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'Wizard of Oz' on deck for enshrinment Posted: Saturday July 27, 2002 11:38 AMUpdated: Sunday July 28, 2002 12:08 PM
COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. (AP) -- Ozzie Smith says he's done his last backflip. Perhaps. "You never know what will happen when you get in front of people and start thanking the ones that have helped you along the way and see the look on their faces," the 47-year-old Smith said as he contemplated his induction Sunday into the Baseball Hall of Fame. "How I will react to that, I don't know." Smith's road to Cooperstown -- he's the 22nd shortstop to make the Hall -- is the stuff of dreams. The second of Marvella and Clovis Smith's six children, Osborne Earl Smith was born the day after Christmas in 1954 in Mobile, Ala. Smith's dad, a truck driver, moved the family to the tough Los Angeles neighborhood of Watts when Ozzie was only 6. It was there he learned to play the game in his uniquely acrobatic way. "I lived across the street from a recreation center," said Smith, whose parents separated when he was in junior high. "I don't know how my first game went, but I was excited about finally having the opportunity to play in an organized sport." Although Marvella rarely saw him without a ball in his hands, it took time for him to begin dreaming about playing baseball for a living. He'd just as soon go down to the neighborhood lumberyard with his friends and do backflips off inner tubes into the mounds of sawdust. "It didn't become serious to me until I became a junior in high school," said Smith, who would go on to refine the position of shortstop during his 19-year major league career and make people appreciate the art of defense as never before. "There were little things that I did when I was about 11, little games that I played that were helping enhance my skills and my hand and eye coordination."
Despite his gifted hands, people were always telling Smith he was too small, and so he struggled to get noticed. Eddie Murray, a power-hitting classmate at Lock High who would go on to star with the Baltimore Orioles, was drafted after graduation, while Smith was overlooked and enrolled at Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo 200 miles north of Los Angeles on a partial scholarship. "When I decided to go to college, I had to do some soul searching and realized that baseball was what I loved doing more than anything else," said Smith, who rooted for the Dodgers as a kid and idolized Pirates star Roberto Clemente. "I played with Eddie Murray, and when the scouts came, that's who they were coming to see." Even in college, Smith was second string and made the lineup only after the starter broke a leg. Taught to switch hit by his college coach, Berdy Harr, Smith was drafted in his junior year on the eighth round by the Detroit Tigers. They offered him $4,500, he asked for another $500, was turned down, and stayed in school. After being noticed in the instructional league by Alvin Dark, Smith signed with the San Diego Padres in 1977 for $5,000, played 68 games in Walla Walla, Wash., and hit .303. The next season, Smith was the Padres' starting shortstop. He stole 40 bases and his incredible glove work helped him to a second-place finish to Bob Horner in the NL Rookie of the Year voting. If people hadn't yet taken note, they did after teammate Gene Tenace made a simple request. "We weren't very good as a team at that time in San Diego," said Smith, who won 13 straight NL Gold Glove awards and holds five major league fielding records, including 8,375 assists and 1,590 double plays. "We had to create an atmosphere of excitement for the fans. Gene said a backflip would be a great thing to do on Fan Appreciation Day. I was a little reluctant to do it because I didn't want to be labeled as a hot dog, but the fans got so excited." A ritual was born. A Wizard was in the making. In 1980, Smith had 933 chances and set a major league record of 621 assists, breaking the mark of 601 set in 1924 by Pittsburgh's Glenn Wright. His 5.75 balls reached per game dwarfed the league average of 4.30. But after an embarrassing contract squabble arose in which Smith's agent took out a newspaper ad seeking a second job for his client, the Padres became worried they might lose Smith to free agency and traded him to the St. Louis Cardinals for Garry Templeton in February 1982. Smith was not known for his offense -- he batted just .262 in his career with 2,460 hits, 28 homers and 793 RBIs. But his magic glove made an immediate impact on the field and at the gate as attendance at Busch Stadium surged along with the Cardinals, who won the World Series in his first year with the team.
Smith, who had to learn how to hit in the major leagues, proved an apt student. In the 1985 National League playoffs, the Cardinals and Los Angeles Dodgers had split the first four games and were tied at 2-2 in the bottom of the ninth inning of the pivotal fifth game. It was in this setting that Smith, a spindly 150 pounds, muscled up against Dodgers reliever Tom Niedenfuer and hit a game-winning home run, the first left-handed home run of his career. The Cards won Game 6 to clinch the NL pennant. That was Smith's power year -- he hit six home runs, double the number he managed in any other season -- and his most satisfying. His career year in 1987 was instrumental in the Cardinals' World Series run. He hit .303 with 43 stolen bases, 75 RBIs and 104 runs scored and finished second in the MVP balloting to Andre Dawson of the Cubs. Smith continued his strong play into the 1990s. His eight errors in 1991 set an NL record for fewest in a season by a shortstop. Despite playing with a slightly torn rotator cuff in his throwing shoulder the last decade of his career -- he calls that his greatest achievement -- the "Wizard of Oz" led the NL in fielding seven times. "Was he the best?" former Cardinals manager Whitey Herzog once pondered. "He made more diving plays than I've ever seen. I don't see how it was possible to play it any better than Ozzie played it." That showed in the Hall of Fame voting. He was named on nearly 92 percent of the ballots, becoming just the 37th player to be elected in his first try. It's a big deal. "Going in on the first ballot means there was no doubt about being a Hall of Famer," said Smith, who will be accompanied by more than 100 family members and friends on his special day. "By making it the first year, there's no doubt. It's very special." Smith, the lone inductee for the first time since Reggie Jackson in 1993, said his speech for Sunday is nearly complete, though he has been through several drafts. "I've messed up a lot of paper, that's for sure," he said. "I've had to make some changes, and though they aren't always pleasant changes, I'm as ready as I'll be." |
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Ozzie Smith talks about his emotions going into the induction ceremony. 
