FORT MYERS, Fla. -- Spring training is like a play. It's got a definitive starting point, a series of brief intermissions, and if you've seen it before, you know how it's going to end.
In the theater of Grapefruit League baseball, everybody's got a role. From the apple-cheeked, aw-shucks rookie to the broken-down, squeeze-another-year-outta-this-tired-body veteran, each player on the roster has a part to play. As the bit players look to upstage each other and the stars readjust to the spotlight, the coaching staff watches with the eyes of a critic.
Expectations are confirmed, potential realized. Jobs are won. And lost.
Year after year, the faces change but the roles remain the same. Here are the stories of five characters from the Twins' camp 2000.
The Can't Miss Kid: Michael Cuddyer
Michael Cuddyer smiles often. It's an easy, breezy smile born of low pressure and a lot of fun.
The Twins' No. 1 pick in the 1997 draft, the 20-year-old Cuddyer wears the "sure thing" label with ease. Like everybody else in camp, he knows that if the Twins are going to break through their small-market malaise, they need players like Cuddyer to come through -- but not for a couple of years.
In the interim, Cuddyer knows that he has one job this spring -- to be a human sponge, soaking up every drop of baseball knowledge from his coaches and veteran teammates who have been through the wars and await his arrival on the front lines.
"A lot of the guys have been helping me," said Cuddyer, an infielder who has worked extensively at third base since the Twins drafted him. "(Corey) Koskie has been really good, helping me out with third base, teaching me the ropes and what to expect when you get to the big leagues."
Cuddyer got a taste of big league camp last spring, however, giving him a touch of veteran guile himself, even though he's still three weeks shy of being able to buy a round of beers for his buddies back home in Chesapeake, Va.
"I'm a lot more relaxed this year," said Cuddyer, who spent last season on the same diamond, toiling for the Class A Fort Myers Miracle. "Last year I was kind of nervous, but this year I knew what it was going to be like, so I wasn't as wide-eyed or in awe."
Still, everybody in camp knows taht Cuddyer will start the year in the minors, most likely at Class AA New Britain, which rids him of the pressure of fighting for a roster spot. It frees him to work on his deficiencies, most notably his defense, and gives him time to practice that major league smile.
"I'm still having fun, still getting experience," Cuddyer said. "I can never learn enough from the big leaguers, guys who are there, playing every day. It's just allowed me to prepare myself for the day when I get there."
The Hot Prospect: Matt LeCroy
The Twins' catching situation was blown wide open by the retirement of Terry Steinbach last fall. This year's leading candidate for the starting spot figures to be Javier Valentin, whose 387 career major league at-bats are far and away the most for any of the catchers in camp.
But Valentin's status as a fixture in Tom Kelly's everyday lineup is hardly a lock, and whoever emerges from the muddle as the No. 2 catcher heading north will have a legitimate shot at playing some serious innings at the major league level this summer. Early in camp, the one player raising a few eyebrows was a stocky kid from Clemson with power to all fields -- Matt LeCroy.
Like Cuddyer, LeCroy was a first-round draft pick in 1997 and has played only two years of minor league ball. However, LeCroy also has a pair of late-season callups to AAA Salt Lake on his résumé, not to mention the experience of playing for Team USA in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and last year's Pan-Am Games. Some see him as a player on the fast track to the majors, and his performance this spring hasn't done much to contradict that rating.
LeCroy homered in each of the Twins' first two spring games, and he knows that his bat has sent his stock soaring with the team's brass. But Kelly is famous for preaching defense, and LeCroy must impress the skipper with his work behind the plate if he wants to make the final cut.
"They told me I've got a realistic shot, and I've started off pretty well here," LeCroy said of his chances to make the team. "I know I have to play good defense, and obviously I've got to hit well. I've got to be able to drive in runs and hit home runs -- that's my strength. If I do all of that, I've got a shot."
LeCroy hit 30 homers last summer, 20 at Fort Myers and an eye-popping 10 in just 29 games for Salt Lake. Now fully recovered from a broken finger on his right hand that prematurely ended his season and held him out of winter ball, LeCroy is attacking spring pitching with gusto. His goal is to see Minneapolis in April. Nothing against Salt Lake City in the spring, but ...
"Whatever happens ... minor leagues is minor leagues," LeCroy said. "I don't care where you're at, you've gotta go put up numbers and hopefully go make the big team."
Even in retirement, Steinbach continues to cast a long shadow over catchers. This spring he's in camp to work with the young backstop prospects, and LeCroy hangs in that shadow, eyes and ears wide open, whenever he can.
"He's so smart -- he knows so much about the hitters and the game, it's just remarkable," LeCroy said of the man whom he hopes one day to replace as the Twins' everyday catcher. "I just try to be in his hip pocket whenever I see him."
