Dominant. Sickly. Articulate. Silent. Petulant. Thoughful. Prickly. Charming. Hyper-sensitive. Fiercely competitive.
The many faces of Pedro Martinez, 2003.
In many ways, Pedro Martinez's season was a microcosm of his team's. Ups and downs. Exhilarating highs. Mind-numbing lows. Outbursts in response to criticism from fans and media, especially talk-show blather that questioned his heart.
While his personal roller-coaster ride was emotional and bumpy -- and in danger of falling off the tracks at times -- Martinez not only persevered, but thrived between the white lines. It was much like the Red Sox as a whole, who set aside devastating losses generated mostly by depressing bullpen collapses in gaining a playoff berth for the first time since 1999.
By the time the season had come to a close -- a season in which he was blasted for what was perceived as whining about his contract, had his durability questioned when he made his seemingly annual trip to the disabled list, and was accused of lacking mental toughness when he was stricken with pharyngitis and was forced to miss a start -- Martinez had pieced together another Cy-Young-Award-worthy campaign. And in September, when the Sox truly needed him, he was nothing short of sensational.
It was quite a ride to September:
Martinez had put the Sox on notice that he wanted the option on his contract -- due to expire at the end of the 2003 season, although the club held an option for 2004 -- picked up before spring training ended. If it wasn't, he warned, he would explore free agency. Even though he also said his desire was to finish his career in Boston, the free-agency comments didn't sit well with the fans, some segments of the media, and even with Sox management.
On April 7, the Sox picked up the $17.5 million option. Martinez said he was grateful, but also said, when pressed, that since Boston didn't want to talk extension, the figures he and his agent had placed on the table were gone, that it would be more expensive after the season if the Red Sox wanted to sign him to a new deal, business being business.
Again, the comments weren't well received. He was perceived as being ungrateful.
And it didn't help his cause or fragile feelings when, in his first start after the option had been exercised, he endured the worst start of his career. Martinez was shellacked for 9 runs on 10 hits in only 4 1/3 innings by Baltimore on Opening Night at Fenway Park.
As Martinez left the field, the heckling was unmerciful. He made it a point to pick out a face in the crowd, a man yelling at him as he entered the dugout, to remind himself of how unforgiving the fans can be in Boston.
Martinez spoke to the media after the game. But not after blanking Tampa Bay on two hits over seven innings in his next start, also at Fenway. Martinez did say he was fed up with talking to the media, which he felt hadn't portrayed him fairly in his comments after the option had been picked up.
There was an interruption from May 16 to June 11, when a strained right latissimus sent him to the disabled list.
There were groans about special treatment when Martinez left the team a day early to head home to the Domincan Republic, getting a head start on the All-Star break. Those groans resurfaced when Martinez was given permission to go home between starts to light the flame for the start of the Pan Am Games in early August.
When pharyngitis sent him home before an important start against Oakland on Aug. 21, talk-show callers, goaded by hosts, intimated Martinez was a coward, bailing out of a big game because of a sore throat. Martinez responded by loudly and profanely reiterating his desire to leave when his contract was up in supposedly off-the-record comments, though he denied making the remarks later.
There was one more blip on his season, when, still weakened by pharyngitis, he was unable to preserve a 3-0 first-inning lead in a crucial series with the Yankees at Fenway. Martinez lasted only four innings, forced to endure criticism that he couldn't suck it up in a big game.
But, his strength having returned, Martinez breezed through the Yankees, Orioles, Devil Rays and the Indians in his first four starts of September, going 4-0 with a scintillating 0.90 E.R.A.
And suddenly, with the playoffs looming, those contract, media and fan issues seemed long ago and far away.
Pedro Martinez, the ace of the Boston Red Sox' staff, was back at the top of his game. And wasn't that all that mattered?
