No Matter What, Evans Is Enduring : Baseball: At 38, he has gone through a lot with his family and the Red Sox, but his performance has been consistently excellent.

He is as lasting as the Green Monster that looms over left field in Fenway Park, as much a landmark in Boston as the Citgo sign perched over the Monster’s shoulder outside the bandbox ballpark.

Dwight Evans is a living link to the few glories the Red Sox have savored in the last two decades.

He is graying a bit, but the 38-year-old Santa Monica native and Chatsworth High School graduate is no relic overstaying his welcome. Although a back problem prevents his playing right field, where he won eight Gold Gloves, Evans perseveres through trials both personal and professional to remain among the top craftsmen of the hitting game.

Any suggestion that he is stoic; that he deserves admiration for bearing the disappointment of 17 years without a World Series championship; that he handles the pain of an injury that has reduced his role and the heartbreak of a serious illness that afflicts his two sons, brings a smile to a face that is as weathered and strong as a New England cottage.

“It’s just a game we get paid quite a bit of money for,” he said on a recent blustery spring day at Fenway Park. “I feel fortunate and blessed in my family and my career. I’m grateful I’ve played the game this long in this town. When I see guys packing up and moving, I think of how we’ve been in the same house since 1976.

“To play this long is a privilege and an honor. We are New Englanders. I grew up in Hawaii and was raised in L.A., but what I see out there is nice weather for New England. I like it here. This is home.”

The back woes, which are a stress fracture and a bone spur at the top of his tailbone, have limited him to designated-hitter duty since last August. To call him limited, though, is to underestimate Dwight Evans.

His .273 career average is fairly modest by the standards of Carl Yastrzemski and Ted Williams, whose memories he competes with every day, but Evans is the only major league player with 100 or more runs batted in the last three seasons, and his 334 RBIs in those seasons is second only to the 335 amassed by Toronto’s George Bell, who is eight years Evans’ junior.

Evans enjoyed his best season in 1987, at 35, when he hit .305 with 34 home runs and 123 RBIs and tied for the league lead with 106 walks. He hit .285 last season, including .299 as a DH, fifth-best in the league. With 20 home runs, he became the only major leaguer to hit 20 or more homers in every season since 1981.

Significantly, he hit .327 with runners in scoring position and had 44 multihit games.

Evans’ RBI total of 1,302--including a team-leading 19 this season--puts him among the most productive active players and in the top 50 all time. He is in the top 30 in extra bases, is in the top 50 in games played and is tops in home runs among active players with 374. This season, he is hitting .248 overall.

Defensively, he was among the best, as will be confirmed by anyone who saw his spectacular catch to rob the Cincinnati Reds’ Joe Morgan of a home run in Game 6 of the 1975 World Series and his ensuing rifle-like throw to double Ken Griffey off first base.

As much as he would like to return to right field, though, the prospects look dim. Not only is there the matter of Boston’s acquisition of Tom Brunansky from St. Louis last week, but Evans’ balky back simply won’t permit it.

“I can play with it. Some days it’s better than others, and the only thing I can do is go day by day,” said Evans, who is with the Red Sox this weekend at Anaheim Stadium. “I’d love to be back in the outfield but I can’t, and if I can’t, I just want to help the ballclub.

“It’s like a rose bush with a thorn. It doesn’t really bother me just walking and doing normal things, but when I accelerate, there’s discomfort. Sometimes it brings you to your knees and sometimes it’s bearable.”

He has borne the aches and pains that every player knows--and other, deeper aches that bring pain to the heart.

Evans’ oldest son, Timothy, 17, was a toddler when it was learned that he had neurofibromatosis, sometimes called “Elephant Man’s disease.” Those afflicted develop soft tumors on or under the skin, and they also can have bone defects. Timothy had 10 operations between 1975 and ’78.

Justin Evans, 13--the third child of Dwight Evans and his high school sweetheart, Susan--also has the disease and recently underwent surgery to remove a tumor from the base of his skull. The Evanses’ 14-year-old daughter, Kirstin, has not been affected.

“You don’t like to make excuses, but these things hurt,” Evans said before leaving to be with Justin for the latest operation. “They hurt a lot. How do you handle something like this, when part of your flesh isn’t right? How do you handle it?”

By his own admission, he did not handle his tribulations well when his children and his career were in their infancy. He was forbidding, given to brooding, in a clubhouse where levity was never the norm.

“I was probably immature at one time, for a long time,” said Evans, who also credits his Christian faith for much of his strength. “I think I’ve matured. . . . The trouble with the children, not knowing how to cope with it being a young father, coming from the park and going to the hospital. I was booed and I’d say, ‘Why?’ But I’ve matured since then, and I’m glad I’ve been able to stay around the game long enough to reap some of the benefits.”

He benefited immensely from the tutelage of hitting guru Walt Hriniak, now with the Chicago White Sox, who began working with him in 1980. Evans was hitting .194 at that year’s All-Star break and was being platooned in right field. His average for eight seasons through ’80 was .262.

