The Fairest Of Them All?

Perkins still spends as much time as ever at the mirror, examining and analyzing every inch of his swing. "A lot of players think it's old-fashioned, or that you're some kind of a sissy if you stand in front of the mirror," Tolan says. "But Perk doesn't let stuff like that bother him. He doesn't have great speed and he's not an outstanding defensive player, but he knows how to hit and he's willing to work at it."

Hitting, says Perkins, is "just a matter of getting that good groove and keeping relaxed. If you're standing up there all stiff and tight, your rhythm is going to be off. The swing can't be in two or three pieces; it has to be all of one piece. Hitting is a science, which means that like any science it can be broken down, the same way you would break down a formula over and over again if you were trying to find a cure for a disease. To do that, you've got to be able to see yourself, see your whole swing. Whenever I can find a mirror big enough, I'll stand there for a while with the bat, just practicing my swing and thinking about things."

Perkins had plenty to think about last week, not the least of it being that his wife, Olga, was expecting their first baby on May 28, the day before the players' strike was scheduled to begin. "It would be tough," said Perkins, "being unemployed and having a new kid." He also had to contend with his first slump of the season, a trying happenstance for a pure hitter. Perkins is a line-drive hitter who sprays the ball to all fields, but the only thing he knocked out of the park last week was an umpire. In the Padres' 6-2 loss to Montreal at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium on Wednesday, Perkins drilled a ball foul down the rightfield line, striking umpire Paul Pryor on the right knee and forcing him to leave the field for X rays. It wasn't until the Padres got to Atlanta that Perkins broke out of his slump, going 4 for 9 in the first two games. He was blanked on Sunday, but the Padres took the series two games to one.

Only five players in the woeful history of the Padres organization have hit over .300 for a full season, and Perkins would like to be the sixth. "It would be great to hit .390 or .400," he says, "but I'm just trying to do what I can. At the outcome, though, I'd like to be right up there at the top." And who knows, if the batting championship trophy is big enough and shiny enough, Perkins could spend hours standing in front of it, basking in his reflected glory.