BASEBALL ’90 PREVIEW : Padres Get Good Hitter, Good Man in Joe Carter : Power Plus: When the Padres acquired him from the Cleveland Indians, they added much more to the team than just home runs and speed.

The telephone calls rouse him in the morning. They awaken him at night. They come at all hours of the day. The only consistent pattern is that they usually occur at the beginning of the month.

When you have 10 brothers and sisters and 38 nephews and nieces, telephone calls from your kin are expected.

When you’ve just signed a three-year, $9.2-million contract with the Padres, including a $2-million signing bonus, you can usually guess what they want.

“I keep telling the kids, ‘Call him sometimes when you don’t need anything,’ ” Athelene Carter said. “ ‘Call him just to talk. Just don’t call him every time you need something.’

“But they don’t listen.

“I keep telling my son to start saying no. Don’t give them something every time they ask for money to help pay the bills.

“But my son, he doesn’t listen either. He just keeps giving and giving. Something tells me that will never change.”

When your son is Joe Carter, considered one of the purest and most wholesome players in baseball, what can you do but shrug your shoulders and be proud of the type of person you raised?

“Even today, when I mention to someone that I’m Joe Carter’s mother,” Athelene Carter said, “they usually start laughing. They don’t believe me. They wonder how someone like that can come from Oklahoma City.

“But I tell them. Sometime I even show them my driver’s license to prove it. You should see them then. They start treating me like I’m some kind of celebrity.

“I tell them I haven’t done anything, nothing at all. Joe’s the one. But it’s not much what he does on that baseball field. It’s what kind of person he grew up to be.

“I’m mighty proud of that.”

The Padres will publicly tell you that the reason they traded for Carter, 30, in December is because they needed another power hitter in the lineup. They’ll say how they wanted another smooth outfielder, one who could play center. They’ll even suggest that they wanted to add a little more speed to the team.

Believe what you want, but . . .

“Don’t get me wrong, all of those things are important,” said Jack McKeon, Padre manager and vice president/baseball operations. “But one of the the biggest considerations was what type person we heard Joe was. We wanted someone to fit into this clubhouse, get another leader in here.

“I heard what kind of guy he was at Cleveland, but to see it first hand, he’s even exceeded everything we thought he’d be.”

Said Padre teammate Tony Gwynn: “You know, he may be making a killing as far as his salary is concerned, but I swear to you he’s the same kind of guy he was when we played together in Boulder (Colo.) in ’80. When he got into town, he came over to my room and immediately got me in a headlock and started giving me noogies.

“I think I was happier than even Joe when they traded for him. I got a buddy now I can hang with. Hey, you’re not going to find a better man than that guy.”

Funny, since receiving his $2-million bonus from the Padres in December, there have been no extra cars in the garage, no fur coats in the closet, no luxurious getaways to vacation resorts.

“Well, I did buy a couple of sweaters for myself,” Carter said. “They were the kind like Bill Cosby wears, so they weren’t cheap. But, uh, that was about it. That’s about all I spent.”

Hmmm. Those close to Carter claim he’s fibbing a bit here, that he spent much more than he’s letting on.

Does he really think anyone is going to swallow that it’s just a coincidence that both of his parents retired within two months of his getting his bonus?

Does he really think he’s fooling anyone by leaving a brand new Lincoln, with a red ribbon on top, in his mother’s driveway?

Does he expect us to believe that he didn’t dig deep into his pockets on Feb. 8 and 9 when he took his nieces and nephews to the department store in Oklahoma City, telling them to pick out anything they wanted?

Does he think us so gullible that we believe he has nothing to do with the fact that all of his brothers and sisters miraculously have no more problems getting in their rent and car payments on time?

“He may want you to think he’s just like everyone else,” said Tom Candiotti, a former Cleveland Indian teammate, “but to me, he’s got the biggest heart of anyone I’ve ever known. I knew whoever got Joe would be extremely fortunate. Not just because of his baseball abilities, but to be around that kind of person.

