Wakefield walks away

Tim Wakefield: A bigger pain in the ass than most people realize.

 

Tim Wakefield: So fucking old he played for a good Pirate team.

 

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The Abe Vigoda of pitchers.

 

I thought he retired years ago. Jesus.

 

This is the truth. Not a bad guy, but a handful in his own weird knucklebally way.

 

I believe Haeger blew his arm out over the winter. Which is probably a giant sign from up above that it isn't meant to be.

 

Really? Red Sox people I trust tell me he was a major pain in the ass.

 

Every Sox beat writer I've ever talked to told me Wakefield was one of the most difficult people in the whole clubhouse to deal with. That doesn't necessarily mean he was a bad guy -- I'll trust BYH that he was ultimately good, deep down -- but he somehow got this reputation as a wise old sage when privately a lot of guys couldn't stand him. When you're getting blasted three out of every four starts and you say stuff like "The fans deserve to see me go for 200 wins" I think it reveals you weren't exactly the team first guy some people assumed you were.

 

You know that the Red Sox are hoping to have both Tim Wakefield and Jason Varitek at Fenway Opening Day to throw out the first pitch.

 

Wakefield's self-confidence fluttered like his signature pitch. Very slow to warm to people (especially unfamiliar faces toting notebooks and microphones), very untrusting, always thinking he was one bad outing away from getting demoted to Triple-A again or getting left off the playoff roster. In his defense, he had plenty of reason to think that. He did go from baseball's out-of-nowhere success story to flirting with a 6.00 ERA at Triple-A in his final three years with the Pirates, and prior to Francona, Sox managers took advantage of his versatility without expressing much appreciation for it. Of course, it's easy to say the guy is making millions, who needs a pat on the back, but everyone's human.

Anything you hear and read about his importance in 2004 is true--Wakefield made the ALCS comeback possible by sopping up innings in the Game Three blowout--and I think he was really beloved in that particular veteran-laden clubhouse. But he definitely had a me-first streak as long as anybody else's (ask Josh Bard) and I'm sure, as he grew older and everyone else grew younger, his standing there shrunk and he grew more desperate to hang on and break the Young/Clemens team record for wins (which he really really wanted). My guess is he'd like to have back that quote about the fans deserving to see him break that record, and that those were just the words of a 45-year-old guy whose body could no longer do what his mind expected.