When the Sammy Sosa and Kerry Wood Show began to pick up steam sometime during the middle of the 1998 season, Kevin Tapani was little more than background music in the raucous Cubs clubhouse.
Wood’s whirlwind ride so overshadowed Tapani that one of his lockers usually was filled with boxes of mail sent to the Cubs rookie. Many Cubs fans couldn’t even pronounce his name, referring to him as “Ta-PAN-nee” instead of “TAP-ah-nee.”
Although he wound up winning a career-high 19 games and outpitching eventual Cy Young winner Tom Glavine in a heartbreaking, extra-inning loss to Atlanta in Game 2 of the division series, Tapani enters the 1999 season battling the same old perceptions.
Decent pitcher. Knows how to win. But doesn’t exactly spring to mind when you’re picking your fantasy-league team April 5. Some people in life tend to be taken for granted more than others, and Tapani appears to be one of those guys. That’s fine by him.
“If that’s to be expected, I guess you take that as a compliment that no one was treating (19 victories) like it was some sort of big deal,” he said.
When Buddy Ryan was coaching the Philadelphia Eagles, he once complained about star receiver Cris Carter that “all he does is catch touchdown passes.”
Those who overlook Tapani’s true value can use similarly pained logic by pointing to his run-of-the-mill, 4.85 earned-run average in 1998–the second-worst of his 10-year major-league career–and argue that “all he does is win ballgames.”
But winning, after all, is the name of the game, and Tapani assuredly knows how. He has compiled a .700 winning percentage in 1 1/2 seasons with the Cubs (28-12), the best of any Cub in the 20th Century. Overall, Tapani has a .580 winning percentage with a 120-87 career record, only .004 percentage points worse than Kevin Brown’s .584 career mark (139-99).
That’s where the similarities between Tapani and Brown end. Brown signed a seven-year deal for $105 million with Los Angeles in December. Tapani will earn $3.5 million this season in the final year of a three-year, $12 million deal, actually taking a $500,000 pay cut in 1999 despite finishing second in the National League in victories.
“Nationally it was kind of a quiet 19 wins,” manager Jim Riggleman said. “Internally it was huge. Probably one of the reasons (Tapani was overlooked) is his ERA was a little higher than what you’d expect.”
Riggleman said two horrible outings, in the season opener against Florida and in the first game after the All-Star break against Milwaukee, distorted Tapani’s ERA. Tapani conceded he has a few games he would like to throw back.
“I had some really bad games,” he said. “But if you look at the numbers at the end of the year, that’s what I did. But I won 19 games, more than half of my (34) starts. It’s not like I didn’t pitch well but still won 19. You can’t win that many games by not pitching well. There were other years when I was more consistent and throwing the ball better for the entire season, but there were more ups than downs last year.”
Tapani becomes a free agent next year. Although he assuredly won’t command the megamillions and private jet privileges Brown received, he’s likely to get some lucrative offers.
But Cubs President Andy MacPhail said last Sunday the Cubs probably won’t be signing any $8 million-a-year pitchers unless it’s in-season and “we know we’re in a race and the contract lasts a year or two.”
Tapani said he understands MacPhail’s logic.
“This year we don’t need an $8 million guy,” he said. “We don’t have that type of need. We have everything in place here to be a competitive team.”
But doesn’t MacPhail’s reluctance to sign $8 million pitchers suggest Tapani also may become too expensive for the Cubs if he has another Tapani-like season?
“If I could write my own contract and say where I wanted to play and how I wanted to work out, that would be different,” Tapani said. “But with the job I’ve done, the way I pitched last year, and the fact that I’ve enjoyed playing in Chicago, I hope they’d want me back. But things change so quickly in this game. You don’t know what will happen.”
