February 8, 200422 yr Posted on Sun, Feb. 08, 2004 Soaking it up Since winning the World Series, Josh Beckett, the sudden celebrity, has watched his Texas-sized legend grow BY CLARK SPENCER cspencer@herald.com More photos IN THE SWING OF THINGS: Josh Beckett swings a golf club before workouts at the Texas Sports Medicine Center. JOE RIMKUS JR. / HERALD STAFF SPRING, Texas - The ball, nestled snugly inside his black mitt like a pearl inside a clam, comes with an unwritten warning: Do not remove. The white sphere hasn't budged from its resting spot since Josh Beckett plucked it off the infield grass at Yankee Stadium and tagged Jorge Posada for the final out of the World Series. The Hall of Fame asked for it, and his new girlfriend -- lingerie model Leeann Tweeden -- threatened to take it out of the glove, which prompted a swift retort. 'She was like, `What if I take it out?' '' Beckett says. 'I was like, `That would probably be a pretty [bad]move.' '' Beckett says the ball isn't going anywhere, at least for now. He appeased the Hall of Fame by donating a World Series jersey and cap, but the ball is staying put in his bedroom at the Beckett family compound just outside Houston. When visitors ask, as they're inclined to do, Beckett satisfies their curiosity by removing the glove from the bottom shelf of a glass case and spreading it apart to reveal his most sacred possession. ''I think I'll just leave it in there,'' Beckett says. ``Maybe, someday, some guy will give me a hundred million bucks for it.'' Or not. It doesn't much matter. The priceless ball belongs to him as much as the World Series belongs to the unsuspecting Marlins, and nobody can take either away. Not even four months have passed since Beckett and the Marlins tied a bow on Game 6, and the lives of the 23-year-old pitcher and his teammates changed the instant Posada tapped a slow roller up the first-base line and Beckett dashed toward it, thinking, ``Get to the ball and tag the son-of-a-gun.'' It changed right then and there in front of a sold-out throng of muted Yankees fans, transfixed on Beckett and his howling mates as they celebrated on the field. Beckett was honored as Series MVP, but the attention hasn't waned. ATTENTION-GETTER His celebrity has increased in step with the demands on his time. ''It's kind of a hassle pretty much everywhere we go,'' says Beckett's longtime friend and high school catcher, Stephen Ghutzman, as they sit down for breakfast at a local IHOP. ``It's not like he's a rapper.'' The National Rifle Association called, wanting to use Beckett -- an avid hunter -- in its promotional ads. Beckett -- no ''tree hugger,'' he says -- agreed despite warnings from the group that he could be subjected to criticism. Playboy called requesting an interview. ''Playboy wants to come, and I think that's a pretty interesting deal even though I dislike Hugh Hefner,'' he says. Sports Illustrated is on his black list. Beckett wasn't so much miffed that he and Tweeden -- a Frederick's of Hollywood model who now does work for The Best Damn Sports Show Period -- were not allowed to bring along a couple of friends to a Super Bowl gala sponsored by SI, but that rapper Jay-Z showed up with an entourage of at least 15. ''So the next time Sports Illustrated asks me to do something,'' Beckett says, 'I'll say, `Why don't you call Jay-Z? Maybe he can help you.' '' He shot a commercial for Major League Baseball with Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez. He has turned down far more requests for interviews than he has granted, agreeing to this one on the condition that he be allowed to conduct two at once with the two South Florida newspapers that had submitted separate requests months ago. Lynn Beckett, Josh's mother, says some of the questions have bordered on the ridiculous. ''Somebody asked me what we had for dinner one night,'' she says. ``Come on, people. That's not even interesting. I told them it was something a million other people had last night.'' AT HOME IN TEXAS The Beckett home in Spring is located not far from the diamond where Josh terrorized high school batters -- and attracted hordes of major-league scouts -- with a mid-90s fastball that most of them were unable to hit. Ghutzman, between bites of steak and fried eggs, recalls one incident in which the father of a player on an opposing team tried to gain an advantage by sitting directly behind the backstop screen when Beckett was on the mound. The man would shout out ''inside'' or ''outside'' to his team's hitters depending on where Ghutzman targeted himself for Beckett's pitches. Beckett and Ghutzman conferred on the mound and devised a payback plan. 