Clemens Not Quite the King in Some Eyes

Roger Clemens has a picture of Walter Johnson in his locker but the New York Yankee right-hander probably doesn’t tote around a copy of “Total Baseball: The Official Encyclopedia of Major League Baseball.”

If he did, though, he could have thrown it at some statistics guru, much as he tossed Mike Piazza’s broken bat at him.

Clemens, the Yankees and major league baseball all celebrated his overtaking of Johnson as the American League’s all-time strikeout king Monday. When he got Joe Randa on a forkball in the dirt in the ninth inning of the Yankees’ 7-3 opening-day victory over the visiting Kansas City Royals, it was the 3,509th strikeout of Clemens’ career.

But on Page 2,310 in its seventh and latest edition, printed just in time for the 2001 season, “Total Baseball” shows Johnson with 3,509 strikeouts.

That would make Monday’s celebration premature, since the Rocket apparently is tied with the Big Train.

Besides being the “official encyclopedia” of major league baseball, “Total Baseball’s” statistics are used on baseball’s official Web site.

In a recent audit of baseball stats by “Total Baseball,” Johnson’s strikeout total was increased by one.

The 2000 Yankee media guide also lists 3,509 strikeouts for Johnson, who played his entire career, 1907-27, with the Washington Senators.

“If [Clemens] breaks the record twice, he’ll get that much more publicity,” Pete Palmer, “Total Baseball’s” co-editor, told Bloomberg Sports News.

“The American League was very sloppy at keeping records,” Palmer added.

“They’d put a win down that should have been a loss, or put it down twice. There are thousands and thousands of errors in the American League stats.”

Palmer said that John Schwartz, a statistician in Rochester, N.Y., found an error while examining game stories and box scores from Johnson’s rookie year, when strikeouts weren’t officially kept.

Schwartz determined that Johnson should have been credited with one more strikeout, giving him a total of 3,509.

However, baseball uses Elias Sports Bureau Inc., as its official keeper of statistics and Elias has Johnson with 3,508 strikeouts in his 21-year career.

“We recognize 3,508 [as Johnson’s total],” baseball spokesman Richard Levin said. “The number [3,508] has been blessed by Elias so that’s what we’re going with.”

Jerome Holtzman, a former baseball writer for the Chicago Tribune who now serves as baseball’s official historian, also backed New York-based Elias.

“The Elias Bureau is correct,” Holtzman said. “They’re the official statisticians of major league baseball. ‘Total Baseball’ is merely an encyclopedia. ‘Total Baseball’ has been wrong before.”

Clemens, a five-time Cy Young Award winner who broke in with the Boston Red Sox in 1984, also has pitched for the Toronto Blue Jays. He--and arguably Johnson as well--is seventh on the all-time list, led by Nolan Ryan, who recorded 5,714 strikeouts pitching in both leagues.