Hocking Is One Athlete Who Isn’t Tough as Nails

There is only thing one thing that keeps me from winning a Pulitzer Prize.

I refer you to Denny Hocking, born in Torrance, married to a die-hard Angel fan and about to move into a new home in Orange. He plays baseball for the Minnesota Twins.

Hocking did his very best Sunday, collected two hits, one run batted in and caught the ball for the final out to send the Twins into the American League championship series. As an added bonus, he earned a chance to play against the Angels, a team he cheered for as a teenager.

And so in celebration like the rest of the Twins, Hocking joined his teammates in a pileup near the mound after beating Oakland. A teammate came along in metal spikes and stepped on his right hand, splitting the nail on the middle finger and knocking him out of the ALCS.

Hocking refused to identify the teammate, telling the media, “He was someone I’m feuding with, that’s why I won’t name him.”

Now you know why I write the way I do, and why I can never allow myself to get better and win the Pulitzer Prize, writers and fellow columnists piling atop me to celebrate, my two typing fingers somewhere down below, and sports editor Bill Dwyre standing somewhere above.

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FOR ALL we know Hocking might have won his own Pulitzer Prize by now--had it not been for Dwyre.

Ten years ago this week a Denny Hocking byline appeared in The Times atop his football story on Palisades’ 33-0 victory over Los Angeles, just one of a number of stories he wrote for the City Times, while ultimately answering to Dwyre.

“I never heard of the guy,” Dwyre shouted, and I wonder if Patton said the same thing when first told he had slapped some battle-fatigued private.

I can only imagine what Mr. Inspiration said to Hocking to make him turn to baseball full time. We’ve all been there, ready to quit and become professional athletes after listening to Dwyre’s criticism, but if everyone left the newspaper, that would leave Dwyre writing all the stories.

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HOCKING SOUNDED depressed when I talked to him by telephone. I told him, “Don’t worry, they’ll never allow Dwyre to write all the stories.”

That seemed to pep him up, and when I said it’s a shame he became a utility player when he could’ve had Bill Plaschke’s job as sports columnist, I got the feeling he knows what a utility player makes and what a columnist is paid.

“There are a lot of people worse off than me,” Hocking said, and of course Plaschke has written about most of them. “All I ever asked for was the chance to play in the postseason, and I got it in a pivotal game, and if that winds up being my professional postseason career, so be it.”

Infielder David Lamb will take Hocking’s place on the roster, while the hand masher remains a mystery. (We’ll probably learn it was Dwyre.) Hocking said Monday it was Jacque Jones, but late in the day said it wasn’t Jones.

He said he was joking when he told reporters, “it was premeditated” when someone stepped on his hand. But he said, it’s true, he had words with a teammate a month ago, and so there was a feud, “but it was blown way out of proportion.”

Whatever happened, Hocking will once again be a spectator when the Angels return from Minnesota and play as many as three games in Edison Field.

“I grew up a Dodger fan, but as soon as I got my driver’s license my mom liked the idea of me driving to see the Angels play instead of driving to Chavez Ravine, so I became an Angels’ fan,” Hocking said. Most sportswriters are Dodger fans, because no one wants to drive to Anaheim.

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DWYRE JUST called from the golf course with some more of his inspiration. “Why don’t you write a meaningful column for a change, and suggest they stop all this stupid champagne partying after a team wins four games. I’m so sick of seeing them do that, and it’s only for the benefit of ESPN.”

The Twins and Angels needed to win only three games each to start spraying each other with champagne, and this is one more reason why Dwyre will never be allowed to write all the stories. As for the champagne baths, I think that’s a lot better than having them drink the stuff and get arrested while trying to drive home.

As for TV, I’m going to appear daily on ESPN beginning Oct. 28 in a new show, “Around the Horn.” So if the champagne parties are being staged just for the benefit of ESPN, I would think that’s a good thing just as long as the players understand I can’t have my hair messed up if I’m about to go on air.

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GIVEN YOUR choice right now, how would you vote? 1) We’ll take the Chargers; 2) We’ll take the Colts; 3) We’ll take no one.

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EAST COAST bias, or clueless in the West? In the Associated Press top 25 poll, 73 of the 74 voters selected Miami No. 1, while the football expert from the Los Angeles Daily News picked Texas No. 1.

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THE DODGERS named Joe Thurston minor leaguer of the year after he had 196 hits in 136 games.

Note to Mark Grudzielanek: Thurston is a second baseman.

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TODAY’S LAST word comes in e-mail from John Ward:

“What a [jerk, rotten guy, dummy] you are. I seem to remember a self-centered, arrogant [jerk, rotten guy, dummy], who referred to the Angels as a ‘joke’ last February.”

You’re the first person to say something I wrote was memorable.

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The (jerk, rotten guy, dummy) can be reached at t.j.simers@latimes.com.