Tampa
POP CUESTA has been coaching baseball for 25 years at Thomas Jefferson, a sprawling high school here on the fringe of the city, and too much has changed. Not the game, mind you, but the players. This afternoon, he is sitting on a worn wooden bench inside a dusty makeshift clubhouse, checking the mid-term report card that one of his teenagers has just handed him. He's passing, and Cuesta is satisfied.

Baseball is just another activity to these kids, like Super Nintendo and cruising the mall after school. And that bothers Cuesta, a man who has spent most of his life on diamonds scattered throughout the state of Florida. The clubhouse at Reno martinez Sr. Field is testament to both his love and accomplishment.

A picture of Fred McGriff, now the first baseman for the world champion Atlanta Braves, hangs in his old locker along with his batting helmet. Tony LaRussa, also a Jefferson graduate, peers down from the far wall wearing the green-and-gold of the Oakland Athletics. Cuesta points to another photograph near the door, and the boy is Tino Martinez, Class of 1985, crushing a chest-high fastball. You can't even see his face, or the pitch, but the fully-extended arms tell the story.

"It's a little high," said Cuesta, smiling as if the pride is about to spill out from his ears. "But look at his bat. It's as level as can be."

Twenty-one of Cuesta's players have signed major-league contracts. Seven actually made it to the bigs. One is replacing the former captain of the Yankees, Don Mattingly, and that is Martinez. Short of holding open auditions, the Yankees could not have made a better choice. Just ask Mattingly himself, who stepped aside in November to make the Martinez acquisition possible.

"I have a lot of respect for Tino," Mattingly said. "Tino's worked very hard, and everything he's got he's earned."

Martinez received a five-year contract worth $20.25 million from the Yankees when he was traded from the Mariners, along with reliever Jeff Nelson and Jim Mecir, last December. The deal became official on his birthday, Dec. 7, and Martinez was on the telephone talking with the media just hours after his wife, Marie, gave birth to their third child, Victoria, that same day.

It was a tremendous rush of good fortune for Martinez, and fitting that it came on the heels of his finest season. The 28-year-old first baseman totaled career-high in almost every offensive category last year for teh Mariners, hitting .293 with 31 home runs and 111 RBI.

He was a late selection to the All-Star team by none other than ex-Yankees manager Buck Showalter, who remains a fan despite Martinez' dimantling of his club in the Division Series. Martinez batted .409 in the five-game series, with one homer and five RBI as the Mariners ousted the Yankees. Ironically, that playoff loss was the spark that ignited owner George Steinbrenner's offseason firestorm, ultimately bringing Martinez to the club.

"He's a quality kid," Showalter said. "The perfect guy to follow Donnie. I don't think anybody's going to replace Donnie. But the things that he's done with the Yankees, Tino has the chance to do the same."

Martinez, should have no problem feeling comfortable in the Bronx. He has a .387 career average at Yankee Stadium, the highest of any ballpark in the American League, and his eight home runs and 18 RBI in 75 at-bats.

"When I go in there, I just see the ball well," Martinez said. "It's a good place to hit."

That obviously was the thinking when the Yankees went after Martinez. Mattingly's decline at the plate last season made the club thirst for a power-hitting first baseman, much like the captain was in his prime, and defense was an afterthought. Martinez will never replace Mattingly's glove, but ask around and the general perception is that he is better-than-average defensively.

At 6-foot-2 and 210 pounds, Martinez is larger than Mattingly (6-0, 175), and his style is more smash than smooth. Still, he has a career fielding percentage of .995, and what he can't get done with his gove he does with grit.

"I think I'm pretty decent," Martinez said. "But I kind of like the fact that the Yankees organization and the fans don't expect much out of me as a defensive player. It's fine with me if they don't expect that, but I know I can go out there and do a decent job. I think I'm going to surprise a few people."

One person he won't is his former coach at the University of Tampa, Kenny Dominguez, now the manager of the Yankees' Class A Tampa club. Martinez was the first top-notch prospect he ever landed at the local school, and Dominguez still speaks of him with reverence.

