Rodriguez focused on playing ball despite being in final year of contract
Associated Press

PORT CHARLOTTE, Fla. — Pudge isn’t worried — not about his weight or his contract status.

Ivan Rodriguez came to the Texas Rangers camp about 10 pounds overweight after his regular offseason routine was curtailed because of rehabilitation from knee surgery.

He also arrived knowing he was going into the last year of his contract with the team he has played for since making his major league debut as a 19-year-old in 1991.

The 10-time All-Star catcher is listed as 5-foot-9 and 205 pounds but looks to be about 210 pounds right now. He is working himself into shape, shedding the pounds in the heat of the Florida sun and preparing his surgically repaired left knee for a full season.

“I’m starting to get a feel behind the plate, squatting down and standing up and all of that kind of stuff,” Rodriguez said. “It’s getting all right.”

Rodriguez, whose last two seasons have ended early because of injury, expects to be ready for the April 1 season opener at Oakland. He had surgery last September because of tendinitis in his left knee.

“The knee is healthy. What we’re trying to do now is just ease him back in and let him get going,” general manager John Hart said. “He’s swinging the bat great, he’s throwing great. But he’s still testing the limits of his mobility. I don’t think it’s a health issue, I just think it’s a matter of getting comfortable to go through the rigors of a season.”

That’s what concerns Rodriguez, not the status of his contract even though he has expressed his desire to play his entire career in Texas.

Rodriguez is in the final year of his $42 million, five-year contract he signed in 1997 when he walked into then-club president Tom Schieffer’s office and made the deal.

The Rangers want to see how their catcher, who has caught more than 1,300 games, responds after the knee surgery. Hart said it’s unlikely any contract talks will take place before the end of the season.

He has been limited to just 202 games since winning the AL MVP in 1999, but still started in the All-Star game and won Gold Gloves both seasons.

Rodriguez was putting up more MVP-worthy numbers in 2000 (.347, 27 homers and 83 RBIs in 91 games) before breaking his right thumb. In 111 games last season before knee surgery, he hit .308 with 25 homers and 65 RBIs.

Even though he’s played in only half of the spring games, and the Rangers have limited his work in the bullpen, Rodriguez is hitting and doing other drills daily.

“I hope Pudge is my biggest problem. If so, we’ll have a pretty good year,” manager Jerry Narron said. “I don’t foresee him having any problems.”

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