The Lock: Jacque Jones
When baseball types refer to a "five-tool" player, they're talking about a guy who can hit for average, hit for power, run, field and throw -- the five skills on which a position player is judged. Do them all pretty well and you've got a chance at becoming a major leaguer. Truly excel at all five skills, and pretty soon the comparisons start rolling in -- Aaron, Mays, Clemente, Puckett.
The player on the Twins' major league roster who draws the most "five-tool" praise is second-year outfielder Jacque Jones. Last season, Jones joined the club in June and quickly positioned himself at the head of the pack of youngsters battling for innings in the outfield.
In roughly half a season, Jones hit .289 with nine home runs and 44 RBI, and he tied for the team lead with nine outfield assists. He also made a number of highlight-reel catches and played center field with a flair not seen in these parts since Kirby himself last patrolled the Metrodome carpet.
If anybody enters the spring with a lock on a roster spot, it's Jones, but don't tell him that. He said his goal this year is just to make the team. "I don't want to be too complacent or too overconfident," he confided before Monday's game against Tampa Bay. "I just want to come in and do all the things I need to do to assure myself a spot on the team."
Humility is the sixth tool required of a superstar, one that keeps a player focused when the rest of the world wants to remind him how great he is. Jones is another of the Twins' Olympic veterans (along with LeCroy and outfielder Chad Allen), but he knows that major league pitchers don't check the back of your bubble gum card before they take the hill. When times get tough, Jones doesn't hesitate to lean on the support system that the Twins have in place.
"Matty (Lawton) helped me out a lot last year, and (hitting coach) Scotty (Ullger) has been a big help," Jones said. "And Kirby has been awesome."
Even as an executive vice president, Puckett's presence is a strong one in the Twins' clubhouse. If you're following in a superstar's footsteps, it never hurts to have him in your corner, and knowing Puckett's affinity for the needle, it's not likely that Jones will lose that sixth tool -- humility -- anytime soon.
The Question Mark: LaTroy Hawkins
LaTroy Hawkins is a walking punctuation mark. Standing still, long and lean, he's an exclamation point ready to explode with a 90 mph-plus fastball.
But when he begins his windup, contorting his lanky frame, curling his arms above his head and pausing with his left leg tucked beneath his chin, he's a question mark. As in, "Is this the year? Is this the year he puts it all together? Is this the year the Twins can finally count on LaTroy Hawkins?"
No Twins pitcher has been more enigmatic than Hawkins the past few seasons. Last year he posted a career-high 10 victories. He also lost 14 games and saw his ERA soar to 6.67. He followed an abysmal 2-7 start with a solid 5-1 run, but finished just 3-6 down the stretch. This year, the stakes are higher, as Kelly's patience may be wearing thin.
"My goals are to win more games, throw more innings, lower my ERA and just pitch more defensive games," Hawkins said, ticking off a laundry list of priorities for 2000. "I have some big goals I have to attain this year.
"I have to focus more on my mechanics, making them work, doing the same thing repetitiously, staying back and not flying open on certain pitches. If I do that, I should pitch pretty good this year."
The search to improve his consistency began during winter ball in Venezuela. "I went down there to mainly work on my mechanics and throw more strikes," he said. "I did those things, and hopefully I can carry it over to the season."
For the Twins to have any kind of success this year, they need Hawkins to pitch into the sixth and seventh inning on a regular basis and punctuate the season with a career high in quality starts. Period.
The Comeback Kid: Matt Lawton
Fear can be a double-edged sword for a major league baseball player. Fear of failure can spur an athlete to great accomplishments on the field. But fear of injury can put even the toughest player on the sideline -- fast.
Last June 8, Matt Lawton was hit in the face by a pitch from Cincinnati lefthander Denny Reyes. He missed six weeks of action, and when he came back, he was battling more than just the best pitchers in the world. Even though his face had healed, his psyche was still a bit tender.
"It wasn't so tough against the lefties," said Lawton, a left-handed hitter. "The lefties almost force you to stay in the box. But against the righties -- man, I was bailing. They were throwing me a lot of (cut fastballs) inside, and my first motion was to get outta there."
The fear of being hit again was an insidious opponent the rest of the season, lingering even when Lawton thought he'd conquered it. "I didn't feel like I was afraid, but I think I really was after looking back at my tapes," he said. "But now, I think all that stuff's behind me and I'm ready to go. (In spring training) I've seen lefties and I've seen righties and I've hit the ball well off both, so like I said, I'm ready to go."
The Twins are counting on Lawton to provide not only offensive output but veteran leadership on a young ballclub. It's a role that Lawton does not take lightly.
"I try to lead by example, go out on the field and play hard every day," said Lawton, starting his sixth year in the majors. "I run the ground balls out and hustle so our young guys can see that."
Lawton worked hard in the weight room and the batting cage during the offseason, buffing his body and shortening his swing in hopes of compiling career numbers this year. But his top priority is simple -- staying healthy.
"My No. 1 goal is not to get hit in the face again," he deadpanned. "I want to stay healthy and play anytime the manager calls my name. If I can do that, I think I'll look up in September and my numbers will be there."
