Lefferts Still a Padre, but How Long? : Baseball: Ex-reliever to try to earn spot as starter.

The mornings were spent thumbing through the local sports sections. He tuned in to the radio talk shows during the afternoon. The TV newscasts were a must before bedtime.

When Padre pitcher Craig Lefferts wasn’t frantically searching for rumors, tidbits or innuendo about his future, he was staying by the telephone. Every time it rang, he cringed.

The anticipation was unbearable at times. The anxiety was worse than anything he ever experienced on the baseball field. There wasn’t a day that went by when he wasn’t worrying.

It was the longest winter of Lefferts’ life.

“I didn’t know where I was going to end up,” he said. “I figured I was going anywhere from Boston to Houston to Montreal. I was just waiting for the day I was traded.”

Just how extreme did the paranoia become?

Wendy Lefferts, Craig’s wife, checked into the hospital Dec. 7 to give birth to their third son. They were in the hospital room together when the television news caught their attention.

“The Padres made a move today . . . Later in sports.”

The anesthesiologist entered the room. The pain had become unbearable and Wendy requested an epidural injection. The anesthesiologist wasn’t sure what to make of Wendy’s next words.

“Stop!” she said. “You’re not doing this now. We’ve got to wait 20 minutes until the news is over.”

Said Craig: “So we waited until the sports was over. It turns out that the big news was that the Padres offered Tim Teufel arbitration.”

Who would have thought that when the Padres opened their first spring-training workout of the season today, Lefferts would be on the field with the rest of his teammates?

Yuma, Lefferts said, has never looked so beautiful.

“I still have trouble believing it,” Lefferts said. “There was just so much talk. I kept waiting and waiting. I thought it was going to happen any day for a while.

“If they still have any thoughts of trading me, I hope to change them in a hurry.”

Lefferts, in the final year of a contract that will pay him $1.875 million, has several surprises awaiting his bosses to convince them he should stay.

Remember that beer gut that expanded his jersey? It’s gone. Lefferts, adopting a fat-free diet, has shed 27 pounds the past six weeks, dropping to 199.

Remember that sore left hip that plagued him most of the season, the one that left him with a limp since May? Last week it felt normal.

And remember his career as a reliever? Those days, he hopes, are over.

Lefferts has requested--and received permission--from the Padres to vie for a spot as the fifth starter.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” starter Ed Whitson said. “Lefty? Come on, you’re pulling my leg.”

He’s serious.

Lefferts, who has gone eight years and nearly 600 games since his last major league start, will compete against Ricky Bones and Dave Eiland, among others, for the fifth starter’s job.

“I’ve always wanted to be a starter,” said Lefferts, who last started in 1983 with the Chicago Cubs. “It’s been a dream of mine. The way I figure it, with the way my situation is now, there’s no better time.”

Lefferts, 34, came up with the idea during the Christmas and New Year’s holidays. He knew his days as Padres bullpen stopper were over Dec. 9 when they acquired Randy Myers from the Cincinnati Reds. He figured it was only a matter of days before his time in San Diego would end, too.

But a funny thing happened. The holidays came and went. Informal workouts began at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium. And Lefferts was still a Padre.

Considering he had lost his job, and the Padres have plenty of candidates for the rest of the bullpen, Lefferts decided he had nothing to lose by applying for the vacant starter’s job. He called Joe McIlvaine, Padre general manager, and announced his candidacy.

“I didn’t have a problem with it,” McIlvaine said. “I told him I’d call Greg (Riddoch, Padre manager), and if it was fine with him, it was fine by me.

“I still prefer Craig to be in the bullpen, but it won’t hurt anything by trying.”

Said Riddoch: “I thought it was a great idea. Why not? Lefty might really be able to help us. I’m all for it.”

Now Lefferts only needs to persuade his teammates this isn’t a hoax.

“I think a lot of people still need to be convinced,” he said. “But I really want to see if I can do it. I’d just like them to be serious about the opportunity, too.

“I want to go all spring as a starter, work up to six innings, and be given a legitimate shot. I really don’t see why I can’t do it. My heart’s totally in it.

“We need another left-hander in the rotation, anyway.”

Although it’s much more common for starters to become relievers, it also has worked in reverse. Greg Harris of the Padres made the transition a year ago. So did the other Greg Harris and Joe Hesketh of the Boston Red Sox. Mark Davis is attempting it in Kansas City, as is Dan Plesac in Milwaukee. Doug Jones tried it last year with the Cleveland Indians.

His teammates have trouble believing Lefferts is making the switch. They’re even more stunned the Padres have given their consent.

“I don’t want to get in the middle of it,” said starter Bruce Hurst, “but I think it would hurt us to tinker with the best part of our team, and that’s the bullpen. So it’s easy to see where I stand.”

Added reliever Larry Andersen: “Lefty told me he completed about half of his games the last time he was a regular starter. I asked him when that was. He told me it was 10 years ago in the minors.

“Uh, I really don’t think you can make the conversion based on that.”

But Lefferts is not changing his mind. He believes this is the right move for his career. Besides, if he ever listened to skeptics, Lefferts would have been out of this game a long time ago.

Lefferts was cut from his high school team, his American Legion team and his college team. He also is an asthmatic with a wandering right eye that causes double vision.

“This is nothing new,” Lefferts said, “I’ve been going through this my whole life. I get psyched up when people say I can’t do something. I like to prove them wrong.

“And I can’t wait to do it again.”

Lefferts, the free agent the Padres bought for $5.25 million in 1989 to replace Mark Davis, still maintains he’s capable of being someone’s bullpen stopper. He saved 23 of 30 opportunities last year and posted a 3.18 earned-run average the second half of the season.

But the Padres never felt they could depend on him every day. Lefferts allowed 11.6 baserunners per nine innings, and even left-handers hit .281 against him. Worse, the first batter he faced in games last year hit a whopping .333.

Lefferts contends it was simply an off-year. He sustained strained muscles in his left hip in May when he slipped on his patio, but he never let on how much it affected him. It wasn’t until last week that he was pain-free once again.

“It was bothering me,” Lefferts said, “but I didn’t want to make any excuses. . . . My mechanics got so messed up, I wasn’t doing anything right.”

Lefferts finished the season allowing only two earned runs in his last 13 appearances, yielding a 1.00 ERA. He saved five games during that stretch, striking out 19 in 18 innings. But it was too late. The Padres were going to get a bullpen stopper, and Lefferts was helpless to stop them.

“Sure, I was disappointed,” Lefferts said. “I knew McIlvaine hadn’t seen what I really was capable of doing. I didn’t feel good about it at all. I anticipated all winter that I’d be traded, and I was even told that they’d try to trade me because of financial constraints.

“But here I am.”

It probably will be weeks before the Padres determine whether Lefferts is capable of starting. Even if he’s successful, the Padres might return him to the bullpen where his trade value is stronger. In a cruel twist of fate, the better Lefferts performs, the more likely he is to be traded.

“I don’t want to go anywhere, but I know it’s out of my control,” he said. “It’s not like I’ve never been traded before. I’ll be pitching for someone.

“It’d just be nice to know for whom.”