Padres Turn Calendar Back to the Future

There it is. The dateline no one thought they would see. Not in 1990. Not in The Year of the Great Lockout.

Yuma.

Baseball is being played here by major league players. Those were not the Yakult Swallows. Those were not nondescript minor leaguers with dreams. Those were . . . roll the drums . . . the San Diego Padres.

The Padres’ spring training started when spring started this time around. The Swallows are gone, presumably back to Capistrano or wherever it is that Japanese League teams play.

In a baking, blasting sun, the Padre minor leaguers left the fields, and the major leaguers filed out of the clubhouse at exactly noon on March 20 to begin a 20-day blitz to Opening Day.

“What we have to remind ourselves,” said pitcher Dennis Rasmussen, “is that it isn’t really March 20. It’s actually Feb. 18. We have to make sure we don’t do anything to rush ourselves. I’d hate to see anything bad happen to anyone because we’re so anxious to get going.”

These guys are not exactly crawling off couches and into uniform, not in this day and age. Too much is at stake. Anyone who has checked out salaries knows that. It’s a matter of translating good shape into game shape.

“We’ve got to get the arms and legs ready,” said Jack McKeon, who had been a manager with no team. “Hopefully, we can get our mental stuff ready in meetings and preachings.”

Preachings? That’s a new one.

How’s this for a preaching?

“We have to get things done quickly,” McKeon pronounced, “without being in a hurry.”

Fine. Right, Yogi.

In all due respect to everyone’s concerns, it appears this team is in pretty decent shape. An awful lot of the sights and sounds were very familiar.

Such as . . .

Scouting Reports

Fred Lynn, the newly acquired outfielder, had one.

“Where do they play you defensively,” coach Greg Riddoch asked.

“Wherever I hit it,” said Lynn.

Fan Support

“We were here the first weekend,” a fan said through the fence to Eric Show. “Where were you guys?”

Understandably, Show looked perplexed.

“What’d you do?” he asked.

“We went to the movies,” he was told, “and we walked a couple of miles a day, and we even went to the dog races.”

Show nodded, as if to say it didn’t sound as if they had missed anything.

“By the way,” another voice said, “how’s your arm?”

Excellent. No problem there. Of course, there is the little matter of coming back from back surgery.

Training Table Food

Peanut butter and jelly. Honest. The players forgot to deal with that in the collective bargaining agreement.

It will get better when Whitey Wietelmann, the club’s man about everywhere, gets his pots and pans unpacked. You know how it is when the cook gets caught off-guard by 30 unexpected guests.

Familiar Numbers

No. 11.

No, Tim Flannery has not unretired.

Craig Lefferts, back from a 2 1/2-year hiatus to San Francisco, couldn’t have the No. 37 he had previously with the Padres because Eric Nolte had it, and he couldn’t have the No. 32 he wore with the Giants because Calvin Schiraldi had it.

So he wanted No. 11, which he had worn in high school and college.

“I called Tim and asked him what he thought,” Lefferts said, “and he said it sounded good to him.”

They might as well share uniform numbers because they also share birth dates: Sept. 29, 1957.

They also share an affinity for hustling around a baseball field, Lefferts sprinting from the bullpen when he is called upon to pitch.

“The most important guy I face is the first guy,” he said. “I think sprinting to the mound gives me a psychological edge.”

(Lefferts might not need the preachings.)

Tony Gwynn’s Laments

The man is a perfectionist. That’s one reason, perhaps, why he has won three successive National League batting titles.

However, on this first day of spring training, he was having his problems hitting Bruce Hurst. He kept beating the ball into the dirt. Finally, he beat one into the dirt in front of the plate, and it skipped over Hurst’s head.

“That’s a knock,” Gwynn said, a knock being slang for a hit. “It has to be. I haven’t been able to get anything out of the infield.”

It would have been a knock, too. No one would have thrown him out. Not on March 20 anyway. Maybe on Feb. 18, except when, as Rasmussen said, Feb. 18 and March 20 are the same.

Soon, however, this spring training will become like all other spring trainings. It might be a little shorter, but all the sights and sounds are there.

Welcome back to games instead of gamesmanship.