Kruk, Winning Battle of Bulge, Fights for Spot on the Padres

“Now batting for Las Vegas, No. 8, John Kruk,” the Hawaii announcer said.

No. 8? One fan decided it was time for a play on words.

“Hey Kruk,” the fan yelled. “Why did they give you No. 8? Is it because you ate and ate and ate?”

Kruk, playing for the Padres’ Triple-A club, didn’t take offense. He tipped his hat to the fan and talked to him between games of a doubleheader last year.

From then on, the fan sent pizzas and hamburgers to Kruk whenever Las Vegas played in Hawaii. Kruk doesn’t keep in touch with the fan, and, no offense, but Kruk hopes he doesn’t have to go back to Hawaii.

Hawaii and Triple-A baseball may be past tense for Kruk, just like the days when he ate and ate and ate. These days, he works out and works out and works out, eats very little and hopes he’ll stick with the major league club.

He has gone from 208 pounds last spring to 190 now.

Tony Gwynn can empathize with Kruk. Gwynn, who first met Kruk in Rookie League in Walla Walla, Wash., in 1981, understands the battle of the bulge is not easy to win.

However, Gwynn wonders why Kruk had to fight the battle.

“When he signed, he weighed about 170,” said Gwynn, who had a fast-food companion in Kruk. “I don’t know what happened. . . . I ate more than he did. I asked him last spring training if he loved to eat and he said yes. I loved to eat and still do. But in this game, you can do a lot of things better when you are lighter.”

Kruk, 25, had little choice but to lighten up. Tom Romenesko, the Padres’ minor league director, told Kruk to report at 190 this year or go find another job.

Kruk still appears to have plenty of weight in his hips and rear end, which translates to hitting leverage in baseball.

“Everyone says to put your butt into it when you hit,” Kruk said. “Guys like Tony Gwynn and I have enough butt to put into it. Tony gets on me a lot about being fat. He has no room to talk.”

As a baseball player, Gwynn can talk about plenty. He led the National League with a .351 batting average in 1984 and has a career average of .325.

Kruk led the Pacific Coast League with a .351 average last year and has a .325 career minor league average.

Not surprisingly, Kruk’s idol also has had his share of .300 seasons and doesn’t look like an athlete, either.

Pete Rose.

“He has those short, stubby legs. The man can hit, though. He’s my idol,” Kruk said. “That’s why I want to make the team. I want to play against the man before he retires.”

The left-handed Kruk and right-handed Jerry Davis have been competing for the Padres’ final roster spot. Since the Padres’ top pinch-hitter, Dane Iorg, is also left-handed, Kruk is on the spot.

“It’s touch and go,” Manager Steve Boros said. “We’re kind of heavy with hitters on the left-hand side. But I think John’s going to play in the big leagues with the Padres. It’s just a question of when. If he makes the club, it will probably be as an extra man. We have to consider if he would best be served by going to Las Vegas where he could play every day.”

The Padres also must consider what Kruk has accomplished in spring training. Through Wednesday, he is batting .500.

“He gives you the impression of what I call Cool Hand Luke by the way he saunters to his position,” Boros said. “Some of that may have been taken in a negative way when he weighed 208 at Las Vegas. When you have him 18 pounds over, you start to assume he doesn’t care. He has really gotten a bad rap, but I think he has overcome it by the way he has played at this camp.”

If there has been one negative, it is Kruk’s temper at times. He’s the type who goes 3 for 4 and leaves upset because of the time he didn’t get a hit.

“He has the arrogance of a hitter,” said Deacon Jones, Padre batting coach. “He has that certain cockiness and is tough-minded. He impresses me as the type who thinks every at-bat is his last at-bat on earth. A lot of us like to think we are that way, but we aren’t.”

Should the Padres send Kruk back to the minors, it might be difficult for him to prove anything after leading the Pacific Coast League in hitting last season.

“I’ll bet they could find something for me to prove,” Kruk said. “Honestly, if I keep hitting like I am, I don’t think I’ll go back. I’ll keep doing my job, and, if I make the team, that’s great. If I don’t make the team, I’ll get mad and go back to Las Vegas.”

But returning to Las Vegas would not be the worst thing for Kruk.

Said Jones: “When I was playing, it was nothing for a guy to lead one of the minor leagues in hitting and get sent back the next year. Just because you hit .320 or .350 didn’t mean you automatically got sent to the next level. Nowadays, people think you are supposed to be promoted whenever you do that.”

It’s not unusual for Kruk to be competing against the big boys. As a child, he had to compete against three older and bigger brothers.

The Kruks spent much of their free time playing a modified game of baseball in the family backyard in New Jersey.

“We used whiffle balls, tennis balls, taped up socks, broom handles, anything,” Kruk said. “My mom didn’t like it when we cut off the broom handle. That way, she couldn’t sweep the floor. We used to play fast-pitch, and that’s how I learned to hit. The only way I could hit against my brothers was to be quick. My oldest brother threw his hardest from 15 or 20 feet away, and he made that ball sing. I could hear the national anthem playing when he threw the ball.”

Kruk’s parents also were involved in sports. In high school, his father, Frank, played football, basketball and baseball. His mother, Lena, played on the high school boys’ basketball team because there wasn’t a girls’ team.

When Kruk was 10, his family moved to West Virginia. Though he wanted to play baseball as much as possible, it was difficult because his friends either wanted to swim or worked on their parents’ farms.

“If we had owned a farm, I probably wouldn’t be playing baseball now,” Kruk said. “I probably would’ve quit because I wouldn’t have had any time to play.”

After playing in junior college, Kruk was selected by the Padres in the third round of the secondary phase of the 1981 draft.

He had not signed after being drafted out of Keyser High School, which had a graduating class of 100 his senior year. Keyser also is listed as his hometown in last year’s Padre media guide. But, he spent his high school days living in nearby New Creek, population 150. The Padre oversight didn’t get past his high school buddies.

“A couple of them asked me, ‘What is this Keyser stuff?’ ” said Kruk. “They told me to tell people I was from New Creek, and I said OK. Those are farm boys, and you don’t disagree with them.”

It’s better not to disagree with Kruk when he says he thinks he will be on the Padre roster. He has more than a fat chance.