Pablo Ozuna
As the 2008 season progressed and it became evident that there wasn't a place on the team for Pablo Ozuna, it saddened me a little. Because while I may have panned his current skill set, I never stopped admiring him.
Not only was Pablo's entire game based on creating his own opportunities, but that sums up his entire career. From the beginning of his time as a Sox player to the end of it, Pablo was a self-made success story.
He had to reinvent himself when his real age became clear. He was four years older than his listed age coming out of the Dominican Republic, which pretty much demolished any status he had as a prospect. Thus he bounced around, from St. Louis to Florida to Colorado, mostly in the minors spare a couple of cups of coffee, before signing a minor-league contract with the Sox before the 2005 season.
Ozuna forced himself onto the Sox roster, past incumbent reserves like Ross Gload and Willie Harris, with a spring too strong to ignore. He went 29-for-55, the highest White Sox spring training batting average since 1969, and thus a no-name non-roster invitee became one of 25 players to be immortalized in White Sox lore.
He quickly garnered a reputation for being a human energy ball who would help the team any way he could. Ed Farmer called him "The Secret Weapon" offhand once, and while it didn't stick on the broadcasts, I felt it summed him up well, and not ironically.
Ozuna was active on the basepaths, swiping 14 bags and taking some extra bases on hits. He filled in at four defensive positions, served as the emergency catcher (though he never was called upon) and would've been the first position player to pitch had the game gone on that long. He could hit cold, because he didn't need to see many pitches to put the bat on the ball.
He was also prone to implosions. Pablo never stole bases at a high rate, and couldn't really hold down any position defensively for more than a game at the time. He would drop bunts at weird times, and first-pitch outs could be deflating.
Ultimately, though, when Ozuna was in the game, action soon followed, for better or for worse. And while much of his career could be classified as remarkable, for roughly four months of his career, he was capable of the unthinkable and simply a joy to watch.
It started when he became the answer to a trivia question: Who scored for A.J. Pierzynski when he stole first base on the dropped third strike in Game 2 of the ALCS? Ozuna entered the game in the moments after Doug Eddings' questionable call, and even though bewilderment clouded the air, one thing was certain: Ozuna was going to run.
He took off on the second pitch, and that part itself was anticlimatic. He made it in without a throw as Josh Paul's tough inning continued. It ended one pitch later, as Ozuna came around to score on Joe Crede's double. The Sox would not lose another game that year.
Ozuna also wouldn't appear in the postseason, although he would have relieved Mark Buehrle in Game 3 of the World Series had it gone beyond the 15th inning. He did manage to find a prominent place in arguably
the most iconic celebration photo, however.
He saved his best for the 2006 season, or at least the first half of it. I don't know if any ballplayer has made me laugh as often as Pablo did over the first three months of the season, over which he hit the softest .432/.468/.545 imaginable.
Yet it began with a bang! Ozuna managed to hit an under-the-radar 9-for-19 through the first month, but he made his presence felt in true Secret Weapon fashion on May 3, also known as
The Pablo Ozuna Game (video's in the link). That night, Ozuna needed only three innings to display not only his entire range of skills, but also his knack for drama.
There isn't one correct answer over what was funniest about his first at-bat:
- That it was his first career homer, after going 333 at-bats without one.
- That it came in the ninth inning...
- ...with two outs...
- ...on the first pitch...
- ...off Mariners closer Eddie Guardado to tie the game.
My pick:
6. That he could watch it go into the stands, because it was a no-doubter.
But he wasn't done. After using a rare display of power to tie the game, he went back to his real strengths to win it two innings later.
Again, it started with two outs, when he chopped one over the head of Jake Woods, and saw it barely scoot between Jose Lopez and Willie Bloomquist. As always, Pablo was running hard out of the box, and when seeing how deep Jeremy Reed was playing in center, he turned on the afterburners and turned what should've been a 4-3 into a double, sliding in just before the throw. He'd score the winning run on Juan Uribe's bloop single.
That kicked off a magical two months for Pablo, and two other games spring to mind:
May 22: The
walk-off bunt single -- with two outs.
June 15: The softest three-hit, two-RBI game I can remember. He led off the game by hitting a bloop single ... between the pitcher and the second baseman. He drove in two runs his next at-bat with a bloop single ... between the first and second baseman. He capped it off by getting a hold of one ... and blooping it in front of the right fielder. He also made a diving catch in left.
Unfortunately, his run came to an end on the last day of June, when he pulled a hamstring leading off a game against the Cubs with a single. It hampered him the rest of the year, transforming him from a great asset to a liability. The magic was gone.
He returned to being serviceable the following year, but even that wouldn't last. He broke his leg on a bad step rounding first on a double against Tampa Bay May 27, and that ended his season -- though the tough S.O.B. was able to jog into second and tried to walk the pain off.
That pretty much sealed his fate. Without his legs, he was no longer a plus as a pinch-runner, and his ability to slap and bunt for hits also took a hit. Factor in his still-poor defense, and it became difficult to justify his presence. The Sox
designated him for assigment on June 8, which came as a shock to the clubhouse.
The number of reasons why the Sox wouldn't miss him became too great to ignore, but it's easy to understand why his teammates hated to see him go. Everybody raved about his presence in the clubhouse, but you didn't need a press pass to see why that was true. He made it clear in his on-field qualities -- toughness, fearlessness, and a willingness to do whatever his team needed. After all that, the ebullient personality is merely icing on the cake.
Alas, the Secret Weapon couldn't compete with more talented, younger and healthier players, and try as he might, the guy who forced his way into the picture three years ago found himself forced out. Still, he had a great run, and it wouldn't surprise me if he managed to catch lightning in the bottle again for another team. If luck is hard work plus opportunity, Ozuna's bound to be luckier than most, because effort's never in question.