Sam Donnellon: Maybe we were wrong about Pat Burrell after all

SAN FRANCISCO - It is the question most asked a Philadelphia writer covering the Giants in this postseason.

"What was Pat Burrell like as a Phillie?"

There's no short answer to that, of course. During his nine seasons in Philadelphia, he was loved, hated and loved in wildly vacillating proportions by fans; he went from a willing interviewee to an incredibly difficult one; he was seen in so many different lights by so many different people that, even today, I am not quite sure what I would think of him if I didn't have to cover him all those years.

I was on the field when Burrell was introduced after the Phillies made him the first pick of the 1998 amateur draft out of the University of Miami. That day, he was funny and irreverent, and, with his Hollywood looks and big-league talent, you figured Philadelphia's Mickey Mantle had finally arrived, or at least the long-awaited heir to Darren Daulton.

He would be the front man, hit the home runs and dish out the great quotes, and the city would be filled with restaurants and parks in his name before too long.

Either he never embraced that idea, or the failures of his up-and-down career and the criticism that went with him reshaped his outlook. But the Burrell who outlasted Bobby Abreu, Randy Wolf, David Bell, and others was the polar opposite of Mickey Mantle. He kept us at arm's length. And up until that double in Game 5 of the 2008 World

Series, his public did in kind.

By the end of his tenure, Pat Burrell was, for me, everything I despised about the professional baseball culture. I saw him as an overpaid and spoiled narcissist, a guy who plays the game with mousse in his hair and was once seen on national television flossing his teeth after being removed from the game.

A protest? Or a personal-hygiene statement in a sport dominated by blackened teeth and blackened spit?

You make the call.

And you often did. When he wasn't hitting, when he couldn't (or wouldn't) hit the other way, when he repeatedly popped up and struck out when just putting a ball in play would have been beneficial, when he took on popular manager Larry Bowa and blew off his high-five after a big home run against the Mets, the ratio of haters over advocates seemed infinitesimal.

In those times, he was booed as rabidly when he took his spot in leftfield as Barry Bonds was, the jeers often very personal and, just as often, very unfunny. Sitting out there with young children on a few sunny Sundays, I squirmed more than a few times.

But there was a side of me who thought then he deserved it, had earned it, had not taken his first-pick talents and big-league opportunity as seriously as he should.

I didn't see him as a hard worker. Aaron Rowand, whose work ethic I respect immensely, tells me I'm dead wrong.

I didn't see him as a leader, either. Again, Rowand said, I don't see what his teammates see.

Rowand, a former Phillie and now a reserve outfielder with the Giants, along with first baseman Aubrey Huff, persuaded Giants management to take a flyer on Burrell after the Rays gave up on him as their DH in May.

At the time, stuff swirled around about his attitude in Tampa, as well, stuff Rowand tried to dispel to management just as he did the other day with me.

"But, really, they didn't know if he was going to be able to play

defense or whether he could still hit," Rowand said this week. "Deep down, I knew . . . I knew, because of his personality. He's always preparing, always at the field early, in tune with the game."

Burrell?

"He's a very smart baseball player," Rowand said. "Sitting around and having him go hit, that's not how he was going to be at his best. And you saw how it played out."

Burrell played 96 regular-season games for the Giants, hit 16 doubles and 18 home runs, knocked in 51 runs. While his postseason average is under .200, he's hit three doubles and a home run and has walked seven times.

The irony, as the World Series resumes in Texas tonight, is that Burrell might end up as the Giants' DH in one or more of these games. He said he's fine with it.

"If I'm DH-ing, I've got to find a way to make it happen," he said.

"It's not nearly the same as having to be a DH every day," Rowand said. "He's been in the game, he's been in tune."

And he seems changed, chastened even, by his struggles of the last three seasons.

"Here's the thing," he said the other day. "You've got a lot of guys here who have played long enough to understand how important this stuff is. I don't think you need any extra motivation. That's where I go back to the organization doing their homework on guys that they brought over. It's all about winning this. It's a chance to really do something good."

There's an old joke among media types that the difficult personalities they cover finally want to say hello at precisely the point in their careers it is time to say goodbye.

Burrell, 34, simply might be at that point. But I'd like to think, stripped of the pressures of a big contract and that face-of-the-franchise stuff, humbled by the meanness of the game, San Francisco is seeing the guy we thought we'd see for all those years in Philadelphia.

"I can't complain a whole lot," he said. "It's been great. I don't have the words. I've been pretty lucky to get some pretty good opportunities. You've got to be thankful for that and hopefully seize the moment and go out there and win another one." *

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