A locker away, Oakland teammate Nick Swisher teased Frank Thomas about the way he’d lumbered home from first base on a double earlier in the week against Kansas City.
“A monumental occasion,” A’s outfielder Jay Payton called it, jokingly.
Then Swisher, Dennis the Menace in green stirrups, kidded Thomas after overhearing the Big Hurt mention his age.
“You’re 38? Gosh, are you an old man,” said Swisher, 13 years younger.
Thomas just nodded and smiled, looking as relaxed as one might expect the most valuable player on a first-place team to look. He seemed nothing like the supposedly brooding superstar criticized at times in Chicago for being unable to get along with teammates.
A moment later, Thomas’ and Swisher’s attention turned to the adolescent movie on the big-screen TV that was cracking up Oakland’s players before their 9-3 victory over the Texas Rangers on Friday night, including the oldest kid in the clubhouse.
Thomas is laughing more than he used to, content being one of the guys in Oakland after 16 seasons of being The Man on the South Side.
But don’t ask Thomas about having the last laugh on Sox general manager Ken Williams as he continues doing things Williams was convinced he couldn’t when the Sox let him go.
“I’m not talking about Chicago,” Thomas said matter-of-factly. “Oakland has been a good change for me. I don’t feel that constant pressure of having to do the right thing every day or having to be at a certain level every day, to be the guy. That’s just not here.”
Asked how long he could see the fun lasting in this second phase of his career, Thomas sounded like a politician running for re-election: four more years.
“I want to play till I’m 42,” Thomas said. “I’ve played with guys who have done it, with Pudge (Carlton Fisk) and Harold Baines and Julio Franco. I saw what it took. I can do it.”
Deal of the century
Nobody doubts that in Oakland, where 38 percent of A’s fans selected Thomas the team’s MVP in a recent online poll. GM Billy Beane, who called it baseball nirvana when he signed Thomas to an incentive-laden, one-year, $500,000 deal in January, already has discussed renewing their vows.
“Based on what he’s done, it would behoove us to try to bring him back and enjoy a future marriage,” Beane said.
Since overcoming an early slump, Thomas and the A’s have lived happily ever after.
On pace to earn nearly $2 million in incentives as one of the biggest bargains in baseball, Thomas led the A’s with 27 home runs through Friday and was tied with Swisher for the team lead with 75 RBIs. And 13 of those homers have given his team the lead. In a sign that Thomas truly has regained his discriminating batting eye, he is averaging 4.35 pitches per plate appearance, his best per-at-bat average since 1990.
“I’m back to being normal again, so I’m able to take a strike,” Thomas said. “Now I’m trying to hit with two strikes. That’s what I did in the early ’90s. Not playing in a year and a half, I lost a lot of that and had to get it back.”
He attributes the slow start to getting only eight at-bats in spring training as he rushed back from the chronically injured left ankle that essentially wiped out the last two seasons in Chicago. It also took a while to manage the discomfort caused by a new method of dealing with his ankle. Oakland trainers took Thomas off anti-inflammatory pills he had used for years so he wouldn’t push himself beyond the pain.
The factors conspired against him so much that when Thomas left U.S. Cellular Field on May 24 after an emotional three-game series in his old ballpark, he was batting .197.
“If I had started that slowly in Chicago, I would have been booed so much that I would have walked away,” Thomas said.
But since June 1, he has hit .293 with 16 home runs and 47 RBIs, better numbers over the same time period than the man who essentially replaced him, Jim Thome.
To understand how hot Thomas has been, he has hit one home run every 12.6 at-bats in that span compared to one every 13.5 in his most productive power season of 2000, when he homered 43 times.
“I told them I wasn’t done,” Thomas said.
Thomas predicted the day he signed with the A’s that the Sox would shake their heads for discarding him. But he took no glee when it was pointed out that he will lead his first-place team into September thriving while Thome figures to be ailing from a strained hamstring that has sidelined him.
In fact, Thomas still roots for the Sox and thinks they will make the playoffs, talks regularly to friends on the team and maintains the utmost respect for Thome, whom he called before the season to clear the air.