“Ever since I came to Cleveland in ‘86, Joe was the heart and soul of the team. He was a class act not only on the field, but off the field. I don’t think you’ll ever be able to find anything bad about Joe Carter.

“Really, what more can you ask for?”

The trouble, of course, is that the Padre front office and fans crave more. Much more.

They demand a pennant, just like they one they were told would come last season. They are still awaiting delivery.

Carter, 6-feet-3, 215 pounds, hears the talk each time he steps into the clubhouse. There’s not a day that goes by, he says, without someone talking about the pennant. The expectations of the players, front office, fans and media are beyond anything he has experienced.

Oh, there was the spring in 1987, when there was talk of a pennant in Cleveland. The Indians were the chic pick of the year, even splashed on the cover of Sports Illustrated.

No one was talking about the Indians by the end of April. They were well on their way to a last place finish and a 61-101 record.

It was the last time the Indians have been picked to win the division. It might be another 20 years before they’re picked again.

“All of the media was talking about us, how we were going to win it,” Carter said, “but we didn’t buy it. We knew we didn’t have the pitching staff to do anything.

“I mean, come on, we had five guys who had career years, and we still finished in third place the year before.

“This is something totally different. Everybody believes in this. Everybody has this confidence, and it’s been there all spring.

“But people can talk all they want. Talk gets you nowhere. You better do it on the field.”

The Padres found that out last season when they were just about everybody’s pick to win the National League West. By the end of spring training, during which they had the best exhibition record in franchise history, they started talking about it themselves.

“It was kind of crazy,” said Jack Clark, the first baseman who had joined the team in the off-season. “Everybody kept talking about a pennant. I couldn’t understand it.

“I kept looking around the clubhouse, seeing all of the holes we had, and said, ‘Well, OK.’ I mean, I hadn’t been in the National League West for a while. I was thinking maybe it was a lot weaker than I thought.

“Unfortunately, I was right.

“But now I look around here with Joe, and just adding his bat in the lineup, along with all of the other improvements we made, you can’t help but like this team’s chances.”

After all, when you add 31 home runs and 108 RBIs, which is what Carter averaged the past four seasons for the Indians, you can’t help but believe you’re going to have a better team.

Then again, you wonder, if the guy is all that good, then why in the world did Cleveland ever let him go in the first place?

Carter is a Christian who in his few weeks with the Padres already has become the leader of the chapel service. He tries to read the Bible every night before bed. He doesn’t drink, doesn’t smoke, doesn’t chew tobacco. And rarely, if ever, will you catch him using profanity.

But he is not a pushover. If you don’t treat Joe Carter right, he remembers. And never, ever, did he allow the Indians to forget what happened in 1987.

Carter was coming off a monstrous year in 1986, batting .302 with 29 home runs and a league-leading 121 RBIs, the most by a Cleveland player since 1953. He never went more than two games without a hit.

It was a virtual perfect season, except for one tiny flaw. Carter still was 29 days shy of being eligible for arbitration when it was over. The Indians didn’t let that fact slip by them.

When the Indians sent out contracts over the winter, Carter’s was for $160,000--$30,000 less than he made the previous season. Carter looked at the figure. Did a double-take. And ripped up the contract.

Carter was informed that this was just the Indians’ initial offer. He was told by club officials not to worry, he’d be taken care of. Carter believed them. He left his family in Leawood, Kan., for one week in January to participate in the Indians’ annual winter caravan through northern and central Ohio, western Pennsylvania and western New York.

Well, when spring training came around, Carter kept waiting for the Indians to keep their promise. Carter was asking for $437,000 and said that he would have settled for $380,000. Instead, the Indians simply renewed his contract for $250,000--a raise of $60,000.

Carter didn’t publicly ridicule the Indians. He didn’t call them liars. All he did was walk out of camp for two days, just to let them know where he stood.

“I think that was the start of things right there,” Candiotti said. “The Indians never treated him right. It was like they didn’t think he was worth that kind of money.

