egotistical or selfish?

i was having a conversation the other day with one of my students' father, and since we are both baseball fans, the subject naturally turned to my astros. now this is a man who has coached 2 little league teams to the little league world series in the last 2 years (i think they may have won in 2004), so he knows his stuff. anyway, the subject turned to lidge and our (the city's) expectations of him. it is my very humble opinion that he is not a god, and he will always be capable of making mistakes. if we as fans put him on a pedestal, he will without a doubt come crashing down from it and disappoint us (translation: if he is not perfect, we as a city are in danger of turning on him and ripping him a new you-know-what). it happened last year after the pujols homer, and i know there were fans who started out this year doubting him based on that alone. anyway, i am happy thinking that he is simply a ballplayer who has been blessed with the gift of a thunderbolt for a right arm (anyone get that movie reference?), which could be TAKEN AWAY at any time.

so jim was talking about how he didn't think lidge's stuff was as good (consistent) as last year, and the conversation turned to a similar situation with billy wagner a few years back. so from there, i gave my opinion of billy wagner, which, for those of you who don't know me, is not very high. i liked him until he demanded $8 million a year (and my “boyfriend” and bagwell actually restructured their contracts and took pay cuts to make this happen). my family and i calculated it one time, and it was something RIDICULOUS like thousands of dollars per pitch. anyway, this led to talk of roger clemens and what i thought of him. in order to do that, we have to go back a few years...

i have no idea what year it was, but i know the last straw for me regarding clemens (pre-astros) was when he stormed the plate after hitting a batter one year (manny ramirez maybe??). i saw ol’ rog hit too many batters in his career with the yankees, and i was not a fan at all when we "purchased" him in 2004. when we got him, i was not nearly as fired up as most of the city just b/c i didn't care for him; HOWEVER, i was willing to give the guy a chance b/c this city (as well as some other texas cities) has been known to bring out the best in players and their attitudes (just look at rodman in san antonio...he wasn't nearly the thug in sa that he was elsewhere). so i watched, and i waited, and lo and behold, rocket seemed to get it done on the field without any major outbursts (kudos to him). but then last year he pissed me off again...

now for the relevance of the blog title: is he egotistical or selfish? in other words, does he really believe that he DESERVES $18 mill for pitching 35 games (maybe) a year and not traveling with the team (egotistical), OR does he really just want that much money for no reason other than to have that much money (selfish)? (side note: i secretly wondered if having the lowest ERA and never winning last year wasn’t some sort of punishment for clemens’ actions). i heard once last year that he wanted that much money just so he could make more than pedro martinez, who had just signed a huge contract. if that’s true, i’m leaning toward egotistical. and then there’s this year’s drama…

if it’s possible, i have zero respect for this man (who IS absolutely an amazing ballplayer...i'm smart enough not to argue that point). now that he’s faked retirement and come oh-so-close to another world series ring with the astros, he’s playing another game: the power trip. what I want to know is why are the astros playing it with him??? um correct me if i’m wrong, but i think we’ve shown over the last few weeks that we can hold our own without him. i say don’t stoop to his level. i believe that our ball club has more class than to deal with him and his crap (wishful thinking perhaps??).

egotistical, selfish…how about just an ass?