Like It or Not, Erstad Leading Off

Darin Erstad is a leadoff hitter who isn’t one.

He knows it. His manager knows it. His manager knows he knows it.

But circumstances and a lack of better alternatives leave the Angels with no other choice, so come opening day, Terry Collins will write Erstad’s name in the No. 1 spot, then ask him to “just be Darin Erstad.”

“No, he is not going to be the prototype leadoff hitter, the guy that works the count, takes a lot of pitches,” Collins said. “Darin Erstad can hit homers. When he gets his pitch, I want him to hit it. The more he does it, the better he’ll be at it.

“I’m sure if you ask him he’s not that excited about leading off. But he’s our best runner, so he’s going to do it, because that’s what we wanted him to do.”

Erstad led the Angels with 23 stolen bases last season, ninth best in the American League. He scored 99 runs too.

It sounds like leadoff material. But he walked only 51 times. In his 138 at-bats as a leadoff hitter last season before the Angels traded for Tony Phillips in May, Erstad’s on-base percentage was .318. He isn’t fooled.

“I don’t think I’m a leadoff hitter,” Erstad said. “I’m not a Rickey Henderson-, Tony Phillips- or Kenny Lofton-type of player.

“I get on base a little bit. I can run a little bit. Of course, then I’m not your normal first baseman either. It’s all screwed up.”

By all rights, Erstad should be playing in the outfield and batting third. He’s stuck out of position and out of order.

But you know what? It’s going to work. It will work because Erstad will make it work.

Watch him at the plate. He doesn’t have the fluid swing of Will Clark or Ken Griffey Jr. He simply gets hits. Again and again. He batted .299 in his first full season in the majors last year, and he probably will surpass .300 this year.

When he gets to first base, he somehow gets to second.

“I don’t have great, great speed like a [Chuck] Knoblauch or a [Brian] Hunter,” Erstad said. “You’ve got to study the pitchers, get the reads. I’ve got to make up with that. I’m still learning. Last year was the first time I’ve really ever stolen bases or even thought about it.”

He put his mind to it and he did it. Same thing with first base. You think it’s easy being on the receiving end of Dave Hollins’ throws? Erstad’s .990 fielding percentage ought to come with an asterisk for exceptionally trying circumstances.

Perhaps it should not be considered exceptional for a player picked No. 1 overall in the 1995 draft to do this well. Maybe he ought to do even more. But in the unpredictable world of drafting, sometimes you come out ahead merely by not having a bust.

The Angels have another good young player on their hands. He’s a talented enough athlete to have played baseball and football at Nebraska (he was a punter and kicker on the Cornhuskers’ 1994 championship team).

Erstad said if there’s one thing from his football days that translates to baseball, it’s the experience of playing big games in front of big crowds.

And if there’s one thing that comes with being a Cornhusker football player in particular, it’s receiving the unmatched devotion of the team’s loyal fans.

“I haven’t come across anything like that,” Erstad said. “The only thing I’ve ever seen that resembles it a little bit is Packer football. That’s the only thing I’ve ever seen that’s even close.

“I go to Yankee Stadium, I go to the plate and I hear a chant--’Go Big Red’--from the crowd.

“There’s 30,000 people there. I don’t hear anything--you hear the buzz, you don’t hear voices--and all of a sudden you hear, ‘Go Big Red.’ A guy with a red hat, standing up, going crazy. They don’t forget who you are.

“I get letters upon letters from Nebraska. They write about anything and everything that’s ever happened, baseball or football. They’re real supportive.”

Erstad brings a little bit of that spirit to the Angels. He’ll do anything for the team. Even bat leadoff. When Collins asked him if he’d rather be in a platoon situation in the outfield or play first base full time, Erstad signed up for first base duty. That meant not only more games for Erstad, but more games for everyone in the outfield and less grumbling about playing.

The only question about him coming into this spring training was his surgically repaired right shoulder.

Ask him about it and he says sternly, “Oh, I’m ready.”

If we’ve learned nothing else about Darin Erstad, it’s that we shouldn’t doubt him.