Banner Graphic, Volume 17, Number 178, Greencastle, Putnam County, 31 March 1987 — Page 9

Mattingly cites work attitude as major element of success

c. 1987 N.Y. Times News Service TAMPA, Fla. Mike Schmidt, the National League’s most valuable player three times, its home-run leader eight times and its runs-batted-in leader four times, was talking recently about a possible new contract with Philadelphia when he was asked how someone earning more than $2 million this year negotiates for more money. “You’d be hard-pressed to get more,” Schmidt replied, “unless you’re Don Mattingly. Mattingly is throwing Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig years at them. You don’t have those years anymore.” Schmidt’s unsolicited testimony to Mattingly’s rapid development, in only three full major league seasons, to become the best player in baseball is typical of the recognition the Yankees’ first baseman receives from his peers. They don’t climb on soapboxes and proclaim him the best; they do it in a more casual manner, simply slipping his name into their comments on other matters but in the context of “Well, of course, he’s the best; everybody knows that.”

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DON MATTINGLY Enough not enough

Schmidt, for example, has had a 14-year career that any player would take. He is on the brink of reaching the 500-home run plateau and five years after he retires, he will be elected to the Hall of Fame. Considering his 1986 performance, he remains at the apex of his game, but from that vantage point he singles out Mattingly as No.l. In his three full seasons in the majors, Mattingly has batted .343, .324 and .352, he has hit 23, 35 and 31 home runs, he has hit 44, 48 and 53 doubles and he has driven in 110,145 and 113 runs. Whatever the numbers, they are unparalleled today for their consistency and their combination of average, power and run production. How does a player produce those performances? What does he do to make sure he doesn’t slack off, even though no one has a guarantee? Does he ever have doubts that he can produce those numbers once more? “Spring is tough for me,” Mattingly said. “Spring scares me because I don’t have that intensity. I wonder if I’ve lost that teed-off attitude: ‘C’mon, man, get nasty.’ That’s part of my success nasty. I don’t have that here and it scares me. I don’t have that intensity. Maybe the older players like the Mike Schmidts and the Dave Winfields know how to handle it and don’t worry, but it’s scary down here. It’s a scary time.” If his teammates had heard Mattingly talk each time he uttered the word, he said “sccarrry” they would have been incredulous. The Don Mattingly they know has “intensity” as his middle name. “He’s got a great mental attitude,” said Mike Pagliarulo, the third baseman, who joins Mattingly as the Yankee’s hardest workers. “What I admire most about him is his intensity. When he’s at the plate, he never loses his concentration. We could be losing, 10-0, and he’s at the plate as intense as ever.” In one respect, wintertime in Tenafly, N.J., is no different from wintertime in Evansville, Ind.; in another, it is different. Mattingly needs an indoor batting cage for hitting, and he has constructed one at his home in Evansville. Working on intensity, though, does not require a cage so wherever he is, at his home in Evansville or at his home in Tenafly, Mattingly can work on his intensity. Yes, Don Mattingly works on his intensity in the off season. “I don’t set number goals, but I try to set my concentration during the winter,” he explained, sitting at a table window in the restaurant on Old Tampa Bay. The sun sparkled on the water outside, but Mattingly would not attempt to continue his fast spring start until that night in Lakeland. He continued explaining his offseason mental practice. “I tell myself I’m going to hit the ball hard every day. I don’t mean for one or two games. I mean 162. I try to prepare myself mentally for the season, a 162-game schedule. Make sure you don’t get down at one stretch, don’t get too happy and all that.” When he wants to work on his hitting, Mattingly goes into his new batting cage. Where does he work on the mental part of his game? “When I’m sitting around, I just think about it sometimes,” he said. “I think about the coming year and where I want to be, where I want my head to be, what I want to do to help the club. I also think about George.”

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That’s as in Steinbrenner, the Yankees’ owner, who after Mattingly’s $1,975,000 salary arbitration victory last month put his highest-paid player on notice that he better carry the Yankees to the World Series. And what does he think about George? “Don’t think about him; don’t let him get to you,” Mattingly said. “I also think about not worrying about the media and everything you have to deal with don’t let it get to you.” It was his quest not to have anything get to him or interfere with his work that prompted Mattingly to add an indoor batting cage to his house in Indiana. “I started hitting in it about January 26,” he said. “When the season ends, I basically shut everything down. I get away. You can’t get away from people talking about baseball, but I don’t do anything until about a month before spring training.” Sometime earlier than that, Mattingly starts working with weights, both free weights and Nautilus, three times a week. “I work on building up my strength, but I keep my flexibility,” he said. “I do other things, too. I play racquetball, jump rope, use the rowing machine and ride the bicycle. I don’t like to run. I don’t mind running when I’m playing racquetball, but to run six or eight miles or run 12 wind sprints, that doesn’t interest me. I wish we could play basketball. That’s the easiest way to stay in shape.” With his body in shape, Mattingly moves into the batting cage. “I hit about an hour or an hour and a half each day, six or seven days a week,” he said, detailing this winter’s work. “I never took a day off. Some days if I had things to do or somewhere I had to go, I didn’t hit. When I hit, I just don’t go out and hit. Whatever I do, I do with a purpose. I have something in mind. I’m going to work on something specific when I go out. “I start out going to left field and eventually work my way around, going up the middle and then finally pulling the ball to right. I had 140 balls, but I don’t put all 140 in the machine at a time. Maybe I’ll hit 30 at a time, stop and think about something different that I want to work on. There are times when I might hit 80 or 90 balls without stopping. There’s enough time between balls to set yourself so you can treat it like a time at bat. At this stage of the spring, I feel as good as I ever have hitting the ball and I think the batting cage helped me. I got some concentrated work. ” When Mattingly begins spring training, he said, he follows the same pattern as he does in his winter cage work. He starts out hitting to left field and work’, =is way around to right. As he does throughout the season, Mattingly tries to get as mucn hitting in during the spring as he can. He has a couple of extra reasons to do that this spring. “I lost 30 runs batted in last year,” he said. “I don’t care what I hit; I left too many men on base. I’ll take .325 if I drive in 140 runs. I hurt us early. I left some guys out there. I have to work on that. I also want to get off good. I want to be dead ready April 6. I’m a chronically slow starter. I never feel I get my swing to where I want it until late in the first half. I want to change that.” If he does, it was suggested, he conceivably could produce numbers that read .350-35-150. “That would be nice,” he said, smiling. If he achieved that parlay, everybody else would be shaking his head.

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