On the plane ride to New York last Friday, Shawn Chacon spent much of it reminiscing on what he had left behind and daydreaming about how his debut as a Yankees starter might go.
He arrived at Yankee Stadium to find an intense buzz outside and it was clear to Chacon he had left calmness like that of a bird cage back at Coors Field to enter ordered chaos like that of a beehive. He found his new teammates stretching in preparation for their game against the Angels. Derek Jeter was the first to welcome him, and then one by one others followed. Gary Sheffield told him that “we rely on each other here,” and “don’t let that big city out there scare you.”
Chacon reminded himself to shed the nervousness, the awe.
“I didn’t expect hugs,” Chacon said, “or everybody to be excited about little old me coming from Colorado. But I could tell they were a tight-knit family.”
He stayed until the sixth inning and left, as the Yankees asked, because he was pitching the next day. Once at the park Saturday, some of the more than 54,000 fans began yelling to him, “Chacon! Welcome to New York! You look good in pinstripes, real pinstripes, not those purple pinstripes!”
While warming up his fastball was “running all over the place,” but he harnessed it in the game and complemented it with razor-sharp breaking pitches. Not once in his 104 pitches did he shake off catcher Jorge Posada; he would trust his new catcher. His work was done after six innings with one unearned run allowed, four hits, three walks and four strikeouts earned in a game the Yankees won 8-7 with a three-run ninth inning.
In his Times Square hotel room Sunday night, Chacon, via telephone, said the emotion and sadness he felt leaving Colorado was beginning to be replaced by the realization he is on a team and in a place that is the standard for gauging how good a baseball player is and can be.
“I learned from watching Preston Wilson and Joe Kennedy and the others that were traded by the Rockies this season before me that you kind of take it for what it is,” Chacon said. “If they don’t want you, you go somewhere else. With all due respect to the Rockies – they gave me an opportunity – the morale there is low. You can see it in guys’ faces in the clubhouse. They have a losing attitude. I know everybody in that organization wants to win and get better. I don’t know if the players really feel they have a chance to win. For the veterans, especially, it is like, ‘Man, when is the losing, losing, losing going to end?’
“The organization has to figure it out. They have a good idea what they need to do. I just think they don’t know how to do it.”
This is what people on the outside say about the Rockies. This comes from a guy who was on the inside.
And what concerns me more is the clear feeling among many of the Rockies that they wish it was them, not Chacon, who had joined the Yankees. That rather than being a part of building something, they would prefer to bail.
There are some serious self-esteem issues, baseball-wise, among the Rockies. I suppose it figures when you have a 37-67 record.
This is what Chacon said some of the Rockies players and coaches told him when they learned he had been traded to the Yankees:
“Dude! Unbelievable! You’re going to the Yankees!”
“You’re going to the head of the class!”
“You just got called up to the big leagues!”
“Man, you’re lucky to be getting out of here!”
The Rockies get furious when people make fun of them, and here they are making fun of themselves.
The Rockies keep whittling and restructuring and now do not have a single African-American on their roster. The handful of Latin players among them are bunched into a corner in their clubhouse. This is a team too full of small, unhealthy cliques saddled with doubt.
They gave up on Chacon, 27, though he was a product of their system. His production did not meet his present or future earnings, they insist. The scary thought is just about the time Chacon is ready to get it right, get it going, mature enough to become a consistent contributor, the Rockies walked.
The Yankees told him to shave his goatee, keep it simple, do what you do and have fun. He did. Except for that mishap as he warmed up to begin the sixth inning.
“My spike got caught in the dirt, and there I was on the ground looking like a fool,” Chacon said. “Jeter, A-Rod and Posada came up and they were doing everything they could to keep from laughing. Guys said it looked like I had been shot. That was the most embarrassing moment of my life.”
There is a difference, however, between slipping and falling flat.
Chacon’s past and present tell him that. He is scheduled to pitch Friday at Toronto.
“This is going to work if I keep in mind what I came here for and stay confident,” he said. “I know I can help this team win. This is the place to be. The place to be good.”
Staff writer Thomas George can be reached at 303-820-1994 or tgeorge@denverpost.com.
