The Grapefruit League: It's Not if You Win or Lose, But How Tan You Get

Depending upon who you are, spring training can have a variety of meanings. If, for instance, you are Carl Yastrzemski or Fred Lynn, it means five innings of baseball, a few wind sprints in the outfield, a quick shower, and the rest of the day off.

If, on the other hand, you are Bob Heise or John Balaz, it means having to sweat out every ground out to third because it may be your last in a Red Sox uniform for quite a while.

Regardless of your playing status, however, spring training is a month in the Florida (or Arizona) sunshine, a month of drinking freshly squeezed Anita Bryant oranges and Busch Bavarian beer.

It is a month to work on tans, to predict whether you will hit .246 or .247, and to tell reporters that if everything falls into place, and the pitching comes through, then your team could be a real contender this year.

From Winter Haven to Tampa, from Bradenton to Ft. Myers, nothing differs at the 24 major league camps save for the insignia on the uniforms and the fact that of the nearly 1000 players who arrive in camps at the beginning of March, only 25 will become World Champions in October.

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"Yeah, I know where Harvard is," Pete Rose said as he awaited his turn in the batting cage at Redsland in Tampa, Florida. "Some girl on a game show last week didn't know where it was but I do," he continued.

Rose, chicly attired in baseball pants and a tee-shirt with his picture on it, was skipping an exhibition game to take extra batting practice. "You don't get no fuckin' work if you play three games in a row," Charlie Hustle explained. Rose said that he had only taken about 12 swings in the three games, but by staying behind, Rose would have many more opportunities to smack the white pill into the outfield.

Other world champion Reds had the same idea as Rose. Joe Morgan also took his turn in the cage and when he wasn't working on the baseball, he worked on his teammates. "Looks like I'm going to have to carry you guys again for the first month," Morgan chided some teammates. Eventually, the talk drifted to contracts. "They had to sign me," Morgan contended. "They already put me in the press guide."

Outfielder George Foster provided the play-by-play commentary while Bob Bailey was hitting. Bailey hit a line-drive to the outfield, and Foster screamed, "Oh what a grab by the centerfielder!" Then Bailey slashed one down the third base line, and Foster yelled, "Brooks Robinson dives and gets it!" "They're grabbing everything," Bailey responded.

George Foster has been around professional baseball for a while and knows how to gear himself for each new season. "I relaxed over the winter," Foster said. But even then, baseball is still on his mind. "I think about particular pitchers and how they pitch to me." But once he gets down to Tampa, Foster says, he works on "all facets of the game" as well as conditioning his hands, wrists and arms.

Foster had to adjust to another part of baseball, the multitude of fans and autograph seekers. "We have to try to set the best examples. Kids idolize us. We have to show that we're doing things we want to do. But the main thing is to maintain health and strength. We have a great chance of repeating."

*****

Sixty miles away from Tampa, the Red Sox practiced in Winter Haven, home of Polk Community College. The Red Sox prepared for a exhibition game with the Montreal Expos by warming up their arms in front of the stands on the first base side. Fans constantly yelled requests to the players. "Hey Yaz, look over here," one Instamatic-toting woman yelled. Carl Yastrzemski obliged by looking into the stands for a second and then resuming his warmpup. "Hey Pudgie, I came all the way down to see you," a Bosox partisan screamed to Carlton Fisk. Fisk trotted by and said, "I gotta warm up now."

The Red Sox found ample time to clown around. Carl Yastrzemski played a game of dodgeball, ducking out of the path of the ball a fraction of a second before it would hit him as it sailed in from the outfield. On the bullpen bench, outfielder Rick Miller and catcher Tim Blackwell engaged in a fierce game of hockey. Miller used the handle of a bat and shot a baseball forcing Blackwell to make some spectacular kick saves as well as a few tremendous diving saves. Blackwell also made good use of a rusty nail, poking his opponent to keep him out of the crease.

