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Try it freeRoger Clemens gave a bold take on the YES Network broadcast during Old-Timers’ Day.
As the Yankees pulled starter Luis Gil from the mound during the top of the sixth inning in their 5-4 victory over the Astros on Saturday, Clemens talked about the changes baseball has seen since his final MLB season in 2007.
While the Yankees legend was in favor of a number of tweaks, what Clemens said he isn’t in favor of is how starting pitching has changed, with the sport seeing shorter and shorter outings.
So he proposed an idea on how MLB could push starters to go longer.
“If you want to stop these guys going three or four innings, looking over their shoulder, you tie your DH to your starting pitcher,” he said. “If your starting pitcher comes out [of] the game before the seventh inning, you lose your DH. And that’ll change that.”
The seven-time Cy Young Award winner did say he likes the pitch clock and is a fan of the automatic strike zone and the ability for a batter, catcher or pitcher to challenge a pitch — which appears likely to come into play in 2026.
“It only takes two seconds,” he said about the challenge system.
Clemens said he was also an innovator in how he and his catchers would call pitches.
“I was PitchCom before PitchCom, I called about 95 percent of my game from the mound,” Clemens said of the devices pitchers and catchers use now to call pitches in place of hand signals.
Clemens added one more take, this one about the name “Old-Timers’ Day. He thinks it should really be called “The Alumni Game.”
“It sounds a lot better,” he said. “I don’t like Old-Timers. We are not old. We are not going to let any grass grow beneath our feet.”
Also during his appearance, Clemens addressed the reason behind his No. 22 Yankees jersey.
In his first few starts with the Yankees in 1999, he wore No. 12 because No. 21, the number he wore for the first 15 seasons of his career, was already taken by Paul O’Neill.
He eventually chose 22 because legendary Cowboys running back Emmitt Smith — who wore the same number.
“[He] is a big fan of my boys and everything like that, so they made the phone call. And said, ‘Get 12 off your back. You’re not a quarterback. Put double deuce on there and look strong. And the wins started coming with 22 on my back,” Clemens, a two-time World Series champion in The Bronx, said.