“So after last year, with his contract problems, you just knew he was going to be gone. You knew they were going to be bringing in a lot of new faces.

“We’ve gone through this, it seems like, every year. But I’ll tell you what, it still feels real strange not to see Joe here. Real strange.”

Carter’s relationship with the Indians, for all purposes, ended last spring when he turned down a five-year, $9.6-million contract. Carter was all ready to sign, but when he found out that just three years were guaranteed, with two one-year options, he politely said, “No, thanks.”

The media and fans immediately turned on him. It came out in the press that Carter had turned down the contract was because the Indians don’t allow wives and family to travel with the team at any time during the season.

Sure, that club policy was brought up during negotiations, but are you kidding? Do you really think that stopped Carter from signing the deal?

“That whole thing led to a lot of hard feelings,” Carter said. “People called me greedy. If I was greedy, I would have signed the contract.

“Then the thing with the team flights came out. Hey, if that was so important to me, with the money they were offering, I could have bought my own plane and chartered for all of the wives myself.”

When the 1989 season ended, another typical Carter year--35 homers, 105 RBIs--the Indians had to make a decision. Carter was going to be eligible for free agency after 1990, and because he informed them that he was not going to sign anything longer than a one-year contract, they were running the risk of losing him and getting nothing in return.

“We just couldn’t take that chance,” said Indians President Hank Peters.

The Indians told the world they were trading him. The Padres told the world they were interested. Shortly before midnight on Dec. 4, the deal was consummated. The Padres traded catcher Sandy Alomar Jr., third base prospect Carlos Baerga and left fielder Chris James for Carter.

“Jack made up his mind from the start of the winter meetings that he was going to get Joe Carter,” said Hugh Alexander, the Chicago Cubs’ special player consultant. “He kept plugging name after name trying to get him. Alomar, of course, was the big name, but what made it finally go was when they added Baerga.

“The Indians really didn’t know too much about him, so they asked me. I told him of all the trades I tried to make with Jack, that’s the guy I always wanted.

“I think Jack knows even today that the trade could blow up on him. I mean, Alomar and Baerga could wind up to be two pretty damn good players. But Carter is the guy he wanted, and he wasn’t going to let anyone stand in his way of getting him.”

The only hitch left was convincing Carter to sign a multi-year deal with the Padres. Carter telephoned Gwynn the following day to find out about the organization. It was about the same time that McKeon received a telephone call from John Schuerholz, the Kansas City Royals general manager.

Because Carter lives in the Kansas City area and had said his first choice was to play for the Royals, Schuerholz offered to trade McKeon right fielder Danny Tartabull.

“Bo who?” McKeon said before putting down the receiver.

Carter was signed to a three-year, $9.2 million contract the next day, with the only stipulation being that he cannot be traded to the Yankees, Mets, Montreal Expos or Detroit Tigers.

“If I have it my way,” McKeon said, “he’s not going anywhere.”

Carter checked up on the gang in Cleveland just last week. He told them how spending a spring training camp in Yuma actually isn’t all that bad. OK, so he lied a little. He told them how he had just bought a home in Poway with a pool and volleyball court in the back yard, but it’s smaller and about twice as expensive as his 6,100-square foot, $320,000 home in Kansas. He talked about playing with a new club for the first time since 1984. Even though it’s the most talented team he has ever been on, it still feels a bit strange.

“I think he’s a little homesick for us, too,” Candiotti said. “It’s not easy jumping into a team with a whole new bunch of guys. Everything’s different, and there are a lot of adjustments to make.”

It most likely will be awhile, too, before Carter feels comfortable in San Diego. He’s lived in the Midwest his entire life. When you talk about going to the beach, he wonders if you mean Lake Erie or the Mississippi.

If there hadn’t been any reservations, he said, he would have signed a four-year contract that was originally offered by the Padres or even pushed them to five years. But no, three years will do him just fine, allowing him and his family enough time to decide if they want to make it their permanent home.

