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Loaiza story
Loaiza is starting over
By Teddy Greenstein
Tribune staff reporter
May 27, 2003, 10:56 PM CDT
TORONTO -- They whispered about him. They gossiped about him behind his back.
They wondered why Esteban Loaiza seemed to spend more time typing e-mails on his hand-held computer than reviewing scouting reports of upcoming opponents.
They wondered why he spent so much time away from the team, why he sometimes would show up late for batting practice.
Most of Loaiza's teammates in Toronto knew about the family crisis that was occupying his thoughts and much of his time. But apparently not everyone was sympathetic.
Loaiza remembers the time last year when reporters told him a teammate who wished to remain anonymous had ripped him for "not taking care of his [work]," for spending too much time on his cell phone and computer.
Loaiza was furious. Didn't they know that his girlfriend was paralyzed temporarily after giving birth to their son?
"I wanted to know who that player was so I could tell him, `Be a man and say it straight to my face,'" Loaiza said. "I went up to every single guy on the team, and they all said they never said that."
Loaiza's not buying it.
"They like to talk," he said, "but they don't like to say it to the person they're talking about."
Loaiza might get a chance to stare down his demon Thursday night when he takes the mound for the White Sox against his former team.
But he still doesn't know who dogged him behind his back. And he no longer cares.
What matters to the 31-year-old right-hander is that he finally has stripped away his label as an underachiever. His 7-2 record and 1.92 earned-run average are evidence of that.
Most important, though, is that his girlfriend, Ashley Esposito, can walk again. And their 2-year-old son, Sage, is happy and healthy after surgery this month to remove his adenoids.
"In this world," Loaiza said, "family comes first."
Stress test
Imagine trying to succeed in professional sports while your girlfriend, who's 1,000 miles away in Texas, is trying to care for your newborn while recovering from surgery to remove a benign tumor near her spinal cord.
Now imagine having to deal with the added weight of a messy divorce. Although the marriage lasted less than two years and produced no children, Loaiza's ex-wife twice has contested terms of the settlement.
"One of those things would be a big distraction alone," said Loaiza's agent, John Boggs. "They're there before the game, after the game and possibly during.
"Maybe he found some kind of solace between the lines. You try to block it out, but, hey, he's a human being. I'll tell you one thing: I couldn't do it."
Loaiza's ex-wife will get another hearing in September.
"The last one is probably going to the Supreme Court," Loaiza said half-jokingly. "I just want to get it over with."
Although Loaiza says he bears much of the blame for his failed marriage, he said the current settlement is already "a lot of money, way too much. She can live like a major-league millionaire for the rest of her life."
Loaiza calls that issue "a headache," but obviously a small one compared with Esposito's recovery from spinal surgery in April 2001.
Loaiza was there by her side, though he had to miss Toronto's home opener. The Blue Jays let him fly to Texas after he earned an 8-1 victory on Opening Day.
With a risk of permanent paralysis, Esposito spent much of the next year in a hospital and a rehabilitation center.
"She had to learn how to walk again," Boggs said.
Loaiza wanted frequent updates, so he bought her a computer for all the times they couldn't be together.
"That was the only way we could communicate because she couldn't use her cell phone in the hospital," Loaiza said. "There were other times she couldn't move."
Esposito was confined to a wheelchair as she fought to get the feeling back in her legs. It was a year before she began walking again.
"She's not 100 percent," Loaiza said. "But she's doing much better. Our son's growing and brings a smile to our face. It's unbelievable.
"Thank God everything is good. For a while I had too much stuff in my head. Now I can concentrate on my game."
Loaiza showed up for spring training this year with no guarantees, including his salary. He would have to compete with Jon Rauch, Gil Heredia and Josh Stewart just to make the Sox's rotation. Loaiza's career was at a crossroads. He had been good enough to command a $5.8 million salary in 2002 but bad enough to finish 9-10 with a 5.71 ERA.
Now he had to settle for a minor-league contract good for $500,000 if he made the club, plus $500,000 in incentives. The Sox hold a club option in 2003 for $3.5 million with a $150,000 buyout.
"I guarantee it was a wakeup call," Boggs said. "It's amazing how quickly you can be out of this game if you don't watch out."
A natural
For years Loaiza had gone no further than his raw ability would take him. He didn't lift weights. He neglected to study hitters. He wouldn't pick up a baseball in the off-season. He spent so much money on clothes, he had a reputation for caring more about how he looked off the field than on it.
"I knew I had to work harder if I wanted to be up here," he said.
Loaiza, at 6 feet 3 inches and 215 pounds, is still anything but a physical specimen.
But his mind is now well-developed. He's succeeding by outthinking his opponents.
"He's putting his experience into play, being a smart pitcher," Sox manager Jerry Manuel said.
Loaiza spends hours watching tapes and going over scouting reports before he faces teams. Then he visualizes how he'll attack hitters using his array of pitches: rising fastball, sinking fastball, cutter, slider and changeup.
"I tell the scouting staff, `Give me the paperwork and I'll study it,'" Loaiza said. "It's pitch for pitch and count for count. I memorize it.
"Every pitching coach I've ever had has said I can throw any pitch for a strike no matter what the situation."
Now Loaiza knows what the situation calls for.
"He handles his own game," Manuel said. "He's not relying on a catcher or anything else."
Even after Loaiza earned a spot in the rotation in the spring, expectations were low.
Manuel said he hoped Loaiza's games would be a "coin flip," meaning that he would pitch well enough for the Sox to win half the time he pitched.
Loaiza beat Detroit in the Sox's home opener by allowing two hits over 62/3 innings, but he had to wait another week to get the ball. Mark Buehrle started twice in that span.
Loaiza dominated the Tigers again in his second start, giving up two hits and no walks over eight shutout innings. OK, good enough, but it was against the Tigers again.
Then he beat the Royals, Orioles and Twins in successive starts, allowing one run in each of those games.
At 5-0 with a 1.25 ERA, Loaiza didn't look like such a fluke.
He barely has cooled off since then. Since getting shelled by the Mariners on May 2, he has given up just four earned runs in four starts.
"If he wasn't doing what he's doing," Manuel said, "we'd really be in trouble."
All-Star stuff
Loaiza is the Sox's leading candidate to be selected for the All-Star Game, which will be played July 15 at U.S. Cellular Field.
His 1.92 ERA is the lowest among baseball's 150 starting pitchers. Among American League pitchers, Oakland's Mark Mulder ranks a distant second at 2.45.
Loaiza tries not to think about any of it.
When teammates jokingly call him "Cy Young," he tells them to cool it.
"There's a lot of season left," he said.
Loaiza will admit to one goal, though. He hopes to match last season's victory total of 11 by the All-Star break.
With seven victories and as many as nine more starts before the Midsummer Classic, that might be shooting low.
Then again, it wasn't long ago that Loaiza simply was looking for a job.
"It takes some guys a while," Boggs said, "to realize their potential."
Copyright © 2003, The Chicago Tribune
