By Jason Kendall For The Tribune-Review Sunday, March 3, 2002 BRADENTON, Fla. - The games have started and, thankfully for me, that means less fishing and more baseball. During the first two weeks of spring training, you have to find ways to stay entertained because things can get boring and drag on you. This year, I've been fishing with some of the guys. Last weekend, we went to Brian Giles' place, which is on a canal. Everyone caught a bunch of fish, but not me. I have to admit that I'm really not much of a fisherman. If you were to rank me on a scale from 1 to 10, I'd probably be a two. Or a one. Heck, I wouldn't even say that. I'm a zero. I'm the net boy. They catch the fish, and I put the net on them. That's my job. Two years ago, I went to Cabo San Lucas in Mexico for my brother's bachelor party. We went deep-sea fishing there, and the stuff down here just doesn't match up. We were catching 200-pound marlin in Cabo, and we're catching two-pound fish here. But it's still fun to sit on the dock, have a beer and hang with the guys. We opened against the Detroit Tigers on Thursday, and it was good to get back to playing games again. It also was a good time for me to test my left thumb. There comes a point when you want to get into the game and see how the thumb holds up. When you're catching in the bullpen, there is no adrenaline going through you. I was really anxious to see how it would feel when we started playing games. I'm glad to say it felt great. I knew going in that I would be fine, but you still have to get over that hump. You have to get over that mental barrier. It was the same thing I had to do when I hurt my ankle, which was much more severe. Hitting wasn't a problem for my thumb. In the first two weeks of spring training, I was able to break up the scar tissue in my wrist, so it's feeling pretty good when I swing. I was more concerned about catching than anything else. You wonder that if you catch that one pitch wrong, will you be in trouble? That was the problem I had last year after I hurt my thumb. If I caught one pitch wrong, or even swung my bat and missed at the wrong pitch, I was done for the game. I couldn't grip the bat, and it hurt like crazy when I was catching pitches. If you're looking for a cutter away that's coming 90 mph at you, and the pitcher sinks the ball and you have to reach over and turn your glove the other way, that's when the injury can happen. On Thursday, I did catch that one pitch wrong, but my thumb was back to normal. Sure, it hurt and I got a little stinger, but it wasn't nearly the pain I felt last year. When it happened last year, it felt like someone was taking a knife and chopping off my thumb. This time, it was sore for a pitch, and then I was ready to go again. Mentally, that is the part I had to get over. For the games down here, I'll probably keep my thumb taped for protection. In the first game, I had two pieces of tape wrapped around my thumb. They are to prevent it from snapping all the way back if I catch that one wrong pitch. I probably won't wear the tape during the regular season, but there's no reason for me not to do it while we're down here. The other good news this week was that we signed Aramis Ramirez to a three-year contract. I think that was an outstanding signing. We're talking about a guy who is going to be a big part of our team. From my perspective, Rammy really has matured as a person. It's good to see everything coming together for him. We all knew he had the baseball part, but he's turning into a professional. You can see it by the way he goes about his business. The big thing for Rammy is that the contract will give him some security. The Pirates did the same thing with me in 1997 when they bought out some of my arbitration years. I think Aramis is a lot like me in that he wants to win in Pittsburgh, and he wants to stay in one place for his whole career. I think we signed for very similar reasons. Like me, he's seen this thing when it was down, and he wants to be here when it's on the upside. Pirates catcher Jason Kendall will write a column every Sunday this spring exclusively for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.