In the nine seasons since, through ‘89, he has hit .281 with 238 home runs--he had 128 in the previous eight--and 840 RBIs, compared with 443 before working with Hriniak.

But Hriniak did more than just change Evans’ stance. He changed Evans’ outlook on life, with Hriniak’s own devotion to family and baseball serving as a model for Evans’ priorities.

“Walt Hriniak taught me how to approach the game and about a good work ethic,” he said. “Hard work does pay off. A lot of people say practice makes perfect, but to me, to practice perfect makes it perfect. Walt taught me a lot on and off the field about consistency. He helped me out a lot in my life.”

What is missing from Evans’ life is the kind of adoration Boston fans showered upon Williams and Yastrzemski late in their careers, yet Evans is unconcerned. Asked if he ranks himself with that storied pair and with another great Red Sox outfielder and Hall of Famer, Tris Speaker, Evans demurs.

“I couldn’t answer that,” said Evans, whose contract calls for a $1.4-million salary this season, with a club option for the same amount in 1990.

“Yaz was a great player. Ted Williams, I saw pictures of Ted Williams playing. We’ve had some great players here, some of the greatest who ever played the game. I don’t look at things like (a place in history).

“For me, things go back to 1980. Looking back at the years since then, I’ve averaged 25 home runs and 80 RBIs. It’s kind of nice to achieve that. Those things are nice and good, but I have to say the most important thing is winning. The reason I’ve been consistent is because I play to win.”

That the Red Sox haven’t won a World Series remains a major source of regret.

“We had some great, great power teams, great pitching clubs,” he said when asked if he was surprised that he and the Red Sox had not made it to the World Series in his career more than their two losing visits, in 1975 to the Cincinnati Reds and in ’86 to the New York Mets.

“In the mid-’70s and ‘80s we had power-packed clubs,” he said. “That should have been good enough to get us in three or four World Series and win two or three World championships. We just didn’t do it. . . . Of all the years, ’75 was the most important.

“It seems like I’ve always been in a pennant race. In ‘72, I came up and we were a half-game out. In ‘86, I have yet to look at the video highlights because that really did hurt.”

It is a credit to his faith, his strength and his sanity that Dwight Evans has not become a bitter man. He sees no reason to be.

“God has blessed me with a talent, and I am happy with myself,” he said. “That’s the biggest thing, that I can accept myself for what I am. I’m not going to make everybody happy. I go out and do the best I can and I go home and sit and analyze it. Whether it’s good in anybody else’s eyes, I can’t say. Nobody ever hit in 162 games. If you’re successful three out of 10 times at the plate, you’re doing well.

“My family’s No. 1, but the game has been great to me. I haven’t hurt the game, and I want to keep playing for a long time.”

HOW EVANS RANKS AMONG ACTIVE PLAYERS

STATISTICS THROUGH FRIDAY

GAMES

Player Team No. Bill Buckner Boston 2,509 Dwight Evans Boston 2,411 Robin Yount Milwaukee 2,318 Dave Winfield N.Y. Yankees 2,279 Dave Parker Milwaukee 2,201 George Brett Kansas City 2,165 Carlton Fisk Chicago White Sox 2,164

RUNS

Player Team No. Dwight Evans Boston 1,382 Robin Yount Milwaukee 1,353 Dave Winfield N.Y. Yankees 1,321 George Brett Kansas City 1,315

HITS

Player Team No. Bill Buckner Boston 2,714 Robin Yount Milwaukee 2,630 George Brett Kansas City 2,571 Dave Winfield N.Y. Yankees 2,434 Dave Parker Milwaukee 2,302 Dwight Evans Boston 2,289 Eddie Murray Dodgers 2,200 K. Hernandez Cleveland 2,173

DOUBLES

Player Team No. George Brett Kansas City 519 Bill Buckner Boston 498 Robin Yount Milwaukee 484 Dave Parker Milwaukee 477 Dwight Evans Boston 461 K. Hernandez Cleveland 425 Dave Winfield N.Y. Yankees 415 Frank White Kansas City 395

HOME RUNS

Player Team No. Dwight Evans Boston 374 Dave Winfield N.Y. Yankees 359 Eddie Murray Dodgers 358 Dale Murphy Atlanta 357 Carlton Fisk Chicago White Sox 336 Andre Dawson Chicago Cubs 327 Dave Parker Milwaukee 308 Gary Carter San Francisco 305

RUNS BATTED IN

Player Team No. Dave Winfield N.Y. Yankees 1,444 Dave Parker Milwaukee 1,356 George Brett Kansas City 1,322 Dwight Evans Boston 1,302 Eddie Murray Dodgers 1,294 Bill Buckner Boston 1,207 Carlton Fisk Chicago White Sox 1,172 Gary Carter San Francisco 1,146