Baseball
Too dumb to know any better
By JOHN ROMANO, Times Sports Columnist
Published October 24, 2003
MIAMI - It is not so much a slogan as a way of life. An approach to survival that is sincere and, at the same time, carefree.
It's a little thing called stupidity.
And the Marlins swear by it.
By their own admission they are too stupid to be scared. Too stupid to be awed. They act stupid on the bench and occasionally play stupid on the field.
Which brings us to this stupid thought:
The Marlins are a victory away from winning the World Series.
A team that has the 21st-largest payroll, the 28th-best attendance and employs a 20-year-old cleanup hitter is outplaying the richest, smuggest, most accomplished team in baseball.
And at this very minute, George Steinbrenner is screaming at employees for not being smart enough to come up with this stupid idea.
It was Josh Beckett who said it first. Earlier in the postseason, the right-hander said the Marlins might just be stupid enough to win it all.
It was not a probing revelation on Beckett's part. More of a smart-aleck remark to an ignorance-is-bliss kind of question.
But in revealing Florida's stupidity, Beckett correctly identified his team's greatest strength.
These Marlins are goofy. They are carefree. They are talented enough to beat the Yankees and young enough not to understand what that means.
They heckle opposing pitchers. They have crude names for each other. Whenever they come out of the dugout to celebrate, infielder Andy Fox screams for everyone to untuck his shirt. And the Marlins listen to him. Why? Who knows.
"Obviously we're not stupid people, but we have stupid fun," Beckett said. "We make fun of each other. We like to fool around. We have a lot of camaraderie."
It's a quality that has shown up on the field. The Marlins never get scared. They never panic. They lost the first game of the division series against the Giants and then won three straight, coming from behind all three times. They had three consecutive elimination games against the Cubs in the National League Championship Series and won each time.
They blew a two-run lead in the ninth inning of Game 4 on Wednesday night and came within a sacrifice fly of falling behind in the 11th.
And still they won. They beat New York in the type of game these Yankees have rarely lost in October.
Call it stupid. Call it vapid. Call it even a lack of respect. But no matter what else happens in the Series, the Marlins have proved they will not be overwhelmed by the Yankees or their mystique.
When the Marlins lost Game 4 of the NLCS, Jack McKeon showed up at 2 a.m. at baseball's postgame party, jumped onstage and played bongos with the band. Think about that. For crying out loud, if the Yankees lose, three people are fired by morning.
Friday's are throwback days around the Marlins clubhouse. It began as a tribute to centerfielder Juan Pierre - who plays a throwback style - and blossomed into a weekly tradition. Everyone is expected to wear a throwback jersey to work Friday. Everyone.
"Whether it's stupid or not, everyone does it," Fox said. "You look at Jeff Conine. He's an older guy, the opposite of the hip-hop generation. One day he comes walking in here wearing a Joe Namath throwback jersey. That meant a lot to us. Those kind of things keep us together."
The beauty of Florida's mood is it translates into other areas of the team. For instance, egos are eviscerated before they can grow too large. Jealousy is not tolerated, and complaining was banned long ago.
They do not gripe. They do not moan, carp, whine or bellyache. They accept demotions, ignore slights and generally behave like a cast of Disney characters.
"I have managed a number of years in the major leagues, and I have never had a ballclub like this," McKeon said. "I've never had so many unselfish, dedicated players interested in one thing: winning."
It could not be any other way. This team does not win with pitching. It does not win with power. It wins because it is well-rounded and selfless.
That was McKeon's theme when he arrived in May. He told the Marlins they had enough talent to win, but they needed to work harder and ignore their personal concerns and statistics.
Previous manager Jeff Torborg had been patient and pleasant. McKeon was more likely to shout. But he also encouraged them to have more fun.
It became their edge. Their style. They would show up early at the ballpark to work, but also to clown around.
"When guys like me and Lenny (Harris) and Conine got here, we were taken aback by the way they acted," pitcher Rick Helling said. "It's not like any big-league clubhouse or dugout I've been around. It's almost a college atmosphere. Everyone talking, everyone chattering. Trust me, that stuff doesn't go on in big-league dugouts."
Yankee Stadium has its monuments. It has plaques. It has, every few feet, some sign quoting Joe DiMaggio on the cosmic pleasure of being a Yankee.
The Marlins have their shirts untucked.
Ah, to be young and stupid.
Times columns today
Chase Squires: A baseball fan who always kept his eye on the score
Howard Troxler: Perspectives in lewdness on both sides of offense
Robert Trigaux: TECO teeters on an unthinkable brink
Ernest Hooper: The taste of Texas; a snoop in the kitchen
John Romano: Too dumb to know any better
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