you passed Walter Johnson and all these guys with great nicknames. I was just, shoot, just happy to be in the big leagues and get to the playoffs and leave a little bit of a mark so I felt like I didn’t waste my time.

(1): The Yankees-Red Sox rivalry.

(2): After leaving his last World Series start in 2003, expected to be his last game.