Rosenberg Gets the Right Call, Finally, to Pitch for the Padres

Reliever Steve Rosenberg checked into the Padre team hotel Friday, took a deep breath, looked at the message light and exhaled when he realized no messages awaited.

He took a cab to the ballpark, looked around the clubhouse and smiled when there was locker with his nameplate.

When the team bus arrived, and Padre General Manager Joe McIlvaine walked over and welcomed him to the club, Rosenberg finally was able to relax.

When you’ve twice been called up to the big leagues the past three weeks and twice been told that a mistake was made, you get a little wary.

“Why do you think I didn’t wait around and take the red-eye (flight) last night?” Rosenberg said, laughing, “I didn’t want them to change their minds again.”

Rosenberg originally was called up April 11, but after he arrived, he was told minutes before the April 12 game against the Dodgers that he was ineligible because he had not spent the required 10 days in the minors. He packed up his bags, used his meal money to catch a plane back and returned to Las Vegas, $10 in the hole.

He was called up again April 27 and was walking out of the clubhouse with Derek Lilliquist when the phone rang. It was Jim Ferguson, Padre public relations director. The Padres changed their minds, and they wanted to delay putting Pat Clements on the disabled list.

So when one of the Las Vegas clubhouse attendants knocked on his hotel door at 1 a.m. and told him the Padres were calling him up, he simply laughed.

“I thought they were pulling a practical joke on me,” Rosenberg said. “I’m thinking, ‘Come on, if I was being called up, why didn’t someone call me?’

“But then I found out my son had turned the ringer off the phone. They had called; we just didn’t know it.”

This time, headed out the door as soon as possible.

“It’s been a tough time,” Rosenberg said. “When they called me up the second time, and changed their minds, it was kind of embarrassing. I walked back on the field, and my teammates wanted to know if I was going to stay and watch the game.

“I said, ‘Uh, no. They changed their minds. I’m staying.’ I had to walk back on the field in my (baseball) underwear just to get my uniform back.

“But I’m back. And it’s official. It’s hard to believe isn’t it.”

Seymour Siwoff of the Elias Sports Bureau, on Nolan Ryan’s seventh no-hitter: “You’ve got to wonder what Buzzy Bavasi and John McMullen are thinking about. This is an entertainment business. You take care of your stars. He’s got to rank right up there with Frank Sinatra. And I don’t think anyone would have ever told him, ‘You’re getting old. You’re not as good as you used to be. Will you you work for less?’ ”

Just how remarkable has Ryan been throughout his career? Consider:

- Ryan has seven career no-hitters; no one has thrown a no-hitter in Padre history.

- He has 12 one-hit games in his career: the Padres have only 13 in their franchise history.

- He has 60 career shutouts; Randy Jones has the most in Padre history with 18.

Padre shortstop Tony Fernandez, on watching his former teammates in Toronto being no-hit by Ryan: “I know everyone think it’s special, but nobody wants to be no-hit. It’s embarrassing. When Nelson Liriano broke it up in the ninth that one year for us, it was a great feeling.”

Dennis Rasmussen, who made his second rehabilitation start Thursday night in Las Vegas, surrendered five hits and six earned runs in 3 2/3 innings, walking three and striking out two. He likely will make at least one more start before being called up. . . . Padre starter Greg Harris, who’s on the disabled list with tendinitis in his right elbow, pitched on the side of the first time since being injured, ans is expected to come off the disabled list May 8. . . . Clements underwent a magnetic resonance imaging test on his ailing left shoulder, which showed no abnormalties. . . . The Padres have had 11 games this season in which outcome hinged on the final pitch of the game. In those games, the Padres won one game, lost one game, held on to win six games and failed to catch up in three games. . . . Eric Nolte (3-1) and Rick Mahler (1-2) are the scheduled starters in today’s 10:35 a.m. game against the Montreal Expos.