TAMPA — You could argue no active major league player carries as strong a bond to his native land as does Carlos Beltran to Puerto Rico. Yet this past winter, Beltran limited his time at home to the Christmas/New Year's school break.
The rest of the time, you could find the Yankees' outfielder in Manhattan, or The Bronx, or Yonkers. Embracing the city where he has played the most.
"When I had the surgery, I felt it was the best thing for me to do, be close to the trainers," Beltran said Thursday at Steinbrenner Field. "I wanted to be [in New York]. I want to make sure I'm healthy. Make sure I show up ready to go."
"The surgery" would be the procedure the 37-year-old underwent Sept. 30, to remove loose pieces and a bone spur from his right elbow. That would be the bone spur that, Beltran and the Yankees assert, sabotaged his first season with the team for which he had long desired to play.
So here Beltran is, set to make his 2015 Grapefruit League debut Friday night at home against the Phillies, aiming to repeat a past feat.
"I know last year was a tough year for me, but at the end of the day, this is something that I have done well in the past," Beltran said. "After a bad year, I always have found a way to bounce back to where I'm supposed to be. To where I think I'm supposed to be."
His 2014 wasn't just bad. By most measures, it marked the worst campaign of his superb career. He registered personal lows in batting average (.233), on-base percentage (.301), and wins above replacement (both Baseball-Reference.com and FanGraphs graded him below the value of a replacement-level player). In all, the kickoff to his three-year, $45 million contract couldn't have gone much worse.
The Yankees badly need Beltran to look closer to his 2013 form, when he bid farewell to the Cardinals with a .296/.339/.491 slash line and 24 homers in 554 at-bats, plus a strong postseason.
Carlos Beltran (right) talks with Alex Rodriguez during a spring training workout.Photo: Getty Images
"It would be a huge boost to our lineup," manager Joe Girardi said. "He can do a bunch of different things offensively. Do some different things in the lineup with him because he's a switch-hitter. We really missed him. We missed his production last year. It's important to get it back."
Beltran was so committed to wintering in New York he registered his older daughter, Ivana, in a Manhattan private school, even though his charity work in Puerto Rico is considerable enough that it won him the 2013 Roberto Clemente Award, named after his fellow Puerto Rican. As the timing worked out, he tried swinging a bat for the first time in Puerto Rico, over the holidays.
"I was expecting the next day to wake up a little sore, and I woke up feeling fine," he said. "So now it's in the past."
Upon returning to his Manhattan apartment for the rest of the offseason, he continued his rehabilitation at Yankee Stadium and also in a Yonkers batting cage, Beltran said.
He sustained the elbow injury May 12, while hitting in the Yankee Stadium indoor cage, and neither a stint on the disabled list nor multiple cortisone shots improved his performance.
"I'm a gamer," Beltran declared on Thursday, but at the general managers' meetings last November, Yankees GM Brian Cashman conceded that, given how poorly Beltran performed, both the team and the player would've been better off had Beltran immediately submitted to surgery.
Nevertheless, it's important to note Beltran already was off to a shaky start (.240/.292/.440) when he got hurt. At his advanced baseball age, he might not be capable of another self-rescue mission.
Now comes the opportunity for Beltran to back up the "gamer" talk, and to defy the odds once again. He put up lousy numbers (.266/.330/.414, 16 homers) in 2005, his first year as a Met, and he rebounded with three sublime seasons that too many Mets fans didn't appreciate. And after major right-knee surgery limited him to 64 games in 2010, he burst out of the gate with an outstanding 98 games with the 2011 Mets before getting dealt to San Francisco.
"I just want to be productive," he said. "I want to put myself in a position where I can impact the team in a positive way, offensively or defensively."
He put himself in the right position before reporting to camp. On Friday, we'll start to see how much that matters.
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