Roger Clemens Goes Batty On Mike Piazza

As if the hype surrounding the "Subway Series" was not enough to keep the entire sports world, led by the New York media, on the edge of its seat, Roger Clemens turned the intensity up a couple more notches on Sunday night. Bringing some of his best stuff for his second consecutive start, Clemens overpowered the first two hitters he faced before dueling Piazza to a 1-2 count and shattering his bat on an inside fastball. The ball went foul off the first base side and the head of the bat went bounding toward Clemens on the mound. Because Piazza never picked up the ball off the bat, he began running to first base just as Clemens caught the bat and launched it into foul ground on the first base side, barely missing Piazza as he jogged to first. Clemens offered several explanations for his freakish behavior during the incident, concluding that he was extremely pumped up at the time and was not thinking at all about what he was doing. Clemens claimed that he didn’t think Piazza would be running, since it was a foul ball.

After the sawed-off bat head flew past him, Piazza began walking toward Clemens on the mound, trying to confront him about his intent for throwing the bat in his direction. Clemens ignored Piazza and instead tried to address the home plate umpire and began asking him for a new ball so that he could re-take the mound. This exchange was brief, due to the fact that the incident had cleared both benches and the umpires and coaches began separating the players before a physical confrontation erupted. The act left the capacity crowd at Yankee Stadium in stunned silence and definitely had an effect on crowd participation throughout the remainder of the game.