Clemens back in business

HOUSTON -- It’s the same old Roger Clemens.

‘‘Too many kids half my age looking out over the outside corner,’’ he said. ‘‘I’m going to have to pitch more inside. Whistle a few in there. Make ’em uncomfortable.’’

But is it the same old Roger Clemens? It’s way too soon to be certain, although he and manager Phil Garner were whistling the happy tune following last night’s re-re-return to action before a record crowd of 43,769 at Minute Maid Park. With 22-year-old Dominican sensation Francisco Liriano demonstrating that he may soon be known as the Southpaw Rocket, the Minnesota Twins won the game, 4-2. Clemens worked the first five innings, picking up career loss No. 173.

Career victory No. 342, the first following what catcher Brad Ausmus calls Roger’s ‘‘sabbatical,’’ will have to wait until at least next Tuesday, when The Original Rocket starts against the Tigers in Comerica Park.

‘‘My body felt better than I expected,’’ reported Clemens, who is trying to jump aboard a very fast-moving train. ‘‘I hope and expect to get stronger each time out there.’’

‘‘I thought he was fine,’’ said Garner. ‘‘He may tell you he was a little amped up, and he may have rushed a little, but I thought he did fine.’’

When you step back to examine just what exactly is going on, this whole thing is amazing. The man had three minor league prep appearances, and that’s it. If this were spring training, it would be about March 15. But there he was, six weeks shy of his 44th birthday, pumping the high-octane stuff while allowing six hits and striking out four (career punchouts Nos. 4,503, 4,504, 4,505, and 4,506) and walking two.

He did need exactly 100 pitches in those five innings, with 38 of them coming during an exhausting third inning, when the Twins scored both runs allowed by the mound legend.

‘‘They put some good at-bats on him,’’ said Garner. That’s no lie. The last five men who came to the plate in that inning saw 6, 6, 6, 8, and 5 pitches, respectively.

Now here comes the coulda-shoulda-woulda part. The Twins should only have had one run, and an argument can be made they should not have had any. Clemens’s problems began when Craig Biggio was too slow in getting rid of the ball on speedy Luis Castillo’s fairly routine one-out grounder to second. The runs clattered across on an authoritative double to deep left-center by Jason Kubel and a two-out single to center by Michael Cuddyer on the one pitch Clemens said he’d like to have back.

‘‘A 3-2 [cross]seamer,’’ lamented Clemens. ‘‘The ball flattened out a bit.’’

Justin Morneau, who would later homer off reliever Russ Springer, followed by working an eight-pitch walk. That brought up Torii Hunter, and Roger had enough in the tank to fan the Minnesota center fielder to end the inning. This did not exactly come as a shock, since Hunter had entered the game 0 for 20 with 12 K’s lifetime against the Rocket, and left it 0 for 22 with 13 K’s.

Clemens got back on track with a nine-pitch fourth and highlighted his final inning of work by hustling to complete a 3-6-1 double play off the bat of Joe Mauer in the fifth.

He left trailing, 2-0, because the Astros were learning what previous opponents already knew, which is that the Minnesota southpaw is a scary young dude. ‘‘That’s as good as I’ve seen,’’ said Garner. ‘‘No, let me say that again. That’s the best we’ve seen so far.’’

Clemens said he didn’t see much of Liriano (7-1) other than what he was exposed to up close and personal with a bat in his hands (he fanned, of course, one of Liriano’s seven in eight innings of work). ‘‘I’m usually in the tunnel [when the Astros are up],’’ he explained. ‘‘I did go inside one inning and all I can say is that when you’ve got command of both sides of the plate like that, you’re going to do extremely well. My job at the plate is to make him work a little, but I only saw four pitches. That pitching machine I’ve been batting off the past two weeks doesn’t have a slider like that.’’

It is obligatory to mention that Liriano was 7 months old when Clemens made his major league debut in May 1984. 1984! That was two weeks before Kevin McHale took down Kurt Rambis. That was at least three Madonna reinventions ago. That was before there were even any K kids.

But the big crowd hadn’t come to see Liriano. They had come to pay their respects to The Rocket, the Local Boy who has been making good for a long, long time, and who is trying to write a spectacular closing chapter. And he did give them something to cheer about, starting in the first inning, when he responded to his own mishandling of a Castillo comebacker by getting Kubel on a 4-6-3 pitch, then fanning Mauer, the American League’s batting leader, on a 93-mile-per-hour fastball to end the inning, and closing with a strong fifth.

A starting pitcher can’t control the outcome. Roger Clemens drew the wrong matchup if his only goal last night was to win this one game. He was looking for reasons to continue this latest comeback, and he got them.

He reported that his arm felt fine, but that wasn’t the best part. ‘‘My legs,’’ he said.

‘‘That’s where I get my power. I never felt like I was sitting on my back leg, or collapsing.

‘‘This is going to take a lot of work,’’ he said. ‘‘I know that. I’m trying to fight off aging as best I can. I’ll do the work. I came in as a power pitcher, and I want to go out as one. That’s the objective.’’

Astros owner Drayton McLane is paying him $12.25 million for a little more than three months’ work. In exchange, Roger’s deal is to be a top-of-the-rotation starter, set a locker room example, and attempt to keep buddy Andy Pettitte from falling apart. Bring it all on, Roger says.

‘‘That’s how it is,’’ he said with a smile. ‘‘Take a couple of Advil and go get ’em.’’

And remember, Tigers. Don’t get too comfortable up there. You’ve been warned.

Bob Ryan is a Globe columnist. His e-mail address is ryan@globe.com.