PADRE NOTEBOOK : Gwynn Challenges Story on Doll, Clark

All-Star outfielder Tony Gwynn says he believes the Padres fabricated a story last season in an attempt to squelch his feud with Jack Clark, and blames management for failing to mediate the conflict with his former teammate.

Gwynn, in a 30-minute admonishment Sunday, also publicly ripped Clark for the first time, saying that Clark’s continual criticism of him simply is the result of jealousy.

It was Gwynn’s accusations that the Padres lied in an attempt to hide the mutilated doll incident, however, that was most intriguing.

The Padres announced in the final week of the 1990 season that an internal investigation determined a groundskeeper was responsible for the placement of a mutilated doll of Gwynn in the dugout. The doll had a noose around its neck and was hanging by a rusty chain.

When the Padres announced their findings, they said the groundskeeper would remain anonymous, but that he would personally apologize to Gwynn. It has been five months, and Gwynn has yet to receive an apology. Although Gwynn refuses to indict any teammates, he believes the Padres lied in a cover-up.

“I don’t believe it (the Padres’ story), not for a minute,” Gwynn said. “I never believed it in the first place. The owners, they covered it up, and they made things worse.”

Gwynn said that he was telephoned by Dick Freeman, Padre president, before the announcement, who informed him of the culprit, but said the club simply was attempting a cover-up.

“When Dick called me,” Gwynn said, “he told me, ‘Tony, the heat’s on us. We’ve got to make this announcement.’

“I said, ‘I know the heat’s on you. Go ahead and do what you have to do.’ ”

When contacted Sunday afternoon at his La Jolla home, Freeman denied that their discovery was fabricated, and maintained that a groundskeeper was responsible.

“I don’t know the name of the guy,” Freeman said, “Bill Wilson (stadium operations director) said one of the groundskeepers had come forward and told him about it. He even told me the name, but I forget it.

“It’s as simple as that. That was the end of it.”

Gwynn also blames the Padre management for allowing his feud with Clark to fester the entire season. As soon as he was accused by Clark of being selfish, Gwynn said the feud should have been halted by Jack McKeon, then-Padre manager.

“Jack was manager when this thing started,” Gwynn said. “Where was he? He was the one in charge. He should have said, ‘Keep your mouth shut.’

“But it just kept going and going and going.”

And it still has yet to cease. Although he’s 3,000 miles away in Winter Haven, Fla., with the Boston Red Sox, Clark continues to publicly criticize Gwynn, with the latest statement coming over the weekend.

“I would have liked to have been back just for the fact to get in his face some more,” Clark told reporters in Winter Haven.

Gwynn, who had been listening to Clark’s criticism for nearly nine months without publicly responding, decided Sunday afternoon that he could no longer remain quiet.

“Tell Jack Clark to shut up and play baseball. He says that? I’d love to go to Boston and face him. I’d love to see what he’d say. I bet he wouldn’t say crap,” Gwynn said.

“I’m tired of being on the defensive. If you want to know the bottom line, it’s that he’s jealous. That’s how all this got started, jealousy. The man was afraid I was going to be making more money than he was. They were talking about an extension with me, and they weren’t talking with him.”

In the end, Gwynn wound up receiving a three-year, $12.25 million contract extension from the Padres. Clark was told to take a hike, and signed a three-year contract with the Boston Red Sox that will guarantee him $8.7 million, and could be worth as much as $10.3 million.

“He talks about being selfish,” Gwynn said. “Let’s talk about his deficiencies. Let’s talk about why he doesn’t have to fly with the team on team flights. Let’s talk about why he walks 104 times a year when he’s the cleanup hitter? Let’s talk why he gets kicked out of games so he can stay home?

“What does he ever do? He hits home runs. He strikes out. He walks. That’s what they pay him for?”

It was during the May 24 team meeting in New York that the Clark-Gwynn feud became openly hostile. Taunts were traded. Factions were formed. And sides were taken.

“I think the whole meeting was orchestrated,” Gwynn said. “Jack (McKeon) got up and said, ‘Tempy (Garry Templeton) has something to say. And it started from there.

“I don’t think anybody in that room thought it was going to get as big as it did.”

The Padre clubhouse never again was the same. Open hostility prevailed.

And if anyone was running the team by the end of the season, Gwynn said, it was Clark.

“He thought he was above the manager,” Gwynn said. “He was telling me he thought I should be doing. Not Jack McKeon. Not Greg Riddoch thought. Not the organization.”

“Nobody said, ‘You were selfish, or anything else. There was a double-standard. It just shows you what kind of influence the man has. For two years, guys were intimidated by the guy. Whatever he said, they followed.

“Most of the time they were expressing their opinion. When they were expressing their opinion, I can live with that,” Gwynn said. “But when they say something that was not true at all, it bothers me.

“Everybody wanted to focus on Jack, like whatever he said is gospel, and that’s not right.”

But now, it’s a new year with new management. Clark is gone. Mike Pagliarulo is gone. Fred Lynn is gone. The only remaining player who bashed Gwynn in the team meeting, or in the newspapers, is Templeton.

“Hey, what happened is over with,” Templeton said. “I don’t hold any grudges. It happened, but it’s over. Hell, I’ve known Tony longer than anyone here. If he doesn’t know by now that I don’t dislike him, he’ll never know.”

Said Gwynn: “That’s what he says, that he was trying to be the mediator. But I have the articles at home. I can pull them out. There were two weeks of stuff said that I didn’t think was fair.

“But I’m here now, and I’m going to stay here. I want to focus on baseball, and forget all of this stuff,” Gwynn said.

“The guy in Boston, I can’t stop him. There’s nothing I can say. Nothing’s been able to stop him before. Every time the guy opens his mouth, he’s telling people what kind of guy he is.

“I’d like to tell him, ‘Just play baseball, will you. And if you’re going to talk about last year, tell the truth.’

“Somewhere down the line, we’ll run into each other, and then we’ll see who has their fun.”

Padre Notes

Padre outfielder Darrin Jackson did a whole lot of damage in the Padres’ intrasquad game Sunday, hitting a double and a 430-foot home run that landed atop a row of cars, cracking a windshield . . . Robbie Beckett, the Padres’ No. 1 in the 1990 draft, was not quite so fortunate. He allowed two runs, two walks, a single, and hit a batter. “I went over to him after the game,” Manager Greg Riddoch said, “and said getting your feet wet sometimes isn’t always pretty.”