Smoltz

KISSIMMEE, Fla. -- John Smoltz spent so many years in Atlanta, that his first time back near his old team was bound to be strange. And it was. Smoltz traveled with the Red Sox to play the Braves Monday here in Kissimmee, and he said he felt weird in the role of the outsider.

Smoltz said hello to longtime teammate Chipper Jones, and to his manager Bobby Cox, but walking up the ramp into the home clubhouse as a visitor was odd, even though he’s on a team that is unlikely to come into direct conflict with the Braves (with the exception of an interleague series scheduled for this June).

“I’ve walked that walk thousands of times, and never have I gone in there retired, or as a visitor,” he said. “As I said to the Atlanta media, it’s not like I’m in the division or the National League.”

Smoltz clearly is still smarting from the doubt the Braves front office had in his ability to rehabilitate his shoulder last year.

“I know there’s a lot of people who think I have a built-in incentive to prove somebody wrong, prove them wrong,” he said. “That’s going to be an obvious thing, but that’s not what motivates me. It really isn’t. If that’s what motivated me, then that would run its course, then I would not maximize, and I would just settle for being able to pitch in a game again.”

He stressed that his body doesn’t operate like most other pitchers. When he went from starter to closer and back again in his late 30s, many doubted he could do it. He told them he could. Eventually he made believers out of his critics.

“I’ve over time, proved that, even here, over there — I would say things that people didn’t believe. And then they would go, ‘Oh, yeah, he was telling the truth.’ There’s a lot of things I know about my body and what I can do,” Smoltz said.

He has made a career of disproving doubters, and takes pride in knowing his body. That said, he knows that eventually all the wear and tear may catch up to him.

“I think when you’ve pitched 20-some years, and you’ve been hurt a couple of times, and had five surgeries, sooner or later, somebody’s going to be right,” Smoltz continued. “I hope it still means I get out of the game before I prove them right. The so-called experts, that have always tabbed me with certain things I can do, or should do, or games I should win.”

This is what gives Smoltz extra incentive to stick to his rehabilitation schedule and get his body healthy in time to make a difference.

“This’ll be another case that I had a chance to prove I know what I’m talking about,” Smoltz said.

dbarbari@projo.com