Piniella Is Born Again but Still Very Intense : Baseball: Fiery Mariner manager reluctantly reveals change but says it has provided perspective.

Lou Piniella’s image is verified in nearly every video clip of him as a baseball player and manager. Usually hatless and with eyes bulging, Piniella is seen throwing a tantrum of some sort directed at an umpire or a piece of equipment.

Piniella must be in the Top 10 on the career lists of bat-throwers, helmet-slammers, cooler-breakers and dirt-kickers. In one of the most infamous clips of Piniella during his years as the Cincinnati Reds manager, he grappled on the floor of the clubhouse with relief pitcher Rob Dibble.

“Hot-tempered” is the phrase most often used to describe Piniella, who off the field was no stranger to night life and trips to the racetrack. So it came as a surprise around the major leagues when word leaked this spring that over the winter Piniella had become a born-again Christian.

Piniella has been reluctant to speak publicly about the new course his life is taking, but the Seattle Mariners’ manager revealed some of his thoughts in a reflective moment during the series against the New York Yankees this week.

“I’m on a better path than I used to be,” Piniella said. “I’m basically the same person, but there’s more humility, more meekness in me now. It’s true. I’m born-again. I say that because that’s what people call it. I don’t think of myself as a born-again Christian but a Christian.”

One might say a recommitted Christian. Piniella was baptized a Roman Catholic and educated in that faith’s school system. A graduate of Jesuit High School in Tampa, Fla., Piniella is now a member of Idlewild First Baptist Church in Tampa. Among the parishioners is Yankees first base coach Brian Butterfield.

“Lou and his wife, Anita, came to our church in November,” Butterfield said. “Lou joined our Bible study group and became very involved. We’d meet for two hours every Tuesday morning. Lou was always the first one there and all fired up to get started. Our pastor, Kenny Whitten, told me one of the nicest letters he has ever received was from Lou. He had to go to Seattle from Tampa on business and wrote the letter on the plane. Kenny was touched.”

“Anita is deeply religious, and she has been after me about this for years,” Piniella said. “It wasn’t any one thing that led me to it.”

That remains his secret. It is known that Piniella has had some financial problems through poor investments. He has sold three of the four restaurants he owned, maintaining holdings only in a property in Woodbridge, N.J.

For many years, baseball was enough to satisfy Piniella’s competitive drive and sense of singular purpose. Was there ever a hitter more “locked in” at the plate than Piniella? That intensity and concentration helped him to a career batting average of .291 over 18 major league seasons. He hit .305 in 18 League Championship Series games and .319 in 22 World Series games.

Piniella has remained as intense and fiery in a nine-year managerial career that includes two terms with the Yankees and a World Series championship with the Reds in 1990.

“One of the reasons I’ve been hesitant to discuss any of this publicly is because I don’t want anyone to think I’ve lost any of my intensity when it comes to baseball,” Piniella said. “More than anything, I was concerned about a loss of intensity. That probably kept me from going in this direction before.

Piniella said, however, that he will not hesitate to use profanity to make a point. “If a situation calls for me to [curse], I’ll do it,” Piniella said. “I’m trying to be a better person, but I’m a manager, not a saint.”