Clemens returns to Yankees

The Yankees sat in their dugout in the bottom of the seventh inning Sunday during their game against the Seattle Mariners with huge smiles spread across their faces. Why were they smiling? They entered the game 5.5 games back of the Boston Red Sox with a 13-15 record. And while they were leading the game 3-0, their bullpen had been less than reliable lately. Smiles should have been the last thing showing on the faces of the Yankees.

The reason was because only a few minutes earlier, Roger Clemens — standing in George Steinbrenner's private box — made a public announcement during the seventh-inning stretch Clemens, a free agent, announced that he would be signing a one-year contract with the New York Yankees and returning to play for them in June.

Money, usually a non-factor for the Yankees and owner Steinbrenner, was not surprisingly a non-factor again. Clemens signed a one-year, $28-million pro-rated contract, which means in the four months that he plays he will earn $18.5 million.

Clemens is targeting a late-May/early-June return in which he will pitch every fifth day for the Yankees — or at least that is what Joe Torre and the rest of the team hope, as they've already trotted out 10 different starting pitchers this year, a major-league record at this point in the season.

Another caveat for the Yankees is that stipulated in Clemens' contract is the ability to not be with the team on days on which he doesn't start.

MLB Draft to be televised

Baseball announced that for the first time in history the annual MLB entry draft will be televised this coming June.

"Major League Baseball is delighted that ESPN2 will provide live coverage of our draft," Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig said in a recent statement. "I am glad that this agreement will give fans access to see this critical function of an organization's development. This is an idea whose time has come."

Before you start throwing things at your TV or — heaven forbid — rip up this newspaper, listen for a minute to the prospects of this event and keep in mind that when ESPN first approached the NFL about televising their draft, people thought they were crazy.

The differences between the two are obvious. The NFL draft is only seven rounds whereas the MLB draft can reach 50, and in baseball a vast majority of the prospects don't even sign with the team that drafted them initially in the entry draft. Even if they do, it could be several years before fans of a team will get to see the player make any sort of impact with the professional team.

Those are the reasons baseball hasn't had their annual entry draft televised sooner. It's just a simple fact that college baseball isn't even close to as widely popular around the country as college football is; the players aren't identifiable.

In choosing to televise the draft, though, ESPN is proving wary of these facts, and by broadcasting it June 7, from 11 a.m.-3 p.m. on ESPN2, they aren't trying to make it a primetime event.

Only the first round will be televised, and each team will have a maximum of five minutes to make their selections. After the first round, the draft will continue in its previous form as a conference-call event, and ESPN2 will cover the selections until 3 p.m.

This also means that for the first time the draft will have a physical location, and it will take place at Disney's Wide World of Sports Complex in Orlando, Fla. Further details and features of the event are still being determined, but attempts are being made to have the majority of first round prospects available for interviews.

As far as answering the question of who will watch, let's just say that I think this event has more potential for success than the poker reruns or World's Strongest Man competitions that are running in that time slot currently. And if they can adapt it to anything like the NFL draft, where there are draft analysts breaking down each prospect and teams' needs (also in this case perhaps a farm-system report), then it could be very intriguing.

Reach reporter Anthony Dion at sports@thedaily.washington.edu.