This certainly warms hears here in Houston!

Only Roger Clemens could draw a standing-room crowd, a national-television audience and four different mascots, all to watch him play a little ball with his son.

For Clemens, every pitch has become a production, every outing a family photo op. His first appearance of this season, alongside his oldest son at Class A Lexington on Tuesday night, was the ultimate baseball greeting card come to life.

Playing at a minor league stadium near Kentucky's famous horse farms, with one son at third base and the rest of the family in a luxury suite, with the song "Rocket Man" blaring through the speakers and fans wearing "Rocket Relaunch" T-shirts, Clemens gave up one run in three innings to the Lake County Captains. By the time he was finished, an artist's rendering was being auctioned at a souvenir stand.

The most poignant father-son moment was also the most genuine. In the top of the third inning, Koby Clemens walked solemnly toward the mound at Applebee's Park. His father braced for words of advice about the next hitter. "One more strikeout," Koby Clemens said, "and everybody in the stadium gets wiper fluid."

Roger Clemens, suddenly aware of the promotion that gives Lexington fans free windshield wiper fluid if the home pitcher records a strikeout in the third inning, reached 93 miles an hour and notched his fifth and sixth strikeouts of the game. "It was just like normal," Koby Clemens said. "Striking everybody out."

The only blemish was a first-inning home run by Lake County center fielder Johnny Drennen, who wears Clemens's No. 22 and sent one of his split-fingered fastballs onto the roof of the Pepsi Party Deck in right field. Even Drennen was awarded reluctant applause.

He remains simply the best.

And I have to wonder -- we will soon get the Rocket back in the rotation with local product Andy Pettitte. Does local poy Nolan Ryan still have a few good innings left in his arm?