The Everyman is not for everyone. Kevin Youkilis has tried to make peace with that. He wants to be liked, to be admired - who doesn’t? - but it cannot be at any price. There is scant room for compromise when you are the most intricate cog in the Red Sox wheel, a multi-positional player who provides the manager with the precious gift of flexibility, a middle-of-the-lineup power hitter who never, ever, gives away an at-bat, an on-base savant whose patience at the plate earned him cult status in a New York Times best seller, a Gold Glove first baseman who just might win one at third, too, if he ever logs enough games there.
Burning desire
Youkilis’s fiery displays are embraced by some, loathed by others, but he won’t change approach
The Red Sox will open the Division Series tomorrow night against the Anaheim Angels thanks, in large part, to the contributions of their Everyman, who plugged holes, filled gaps, and provided contingencies in a year in which Boston’s position players were uncharacteristically thin. Youkilis has sacrificed average for power, Gold Gloves for versatility, and still the numbers sparkle. In 136 games this season, he posted an on-base percentage of .413, an OPS (on-base plus slugging percentages) of .961 and a batting average of .305. Even though he missed 26 games, he hit 27 homers, had 94 RBIs, scored 99 runs, and walked 77 times.
“Statistically, if you consider 2008 and 2009, you could make the case there has been no better player in the league [in that time],’’ said Red Sox executive vice president Theo Epstein.
Some players have a natural swing, the chiseled body. The uniform drapes over their athletic frames as if they were sculpted by Michelangelo. Youkilis is not one of these players. He is all sweat and toil, with his unorthodox stance and his deceiving frame and his glistening bald pate and that curious swath of hair on his chin. He does not look like an MVP candidate; more a refrigerator repairman, a butcher, the man selling hammers behind the counter at the True Value hardware store.
A regular guy.
Only this “regular guy’’ systematically transformed himself into one of the most feared hitters in baseball.
“If there are guys on first and second with two outs of a one-run game and you asked a pitcher, ‘Who do you want to face?’ I guarantee there isn’t a single one who will answer Kevin Youkilis,’’ said teammate Mike Lowell.
So why, then, is this Everyman not unequivocally embraced and revered by his teammates? Why, when a reporter approaches another key Red Sox player to speak about Youkilis does he respond, “I’d rather refrain’’?
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