"He's a perfectionist within himself," said Dominguez, between workouts at the club's minor-league facility. "There's one thing about him - he's a very underrated first baseman. You watch him and he's not a ballet dancer. He makes all the plays, sticks his nose in the dirt and gets it done. The man has no fear."

On the field, perhaps. But there was a time, back in the winter of 1990, when Martinez wasn't sure if he could even continue playing baseball. Martinez returned home to Tampa following his first season in the Mariners' organization, at Double-A Williamsport, when his father Rene suddenly became very sick. He was diagnosed with a brain tumor, underwent emergency surgery and died five days later on Jan. 4. Rene Martinez was 48 years old.

He had followed his son's progress every step of the way, even traveling to Seoul, South Korea, to see him win the gold medal in the 1988 Olympics. At first, the loss was too much for Martinez to bear. His coaches remember Martinez as a tireless worker, but he could barely muster the energy to lift a bat after his father's death. Boarding a plane to join the Mariners in Arizona was out of the question.

"It was tough because that's when I usually start working out for spring training," Martinez said. "I really didn"t want to go back. I didn't have the motivation to go out and practice. Although I knew he would have wanted me to play, it was still hard to get up and to work out, to try and get myself going."

Eventually he did. Martinez made his major-league debut against the Rangers in Texas later that season on Aug. 20, getting his first hit off Boby Witt. he played 24 games with the Mariners that year, and 36 the next before he broke in with the Mariners fulltime in 1992. Martinez hit .257 with 16 home runs that season, and showed steady progress until he tore the anterior cruciate ligament of his left knee and missed the final two months in 1993.

The injury may have stalled his rise, but could not stop it. A quiet man in a small-market city like Seattle needs something to get noticed, especially playing in the shadow of the Franchise, centerfielder Ken Griffey Jr. So Martinez simply shaped homself into one of the more feared hitters in the league last season, helping thrust the Mariners into the playoffs for the first time in the club's 19-year history.

The secret was out. With Mattingly a free agent, the Yankees compiled their short list of candidates, and Martinez quickly became the top choice. Don't underestimate the Tampa connection between Martinez and Steinbrenner, who has shown an affection for local players like third baseman Wade Boggs and resurrected pitcher Dwight Gooden.

"He's very much a key to this ball-club," Steinbrenner said. "He didn't move Don Mattingly out; he came in when Don Mattingly didn't want to return. They're going to love him in New York."

As much as Mattingly? Impossible. The fans won't forget their beloved captain, and 13 years of loyal service can't be replaced in one season. Martinez knows this, and if he should forget, there will be a new reporter at his locker to remind him almost daily.

He has handled the pressure even better than could be expected, at least during spring training. Boggs, whose Legends Field locer borders Martinez' to the left, is oftern close enough to hear the questions.

"The thing you have to understand is for him to come over and fill Donnie's shoes, he's got to play his game," Boggs said. "He's got to have the concentration. He can't have any concentration if [reporters] keep asking him questions about Donnie. He's got to concentrate on what he's doing out there on the field. Just let the issue lie, let the guy play 162 and let the chips fall where they may. He's going to do just fine."

Martinez never shows any sign of doubt. He speaks in short, clipped sentences, rushing through the words like he is in a hurry to get to the plate and start spraying the outfield with line drives. His home runs down here would have landed 10 rows deep in the rightfield seats of Yankee Stadium, and Martinez will start aiming for the upper deck of that short porch April 9, when the Yankees host the Royals on Opening Day in the Bronx. He is looking forward to this season.

"On the field, it's not like everybody wants to see Mattingly," Martinez said. "I'm not trying to be like him. I'm just out there playing, like I normally do. Like I played for the Mariners. Nothing changes. There's a lot of questions from the media, but what's though about that? You've got to answer them. And it's the same answer every time . . . I'm just trying to play my game."

Baseball always has been that simple for Martinez, whether it is played at $30 million Legends Field or the high school diamond that now bears the name of his father. Nothing changes between the foul lines, the same chalk boundaries that Cuesta lays down before every home game at Rene Martinez Sr. Field. He thinkds of his friend's son and remembers why he has been coaching this game for so long.

David Lennon

Copyright 1996, Newsday Inc.