After the national anthem, the players in the bullpen had to sit down and pursue less vigorous activities, such as imitating the umpire and blowing bubbles. The home plate umpire bellowed his strike call very loudly, and Rick Miller imitated him for the first few innings. After becoming bored of that, Miller took to blowing huge bubblegum spheroids that would explode on his face.

During the bottom of the third, the Red Sox had men on first and third. Expos pitcher Steve Renko tried to get out of the situation by faking a pick-off to third and then wheeling around and throwing to first. The move didn't work. Outfielder John Balaz, who sat in the bullpen most of the game, said that the move was the same one used by some Los Angeles Dodgers pitchers. "The Dodgers use that, especially in the minor leagues," Balaz said. Less than one week later, the Sox gave Balaz the opportunity to see that move again by sending him down to the minors.

The afternoon wasn't totally relaxed, however. In the fourth inning, Gary Carter, playing left field for the Expos, chased a fly ball back to the warning track. The ball hit his glove and then he hit the wall, made of cinder blocks deceptively painted green. Immediately, the entire Expos squad dashed into left field and the chatter on the bullpen bench ceased, monentarily.

"Concussion city," pitcher Mark Bomback said as he walked over to the bullpen. "That's some bitch to hit that wall," another player said. "When he got up it looked like there was blood right here (pointing to his head)."

John Balaz recounted the time he ran into a chain-link fence during a minor league game. "I hit the crossbar, but I was luck I missed the upright because I would've been in real trouble."

After about twenty minutes, the ground crew sent a cart out to retrieve Carter, and the entire bullpen left the bench to see the fallen Expo for themselves. Carter lay on the flat back of the cart and a towel was wrapped around his face. Twenty-five minutes after arriving in the clubhouse, a Polk Country ambulance took Carter to the local hospital for treatment. "Do I get the siren and all that stuff?" Carter asked the attendants. "Sorry, but no," one attendant replied. Then as the door of the ambulance closed, Carter shouted to an Expo coach, "Hey, save my ups."

In the seventh inning, the public address announcer announced that Carter was back in Chain O'Lakes Park after having been sown up with 50 stiches. Everyone cheered.

*****

The great thing about spring training is that it's almost as important where the foul balls land as who wins the games. When a White Sox batter lofted one into the parking lot along the first base line of Payne Field in Sarasota, Pirates first baseman Willie Stargell turned to umpire Nestor Chylak and casually remarked, "Somebody got a nod on his car. Did it hit the top or the hood?"

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The Red Sox and the Expos were tied after the regulation nine innings, and as the extra frames were about to begin, newly acquired Sox reliever Tom House strolled down the right field line.

House had been responsible for holding the Expos at bay in the final innings, and was preparing to do a few wind sprints in the outfield when he was confronted by three reporters who were lounging in a nearby golf cart.

"Hey Tom, why didn't you take it easy so we could go home," one of them inquired of the John Denver look-a-like.

"Sorry," came the answer with a smile, "but not at my expense."

*****

For the established players, spring training is a paid vacation, but for those who are trying to secure one of the last places on the roster, it's a time to do what you're told, and even then you have to pray a lot.

"Hey, you shaved it off," Montreal Expos outfielder Gary Carter, who was secure, said to Red Sox catcher Tim Blackwell, who wasn't, in reference to the disappearance of Blackwell's winter beard.

"Yeah, they said to," Blackwell replied.

A week later, 'they' said good-bye to Blackwell. He would not be spending the summer in Boston.

*****

An elderly gentleman sat on the top row of the Payne Field grandstand, soaking in the Sarasota sun and keeping tabs on a Chicago White Sox-Pittsubrgh Pirates doubleheader being played below.

"Excuse me, sir, but this is White Sox country, and you have a Red Sox hat on. You must be a Boston fan."

"Are you kidding me," he retorted. "I don't even know where Boston is. This hat was given to me by a friend."