SPRING TRAINING ’87 : ACES IN PAIN : Padres Show and Dravecky: Two of a Kind

Everywhere Eric Show looked Monday, there were sportswriters. And the questions were always the same: “How’s the elbow, Eric?”

Eventually, Show made it back to his room Monday night, and he soon dozed off.

“Amazing,” he said Tuesday morning. “I dreamt I was being followed by a big ballpoint pen.”

And it’s been pretty much the same for Show’s running mate, Dave Dravecky. Writers keep wondering, “Hey Dave, how’s the elbow?”

Jack McKeon, Padre general manager, feels sorry for them.

“All last year, it was ‘Dravecky and Show--blah, blah, blah.’ And all this year, it’s Dravecky and Show--blah, blah, blah.’ The guys haven’t even thrown a ball yet and you guys are anticipating they’re hurt.

“I can just see Dravecky saying, ‘I’m not talking. My arm is fine. I keep telling you that, and you keep writing I’m hurt.’ I bet he won’t talk anymore.”

Actually, Dravecky and Show are talking to reporters. But whether they like it or not, their respective elbows have become an important spring training issue.

Show was the San Diego Padres’ best pitcher last season when he went down with flexor tendinitis in his right (pitching) elbow in August. He had pitched with the injury for more than a month--with moderate success--but there was no need for him to continue when the Padres had fallen near last place. He missed the last five weeks of the season.

And Dravecky--a left-hander with excellent control--developed the same injury in his pitching elbow, and he missed the final four weeks.

Flexor tendinitis is not contagious, but here were two buddies with identical problems. Their careers were--and still may be--in jeopardy.

McKeon, for instance, used to get phone calls from other general managers who would ask about Dravecky. In fact, if Dravecky hadn’t been hurt, the Padres might have packaged him with another pitcher and traded for a third baseman such as Minnesota’s Gary Gaetti. But Dravecky’s injury hurt his market value, and McKeon was forced to trade outfielder Kevin McReynolds to the Mets to get his new third baseman (Kevin Mitchell).

As of now, Show and Dravecky are expected to make complete recoveries. Show began throwing two weeks ago, and though he’s lost a lot of weight, says his recuperation is on schedule. Dravecky began throwing in December and is, as usual, optimistic.

“I’m not concerned about either one at this point,” said Galen Cisco, pitching coach. “If last year’s injuries were nagging them, we’d certainly be able to tell by now. I don’t anticipate a problem with either one, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be cautious. Why press it?”

So each pitcher will take it slow, which will give each ample time to think about some important things such as what happens if they can’t come back?

DRAVECKY’S STORY

If Dravecky can’t return, he always can go back to his hometown--Boardman, Ohio--and work in his father’s machine shop.

But Dravecky isn’t thinking that far ahead. Here is one of the world’s greatest positive thinkers.

His attitude is his best attribute. Manager Larry Bowa called Dravecky in the off-season and told him he might be moving from the starting rotation to the bullpen.

“No problem,” Dravecky told him. “I’ll do anything for the team.”

Bowa considered it a startling answer.

“You know how I am,” Dravecky said Tuesday. “My role doesn’t matter to me. I love the game, and I want to stay here at the major league level. I was always told in the minors, ‘There’s no place like the show.’ Well, to stick here (in the majors), you’ve got to make adjustments. If it means being a starter or being a reliever, that makes no difference. I’m very easy to please.”

Dravecky admits he has worried about his injury.

“It’s crossed my mind that all of a sudden, this could all end,” he said. “But I don’t fear (for his career). There are other things I can do.”

SHOW’S STORY

Eric Show can do many things: be a physics teacher, a music teacher or go Hollywood.

“But if I had to quit baseball, I’d be very disappointed,” he said. “Like anyone would be, gosh. Fortunately, though, I can adapt very well because I love to do so many things. I could probably get the same kind of satisfaction doing a variety of other things, to be honest with you. All things considered, though, the fact that I’ve played the game since I was 8 or 9 years old, well, it is a big part of your life and I’d miss it. No doubt about it.”

Currently, his acting career is on hold. It had been announced last year that he was going to portray former Giant pitcher Christy Mathewson in an upcoming movie, but he says the movie’s producer, Jerry Gross, had to have a lung removed and may not do the film.

Also, he had received a small part in another movie (he was going to be a government official about to be assassinated), but the film apparently ran out of money. He was asked to go to the Philippines to film another movie, but he turned it down.

“I’ve never had any delusions (about acting),” he said. “It hasn’t ever been my goal to be a movie star. It was nice to be picked (for the Mathewson film), and I appreciate that part and everything, but it was never a big deal with me. It was something that would’ve been nice, I guess.”

Show plays the piano and the guitar (during baseball trips, he often sits in with the hotel band), but he says he isn’t in music to make money.

“At this stage of the game, music is not something I would immediately turn to get the bulk of money I need to survive the rest of my life,” he said. “It’s not the No. 1 thing I’d turn to. I will always have it. I will always love it. I will always do it. One day, I might even get rich on it. But it doesn’t matter to me.

“To me, music is an end in itself. It’s not a means to an end. That’s a very important comment. That’s very heavy. It reveals quite a bit about me, actually. It’s something that’s different than what you see today--rock groups spitting up blood or doing all sorts of things to attract young kids to their rock concerts. That is a means to an end. To me, music is far more eternal. It’s self-expression. It’s a way of life. So it’s something I’ll always have, no matter what happens to me.”

Show has a friend who developed flexor tendinitis of the elbow while playing the guitar, of all things. The guy wasn’t allowed to play for 1 1/2 years.

“I know this is a serious injury,” he said.

So he will change his pitching delivery (he’ll throw more over-the-top), and he will stretch more before he throws.

“That way, I feel I can continue to throw and not cause any more damage,” he said. “And, eventually, it’ll go away. That’s the theory, anyway.”

In the meantime, Show and Dravecky cope.

“We think it’s odd we both have the same thing,” Show said. “We hang out together and we’ve got sore arms together. We kid each other a lot. We ask, ‘How’s the ‘bow?’ Because, after a while, let’s face it, you’ve got to joke about it because it’s something that can get you in a bad mood if you don’t make light of it.”