SEATTLE – Wrap-around sunglasses covered his eyes, but the tinted shades couldn’t disguise the fact that while Bernie Williams was standing in a Safeco Field dugout, his mind remained in Puerto Rico.
“It will be like that for a while,” Williams said of his mindset after returning to the club yesterday following the death of his father, Bernabe Williams Sr., last weekend.
After participating in an optional workout yesterday in which he swung a bat for the first time since Sunday at Yankee Stadium, Williams talked in a monotone voice about his father, but his words were strong. Several times, he was stopped by a small catch in his voice and once he made a gesture with his hand to his cover eyes.
Williams arrived at the hospital in Puerto Rico one hour after Bernabe, 73, died from a massive heart attack last Sunday. Bernabe Sr. had been battling a losing fight against pulmonary fibrosis.
“I was kind of disappointed, but at the same time I knew he was in the right place and not suffering anymore,” Williams said about not getting a chance to see his father alive one more time. “I know he will always be in my thoughts and my prayers and I know from somewhere he is watching us. He did so many things for us.
“He had a very rough childhood growing up on the streets of New York. He was able to meet my mom, have us and raise us to the best of his ability, man. He literally dedicated his life to us and the family and I certainly wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him and all the time he spent with us.”
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Chuck Knoblauch wasn’t in starting lineup for the second straight game last night thanks to a bruised left side.
“They said to give it one more day,” said Knoblauch, who suffered the injury jumping into the left-field wall Wednesday night in Oakland. “Joe [Torre] said as long as it was getting better, there is no need to panic.”
Torre, who used David Justice in left and Robert Perez as the DH, said Knoblauch was available for pinch-hitting duty.
“If needed, he could have played, but I figured with a day game [today], I felt I would rather have him as a pinch-hitter instead of irritating it,” Torre said. “He came to me and said he was ready but once he said he could feel it a bit.”
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One of the most fearsome right-handed hitters in baseball, a weapon the Yankees could seriously use to inject life into a stagnant lineup, is available according to several baseball executives.
Disgusted with the Rangers’ dreadful start and not wanting to go into a complete rebuilding mode, owner Tom Hicks has let it be known that for the right package of arms that can help the Rangers now and tomorrow, Ivan “Pudge” Rodriguez is on the block.
However, before Yankee fans start salivating over Pudge slipping into Pinstripes and possibly making a DH out of Jorge Posada, there are major stumbling blocks.
The first one has the Dodgers involved since they have highly regarded right-handers Luke Prokopec and Eric Gagne to offer the pitching-poor Rangers.
The second one revolves around the Yankees having a shortage of arms ready to contribute at the major-league level.
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