WHO’S ON FIRST? : Angels Took Some Big Stumbling Blocks Out of Joyner’s Path

Gene Autry is back in the golf cart again, parked behind the batting cage, talking with General Manager Mike Port as the Angels file in to take their cuts.

“Who’s that?” Autry asks as No. 21 steps up to the plate.

No. 21 usually elicits that sort of reaction. People look at his soft features and a round face that belongs in a high school yearbook and wonder why the clubhouse boy is digging in right after Reggie Jackson. Must be some kind of spring prank.

“That’s Wally Joyner,” Port tells Autry.

Ah, yes. If the baby face doesn’t register, the name surely does.

Wally Joyner. Kid first baseman. The new Rod Carew from BYU, by way of Puerto Rico, where he got a triple crown for Christmas. The Angels’ most prized and publicized rookie since at least Carney Lansford.

“You should see some line drives now,” Port says as Joyner settles into his stance.

Immediately, Joyner obliges with cracks to right and center fields.

“He reminds me of a young Keith Hernandez or Rusty Staub,” Port continues. “And he’s an excellent fielder. If he plays an entire season, he could win a Gold Glove.”

Elsewhere around the Angels’ training camp, others join in on Joyner. When he’s the topic, people talk.

Manager Gene Mauch: “I know one thing--he’s something special with the bat. And at first base, he’s s-m-o-o-t-h. He has no shortcomings that I can see. He does everything like a big leaguer.”

Assistant general manager Preston Gomez: “He’s like Wes Parker with the glove. In the five years I’ve been here, he’s the best fielding first baseman I’ve seen.”

Winston Llenas, Joyner’s manager in Edmonton last year: “He looks very, very young, but I’m telling you, he can play in the big leagues. He’s a pure hitter, in my opinion, real smooth. And, he can pick it defensively.”

The praise gushes forth. Of course, that’s also happening at 25 other training sites in Arizona and Florida. Gushing is big at this time of year.

For the Angels, Joyner is this year’s phenom. In this instance, though, there is a unique catch.

The Angels, abandoning their customary conservatism, have taken the mortgage money and bet it all on No. 21. The Angels just didn’t clear out the first-base position for Joyner, they strafed it.

First, they got rid of Rod Carew, a seven-time league batting champion with 3,000 hits and a ticket to Cooperstown.

Then they got rid of Juan Beniquez, who batted better than .300 in each of the last three seasons.

Then they got rid of Daryl Sconiers, the spring phenom of 1983.

By the time the Angels had finished cutting down first basemen, they had cleared a path that led straight to Joyner. He is the future, and the future is now.

“We’re gonna give the kid a full-bore shot at first base,” Mauch says.

“He will be given every opportunity,” Port echoes. “As great a player as Rod Carew has been, there comes a point in time when you must say, ‘OK, who’s the next Rod Carew?’

“If we did not have a Wally Joyner in our organization, it’s very possible we might have acted differently with Carew. But the fact is--we do have a Wally Joyner. A chance is due young players who are trying to progress.”

Flashback: Spring, 1983, Vero Beach, Fla. The Angels’ neighbors, the Dodgers, are saying the same things about a young first baseman named Greg Brock, who is replacing another hit machine named Steve Garvey. Sure, there will be pressure. But Brock can handle it.

Flashback: Summer, 1984, Albuquerque, N.M. Brock is back in Triple-A, trying to relocate his batting stroke and his confidence. Brock eventually returns to Los Angeles but has yet to fully justify the Dodgers’ decision to let Garvey go south.

Wally Joyner knows the Greg Brock story. He knows that history often repeats itself in baseball.

He says he’s prepared for Southern California fans and their demands on rookies replacing legends.

“I’m sure they’ll continue to do that with me,” Joyner said. “Some people can take it that I beat out Rod Carew, but I really didn’t. He’s gone. Somebody has to play first base.

“I have to realize that I’m not Rod Carew, no matter what I do.”

Last year, Joyner had enough trouble trying to be Wally Joyner.

After spending the spring with the Angels and hitting well enough--.370--to last until the final cut, Joyner began the season with Edmonton, the Angels’ Triple-A affiliate.

He arrived in Canada sensing that he had to fulfill two sets of expectations--real and imaginary.

The real: The Angels’ desire for Joyner to hit with more power. His .317 average at Waterbury the previous year was nice, but a 6-2 first baseman with designs on the big leagues should hit more than 12 home runs in one Double-A season.

The imaginary: Joyner’s belief that his Edmonton teammates might view him as a big shot after his big buildup--he was the Angels’ 1984 Minor League Player of the Year--and his extended stay in the Angels’ spring camp. Joyner simply wanted to fit in.

In an attempt to crank up more power, Joyner started pulling the ball. In an attempt to win the respect of his teammates, he started to press at the plate.