“Everybody keeps telling me that I’ll like it so much, I’ll move from Kansas City,” Carter said. “I don’t know about that. We’ve got a lot of family there. We’ll check it out and see.”

Why should Carter now pass judgment on a place he doesn’t even know? Hmph. No one ever gave him the benefit of anything in his life.

You tell him how he’s gone through life without being selected to the all-state team in any sport in high school, the All-American team in college or an All-Star team in the big leagues.

“You’re kidding me,” Padre third baseman Mike Pagliarulo said. “Joe Carter has never made the All-Star team? Wow. Something’s wrong there.”

Said Carter: “People have really never respected my talents in my life. Football, basketball, baseball, you name it, no one thought much of me. I remember I was MVP of our basketball tournament my senior year and we won state, and I still wasn’t all-state.

“The only time I’ve ever made all-state, an all-star team or anything, was in track. We had just lost in the regionals in the baseball tournament my senior year, and I stopped by to watch the track team.

“The coach asked me if I wanted to do the long jump. I didn’t have anything better to do. So I borrowed a uniform and won the regional meet with a jump of 22 feet 5 inches.

“Then in state, I jumped 23 feet 1/4 inch, and won. That’s the only reason I made all-state, because they had to give that to everyone who finished first.

“I heard my whole life how nobody from Oklahoma ever makes it in baseball, and I think people still have a hard time believing it now.”

Well, with most of his peers driving BMWs and Mercedes and Carter driving a Jeep, maybe the problem is image.

“I’m telling you he’s the same person now as when we played together at Wichita State,” said Padre teammate Phil Stephenson. “Money will do a lot of different and strange things to people, but Joe is one guy who hasn’t been affected in the slightest.

“The only difference in Joe now is that he’s a much more confident person now than he was in college. It’s not a cockiness, just a strong confidence.”

That confidence and assurance is stored deep inside of Carter and seldom will publicly surface. There is no showboating or exorbitant displays of emotion when Carter plays the game. When he homers, he puts his head down and trots around the bases as quickly as possible.

“I think that’s my biggest flaw, I just don’t show enough emotion,” Carter said. “People take it the wrong way. They think I don’t care. But that’s just me, I just don’t show emotion.

“I think the last time I showed any emotion while playing was when we won the state basketball championship my senior year. I was dancing at half court and everything. And I used to always get excited when I threw touchdown passes. You remember ‘Jefferson Street’ Joe Gilliam? Well, I called myself, ‘Fifty-First Street Joe Carter.

“I just don’t do that stuff any more.

“Sorry, Neon Deion I ain’t.”

Besides, Carter said, he’s not so sure about this flawless image that everyone talks about. He has done some things wrong in his life. He and his wife, Diana, occasionally will have arguments. He has uttered an obscenity. Heck, he even got a speeding ticket last month in Kansas, his first since 1977.

“I don’t profess to be an angel,” Carter said. “There’s a lot of things I’ve done in life I’m not proud of. Being one of 11 kids, you don’t think I was perfect, do you?”

Well, how about it, mom?

“I really don’t know what Joe’s talking about,” Athelene Carter said. “He was always the mature one. But we made sure we raised him right. We never had much money, but we always made sure the children looked nice and behaved. We didn’t want anyone talking bad about the Carter kids.

“Of course, it was different then. You don’t have all of the drugs and problems in schools you have now. But I still don’t think that would affect Joe. No, uh-uh.

“Everybody around here knows what kind of person Joe is. I even got a call from this man in Ada, Okla., once. His son was dying of cystic fibrosis. They had given up on that child so many times, they really didn’t know how long he’d live.

“But their little boy, he was 14, he wanted to meet Joe. So I called Joe on the telephone, and he flew here the next day. He went to the boy’s house and even took him to a restaurant. He couldn’t help smiling the whole time.

“You want to know something?

“The boy is still living.

“Can you imagine, someone having that kind of effect on people?”

You don’t say.