As if we needed further confirmation that the Boston Red Sox aren’t the only team that has beer in its clubhouse, we now have reason to believe their biggest rivals have a history of imbibing as well. Since the original report surfaced that the Sox starting pitchers drank and ate fast food during games this season, there has been a massive domino effect. For the most part, the fans are outraged while the players insist having a few beers during the game is part of life in the MLB.
A.J. Pierzynski admitted players need a “rally beer” sometimes while Jack McKeon said he’s always had to lock the clubhouse to keep certain pitchers from heading in for a drink on days they aren’t starting. On Thursday morning, the NY Daily News cited baseball insider sources who say Roger Clemens and Jason Giambi routinely drank beer in the dugout — something the Red Sox have vehemently denied ever having done.
According to one of the insiders, Jason Giambi and Roger Clemens would routinely drink beer on the dugout bench when they played for the Yankees, passing back and forth what Giambi called his “protein shake,” code for a cup of beer, the source said.
And they weren’t the only ones who partook. “Rally beers are big in the clubhouse,” one insider said. “Guys would drink them all the time, on the bench, in the clubhouse, in the training room. It’s common.”
I think that “protein shake” may have contained something else if those two were drinking it. One of the insiders also said Jose Canseco, who was not a big drinker, once drank a beer in the clubhouse and then went out and hit a home run. Since the result was so great the first time, he drank another beer and popped another home run. Canseco then repeated the action a third time and had himself a three-homer day. Since Canseco never hit 3 homers as a member of the Yankees, the source must not have been referring to his New York days.
The moral of the story is everyone does it. That doesn’t make drinking during games right, but blaming the Red Sox September collapse on drinking is looking more unreasonable by the day. Did it ever occur to anyone that the Sox may have just choked? That can happen without the help of alcohol — especially on Yawkey Way.
