Tex's past and his checkered history with the red sox

[jacksonianmarch]

Published: December 24, 2008

 

At Yankee Stadium sometime soon, Mark Teixeira will put on the most recognizable jersey in American sports, smile for the cameras and answer dozens of questions about his agreeing to a $180 million contract to be the Yankees’ switch-hitting, Gold Glove-winning first baseman for the next eight years.

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Paul Buck/European Pressphoto Agency

 

Yankees first baseman Mark Teixeira’s life experiences and baseball dealings have given him a strong work ethic, a desire for order and a perspective on the game.

 

 

 

No doubt Teixeira will mention his elation that he will man the same position, for the same team, as his boyhood idol, Don Mattingly, whose No. 23 Teixeira has worn for that reason.

 

For a laugh or two, he may drop in the fact that his father, John, played high school baseball with Bucky Dent — we all know his role in the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry.

 

Typical of these introductory news conferences, Teixeira will also be asked whether he can thrive in New York when other big-ticket signings have stumbled. And if so, Mark, why?

 

A confident, if generic, answer is likely to spill from his lips, much in the mold of David Wright or his new teammate Derek Jeter, and he will move on to the next query, and the next one, and so on.

 

That is who the 28-year-old Teixeira is: polite, humble, private. It would be unlike him to open up and discuss influential moments in his life that have produced his strong work ethic, his quest for order and routine, and an ability to focus and compartmentalize that is admired by peers.

 

When he was 15, a freshman at Mount St. Joseph’s High School outside Baltimore, he learned that his mother, Margy, had breast cancer. Weak from chemotherapy, Margy, now cancer-free, still found a way to attend her son’s baseball games.

 

Before his senior year, he lost one of his closest friends, Nick Liberatore, when a truck driver fell asleep and slammed into a parked car that Liberatore was sitting in along a shoulder of Interstate 95. For the next year, every Wednesday night Teixeira and his friends would eat dinner with the Liberatore family, and he has since endowed a scholarship in his friend’s name. And in 2002, Teixeira’s father, a former Navy pilot, had a benign brain tumor that caused him to lose his hearing in his left ear.

 

“Whatever I’ve gone through, I think it’s all allowed me to enjoy the game, but to understand the role of the game in life, too,” Teixeira told The Dallas Morning News in 2005. “If you enjoy playing the game, it’s going to be easier to focus on the game and put things in their proper place. When you are between the lines, it is a game that should be enjoyed. When you are in the clubhouse or getting ready, it’s work. And when you go home, it should stay in the clubhouse.”

 

As one of the nation’s top high school prospects, Teixeira relied on that perspective to help guide him through another difficult time, when the Red Sox asked him to forgo college and agree to sign a $1.5 million bonus before they selected him with their first-round pick. Teixeira declined, and the Red Sox spread word that he was going to Georgia Tech. Every team passed on him in the draft until the Red Sox nabbed him in the ninth round.

 

Incensed at Boston’s approach, Teixeira called Georgia Tech Coach Danny Hall to accept a scholarship offer and wound up recruiting three players who would become his roommates.

 

“I have a very cynical approach towards the draft,” Teixeira told Baseball America in 2006. “I was na?ve. It was my first realization to the business in baseball. The Red Sox told everybody that I wouldn’t sign, and when it got to a late enough round, they said, ‘Let’s take a flier on him.’ So they spoiled me for everyone else.”

 

Teixeira played third base at Georgia Tech but, after being selected No. 5 over all by the Rangers in the 2001 draft, switched to first base because Texas already had Hank Blalock. After the 2004 season, when the Rangers were considering Carlos Delgado, Teixeira volunteered to switch to the outfield.

 

Such a move did not surprise Teixeira’s teammates, who noticed his professionalism and attention to detail. He was the team’s assistant representative to the union, hardened by his experiences with Boston and, to an extent, Texas. So when Delgado signed with Florida, Teixeira, a solid defensive player, concentrated on becoming the best.

 

The next February, at the Rangers’ spring training complex in Surprise, Ariz., a team official watched Teixeira scoop low throws and stab sharply hit grounders and predicted that he would win a Gold Glove that season. Teixeira did. And in 2006, too.

 

By that point, well before he became a hot commodity at last season’s trading deadline and the most desired position player on the free-agent market, Teixeira had established himself as one of the more complete players in baseball. Just do not expect him to talk much about it.

 

So the sox spoiled his draft and now he will get the chance to spoil the next 8 seasons for Boston. Turnabout is fair play

[Cocos Disciples]

Good story, but did none of the 29 other teams even ask Teixeira if the report was true? Seems pretty stupid.

[example1]

So the sox spoiled his draft and now he will get the chance to spoil the next 8 seasons for Boston. Turnabout is fair play

 

So every other team passed on him because he told Boston he wouldn't sign? Then he acts like a bitch when other teams didn't want to sign him? That seems to be the fault of either Teixeira for saying that he wouldn't sign, or the other teams for not doing their due diligence.

 

None of the other 29 teams took a chance on him and he blames the Red Sox? I mean, the Sox FO was probably douchey at the time, but seriously. That's fine. He will get the same booing treatment that A-Rod gets in Boston.

[Cocos Disciples]

Plus, it isn't the same GM or ownership.

[26 to 6]

Plus' date=' it isn't the same GM or ownership.[/quote']

If it was i doubt negotiations with Boston would have went as far as they did prior to him joining the Yankees.

 

So every other team passed on him because he told Boston he wouldn't sign? Then he acts like a bitch when other teams didn't want to sign him? That seems to be the fault of either Teixeira for saying that he wouldn't sign, or the other teams for not doing their due diligence.

 

None of the other 29 teams took a chance on him and he blames the Red Sox? I mean, the Sox FO was probably douchey at the time, but seriously. That's fine. He will get the same booing treatment that A-Rod gets in Boston.

You don't think he had the right to be upset with Boston? If his rights belonged to Boston, say after being drafted then that would have been one thing, but the draft had yet to even occur and it was not their place to make a public statement like that regarding an amateur player who was not their property. Completely unprofessional. They knew what they were doing, and that's evident by their selection of him in the 9th round (had they let him slip further another team probably would have taken a chance on him).

[jacksonianmarch]

a lot of teams wont even take a chance on a player if there are questions about signability, especially first rounders. I had a teammate of mine go in the 6th round, even though he was considered supplemental round talent because a team spread word that he was going back to school for his senior yr. He signed within a week. Its all politics and ********.