The combination of the pulling and pressing dropped Joyner’s average to about .200.

“I struggled more with myself than I did playing,” Joyner said. “Then, Rod Carew was put on the disabled list. If I was hitting a little better at the time, they would’ve called me up. But I was hitting about .200, maybe not even that. I wasn’t even close to hitting well enough to get called up.

“That was kind of discouraging.”

Third baseman Jack Howell, Joyner’s roommate at Edmonton, watched Joyner deal with the slump.

“I think he handled it well,” Howell said. “If he was going to stay in Triple-A and compete, he knew he had to have a great second half.

“He never really let it get to him. Of course he was wondering what was happening, but he stayed in good spirits. He did extra hitting, worked on his batting stance. Mentally, he fought through the hard times.”

Joyner eventually returned to old ways and resumed spraying the ball to all fields. His second half average was .365, bringing his overall mark to .283. He also happened into 10 home runs, eight more than in the first half.

He then went down to Puerto Rico for winter ball, and the hits kept coming. Playing for the Mayaguez Indians, Joyner finished with a .356 batting average, 14 home runs and 48 runs batted in in 54 games--good enough for the third triple crown in the league’s history.

Joyner’s recovery impressed the Angels. Port said it convinced him that Joyner could deal with whatever pressure awaits him as the first-base heir to Carew.

“We know Wally Joyner is a stable individual,” Port said. “Look at what happened to him last year in the minor leagues. He handled everything that came his way.

“Wally knows that we just want him to be Wally Joyner. If he can do that, we’ll be more than satisfied.”

The scouting report on Wallace Keith Joyner:

Twenty-three years old . . . Left-handed hitter . . . Makes contact, drives the ball to all fields . . . Easy stroke . . . Smooth fielder, quick hands, agile feet . . . Moves well for his size.

The description invites comparisons.

A reporter ticks off names for Joyner.

Mickey Vernon.

Gil Hodges.

Wes Parker.

Rusty Staub.

Keith Hernandez.

Joyner interrupts. “What’s his name--Wes Vernon?” he asks.

Joyner has never heard of Wes Vernon. He has never heard of Wes Parker or Mickey Vernon, either.

“You have to get to the ‘70s for the names I know,” he said. “Keith Hernandez I know. When people compare me to him, that’s a compliment.”

Hernandez and the others were a strain apart from the typical first baseman. They were more singles strokers than free swingers, and they fielded their position well.

Joyner prides himself in not being “your basic first baseman.”

“I think the stereotype is leaving,” he said. “First base used to be where all the old veterans went for their last couple of years. I think you’re starting to see more quick-footed first basemen who can make the plays on balls in the hole.

“They’ll hit for some power, too, but they won’t just be a blob over at first base who can’t catch or throw.”

Some veterans are waiting in line in case Joyner doesn’t hit major league pitching with consistency in 1986. Bobby Grich played first base last year. “A piece of cake. A day off,” he said.

According to Mauch, Doug DeCinces “could pick up first base in five minutes.”

Joyner bristles at such talk. He knows that he’ll be replaced if he doesn’t produce, but he believes that the task of playing first base is vastly underrated.

“You can play first base, but you’re not going to be as smooth or as comfortable unless you play it for a while,” he said. “I think a good example of that is Mike Schmidt.

“He went over and played first because they felt it would take pressure off his legs. But they found out there was more activity at first.

“I feel like first base is a pretty important job. I enjoy taking a bad throw from a shortstop or a third baseman, picking it and saving them an error.”

Joyner has been a first baseman all his life. He was stationed there when he hit .460 at Redan High School in Stone Mountain, Ga., and was named Georgia Player of the Year in 1980. He was stationed there when he made All-American at BYU in 1983 and toured Korea as a member of the U.S. team in the Pan-American Games that summer.

It’s at first base where the Angels figure Joyner will make his biggest impact as a rookie.

“His glove is what’s going to help us the most,” Gomez said. “The question is, will he hit major league pitching?”

Joyner has no track record. He has not spent one day on a big league roster during the regular season--not even meriting a look-see with the Angels last September.

What is to be expected from someone whose next major league at-bat will be his first?

Llenas set some modest goals.

“If he plays the whole season, I think he’ll bat around .280 with 10 home runs or so,” Llenas said. “That’s not bad for someone in his first year.”

Especially for someone who more resembles Wally Cleaver than Wally the Angel first baseman.

“I get kidded a lot,” Joyner said. “It comes with the territory, I guess. I am blessed, or cursed, with a baby face.”

But just a face. There is a growing bald spot at the back of his head.

“I take my hat off and there goes my reputation of being 17,” he said, grinning.

So Joyner keeps his cap on and lets opposing pitchers think what they will. Maybe they’ll go easier on the kid.

When a rookie is trying to fill shoes that reached base safely more than 3,000 times in a 19-year career, he needs any edge he can get.