“We hashed it out because he’s one guy who’s incredible,” Thomas said. “That’s what that lineup needed, and I understood that part of it. I just always thought I would be that player who would retire there.”
Back in the swing of things
His angst over leaving Chicago–hurt feelings that contributed to a messy spring-training spat with Williams that Thomas no longer discusses–made the transition even trickier. Thomas missed the familiarity, the restaurants, everything he had grown used to in 16 Chicago summers.
“It was tough not seeing my kids,” Thomas said. “I had a routine in Chicago, and when you get out of that routine, there was a period there where I felt lost. I had been a creature of habit for years. I had to get familiar with my new area and surroundings.”
A relic from his old surroundings helped restore the familiarity.
Thomas’ exit from the Sox had been so stormy that he never retrieved a box of personal belongings from The Cell until the A’s visited in May. Among the items he took back to Oakland was a 64-ounce piece of rebar that was 3 feet long.
Since finding the metal rod at a construction site in Sarasota, Fla., during spring training when he was a rookie in 1990, Thomas had swung it in the on-deck circle because it was twice as heavy as his bat.
“It was nothing major, but I had it my entire career,” Thomas said.
Maybe it was just a coincidence, but without it Thomas hit below .200 this season. After he recovered his piece of metal mojo, he has resembled the guy with 475 career home runs.
“He loves it, man, but it’s too heavy for me,” Swisher said. “I tried using it the other day, but that thing swings me.”
Swisher, son of former Cub Steve Swisher, hangs around Thomas like a kid looking for him to sign a baseball card. He is typical of an A’s roster full of players whose average age is 10 years younger than Thomas and who access Thomas’ baseball knowledge nearly as often as they do the Internet.
A 10-minute team meeting earlier this season, for example, lasted 45 after Thomas started answering questions. The Big Hurt has morphed into The Big Help.
“When you’ve got a guy who has been around the game for 16 years, he’s been to the top of the mountain, he’s dealt with some of the tough things that have been written, it’s easy to learn from a guy that has been through all he has,” Swisher said.
Calling Frank Thomas an elder statesman sounds as awkward as seeing him in a green jersey and white spikes still looks. The A’s didn’t necessarily count on counseling to be part of the Thomas package. Then again, they must not have expected much at all, considering they put Bobby Crosby and Huston Street on the cover of their media guide instead of the player billed as their biggest off-season signing ever.
“Yeah, I’ve been a little surprised, just given the stuff he’s had to deal with the last couple years,” Beane said. “We wouldn’t be in first place if he wasn’t here. I can’t imagine a guy being more professional than he has been with our players. He’s arguably the most underrated dominant offensive force of his generation, and after that first month, he’s been vintage Frank Thomas.”
Except the old Frank Thomas might not have allowed himself to relax and enjoy the ride as much as the new and improved model has. Thomas has done more than rediscover his stroke as a player. He also seems to have hit his stride as a person.
“I’m not motivated by proving anyone wrong,” Thomas insisted. “I miss Chicago. But the way A’s fans have embraced me and showed me they wanted me, my goal is not to disappoint them in Oakland. It’s a good fit.”
Sultans of summer
Heading into Saturday, Jim Thome had better overall numbers than the man he essentially replaced in the Sox’s lineup, Frank Thomas. But Thomas has been dangerous since an abysmal start. Here’s a look at how the two DHs have stacked up since June 1.
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THOMAS CATEGORY THOME
.293 Average .293
201 At-bats 225
59 Hits 66
16 HRs 16
12.6 AB/HR 14.1
47 RBIs 42
38 BBs 39
40 Ks 67
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Thomas overall: .265, 27 HRs, 75 RBIs.
Comment: A’s GM Billy Beane isn’t running around saying I told you so even if Thomas’ numbers have given him good reason.
Thome overall: .294, 36 HRs, 91 RBIs.
Comment: Early season MVP candidate has hit lull but if he regains stroke in September, Sox could become AL favorites again.
David Haugh.
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dhaugh@tribune.com
