When the Feeling’s Gone, Gwynn Looks For It in a Batting Cage

It is 4 o’clock Tuesday afternoon, lazy time at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

The Padres have come home from the most dismal trip they have experienced in years, winning only one of 10 games on a swing through Cincinnati, Houston and San Francisco.

One of them, of course, had a trip that was nothing short of sensational. He batted .548, moving up the charts to No. 2 in the National League. What’s more, he was in the midst of a 13-game streak in which he was hitting .520.

Tony Gwynn.

So who was that lonely figure taking early batting practice at 4 p.m.?

Tony Gwynn.

That’s the kind of dedication that makes this guy no more than an even-money pick to win his fourth batting title of the decade.

Except Tony Gwynn was not a happy camper.

“It’s gone,” he said.

Huh? Come again?

“Whatever got me going,” he said, “it’s gone. Fifteen minutes of batting practice, and I’ve forgotten everything I ever knew.”

You mean you batted for 15 minutes and didn’t hit anything hard?

“Poof,” he said. “It wasn’t there. I hit a couple, but the feeling wasn’t the same. There’s a feeling you get, when you go up there and just know you’re going to hit it. You wait back and you see it good and you know you’re going to hit it and hit it hard. You don’t even have to think.”

When Tony Gwynn is hitting it, no one hits it better. At least no one has hit it better lately.

He made the greatest comeback in baseball history to win the batting title last year. A year ago Tuesday, he was hitting .237, his low mark for the year and maybe his career. He roared back to bat .313 for the year.

The tear on the just-completed trip was reminiscent of the tear that took him to that title. And that tear was reminiscent of last July, when he hit .406 for the month.

“From the beginning of the month to the end, I had the feeling,” he said. “God, that was a great streak.”

The Feeling.

Sometimes, it goes away.

“The feeling’s not there,” he complained before Tuesday night’s game. “I know it’s going to be a battle, a grind. I’ll have to bear down. When you go to the plate and you’re not hitting well, you think about your hands and you think about your hips and you think about your stride and you think about the position of the bat. If you have injuries, you throw them in there too and think about them.”

Could it be, Tony, that perhaps you are guilty of over-thinking?

“I know maybe it doesn’t make sense,” he said, “but that’s the way I am. When I’m not hitting well, that’s the way I have to be.”

It seems to work for the man. He does not seem to get into or stay in mix-ups for long.

“Last year,” he said. “I got into a drought that lasted 2 1/2 months.”

That would have been April, May and half of June of last year. Naturally, he would not mention that he had surgery on his left hand in spring training and missed 21 games after injuring his right thumb on May 7.

But this was a different situation Tuesday. In fact, it seemed an almost baffling predicament.

Here he was, seemingly in the midst of a hot streak, and he was looking to find the swing.

After all, he had taken the day off Monday. Everybody did, because there wasn’t a game. It would not have been unusual for Gwynn to take a few swings, even on the first day home after a 10-day trip, but this time he didn’t.

So there he was at the ballpark and in the batting cage while most of his teammates were working their way out of their street clothes and into their uniforms. He was looking and talking as if he had struck out five times Sunday, like Jack Clark did, or gone hitless since May 21, like Rob Nelson has done, or gone five for 61 since May 23, like Chris James has done.

And Tony Gwynn was hitting .356 as he sat there and gritted his teeth.

So why, Tony? Why come out for extra hitting?

“Well, I took the day off yesterday and didn’t hit,” he said. “I just wanted to see if I still had it. I just wanted to see if The Feeling was there. So far, I’d say, ‘No, it’s not.’ ”

Gone. Goodby. History.

I felt for the guy. He would probably go oh-for-the-home stand. Maybe hit only .237 after June 13 this year.

Fat chance.

This was simply Tony Gwynn’s way of getting himself ready, worrying himself into another tear. It might seem as if he was worrying himself into a slump, like a hypochondriac finds himself a headache.

But this is just Tony Gwynn. This is just his way of doing things.

It works.