| The first biography of Roger Clemens, THE ROCKET THAT FELL TO EARTH is an explosive account of the rise and fall of one of the greatest modern-day baseball players and arguably the best pitcher of all time -- by the New York Times bestselling author of THE BAD GUYS WON! and BOYS WILL BE BOYS.
From his obscure youth as a pudgy, unremarkable nobody in suburban Ohio to the mounds of Fenway Park and Yankee Stadium, Roger "Rocket" Clemens is an American icon, and perhaps the greatest pitcher in Major League history. He played professional baseball from 1984 to 2007 -- for the Boston Red Sox, Toronto Blue Jays, New York Yankees, and Houston Astros. In his 24-year career, Clemens amassed an unprecedented seven Cy Young Awards (two more than any other pitcher) and became one of only four pitchers in baseball history to achieve more than 4,000 strikeouts.
His athletic prowess aside, Clemens also embodies a fascinating dichotomy in American culture: an athletic red state/blue state divide that has sports fans taking sides. To thousands of fans, Clemens is a tobacco-chewing, fastball-throwing legend who walks with the giants of the world. To many others, he is a gun-toting, Republican-voting, steroid-using pedophile who slept with fifteen-year-old country singer Mindy McCready when he was almost thirty and who stalked Charlize Theron.
In THE ROCKET THAT FELL TO EARTH, New York Times bestselling author Jeff Pearlman will do what he does best: He will deliver an exhaustively researched, brilliantly written biography that explores who Roger Clemens is; what he means to our country; and how his rise to baseball stardom and fall to personalhumiliation speaks volumes about the current state of sport in America.
Annotation:
The national sports media has had a much easier time pounding on Roger Clemens than opposing hitters ever did while he was on the pitcher's mound. The barrage continues with this tell-all from Jeff Pearlman, who has previously provided blow-by-snorted-blow accounts of the notorious antics of the 1986 New York Mets and the 1990s-era Dallas Cowboys. Pearlman details Clemens's nearly anonymous upbringing in Ohio, his remarkable rise to baseball stardom (seven Cy Young Awards, 354 wins, 4,672 strikeouts), and his astonishing fall from grace amid rampant accusations of steroid use and promiscuity, including a reputed affair with a 15-year-old girl.
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