'I put down a `1' [for fastball], and he threw one 97 miles per hour that I allowed to go right by my shoulder,'' Ghutzman says. ``It hit the fence right in front of that guy's face, and it scared the living daylights out of him. Both sides of the stands were dying of laughter. That guy probably had dirty underwear.'' The man promptly moved, but the story survives as the Beckett legend grows. The Beckett family spread is located on a secluded road and is protected by an iron gate and four of Josh's bloodhounds. Adorning the stone gateposts are red-white-and-blue signs -- one on each side -- that read ''God Bless Texas'' and ``God Bless America.'' Inside the house, a half-dozen deer heads stare down from the wall in his den. So does a framed Baseball Weekly cover bearing his image and the headline: ''The Next Nolan Ryan?'' A high school honor roll certificate sits atop a television. Beckett spent much of the offseason working out in suburban Houston, swimming with Marlins reliever Chad Fox and several other major-league players. Beckett occasionally seeks refuge at his 1,753-acre Tree House ranch, located four hours from Houston, but he has it on the market for $2.6 million with plans to buy a larger one. COOL AND CONFIDENT Despite the accolades and postseason heroics, the fact remains that Beckett's career 17-17 regular-season mark doesn't exactly jump off the page. The Marlins, who took him out of high school with the second overall pick in the 1999 June amateur draft, aren't sweating. Nor is Beckett. After all, injuries (blister problems in 2002 and a sprained right elbow that put him on the shelf for two months last season) have slowed his development. He has yet to complete a full season. ''I'm still young,'' he says. ``In 15 years, I'm 38 years old. I'm not rushing anything. But I need to put it together and get something done.'' Beckett is brash, cocky. He didn't like it last season when manager Jack McKeon skipped his turn in the rotation because of concerns over another budding blister. ''I was pitching great at the time,'' Beckett says. ``As soon as they skipped my start because I had a blister, I was hot, furious. I didn't talk to Jack for two weeks, and when I finally talked to him we were in his office yelling at each other. It was definitely motivating. [Expletive] these guys. I'll show them. I wanted innings. I was healthy. I was fine.'' Beckett says he respects and admires McKeon, but he disputes the widely held theory that the manager succeeds with psychological mind games aimed at motivating his players. ''He thinks he does, but he doesn't,'' Beckett says. ``But he's a good man. He genuinely cares about us as people. A lot of people may say he doesn't, but he does.'' Beckett is projected to be the Marlins' opening-day starter. But the postseason memories still weigh strong and vivid in his mind. The anxiety of starting Game 6 -- the deciding game as it turned out -- was such that the only food Beckett could put down before the game was ``six saltine crackers.'' As a result, the beer and champagne toasts celebrating the World Series title took no time to take effect. ''I spent like $1,300 that night,'' he says. ``The next morning, the receipts were coming out of my pockets. All I ate were those saltines, and that's why I got so tipsy because I hadn't eaten anything. I never went to sleep.'' He's still living that dream Sorry ladies Beckett is now offcialy taken by Leaann Tweeden from the Best Damn Sports Show. Dont like that he did a spot for the IRA. Overall not a bad article as you get to know Beckett a little better. Article
February 8, 200422 yr Great Article. I really am anticipating the beginning of the season. Beckett started showing his hot talent in playoffs/world series. Imagine watching that all season long! AHHH YEAH!
February 8, 200422 yr his new girlfriend -- lingerie model Leeann Tweeden :hat See what happens when you win the World Series...I bet A.J. Burnett is livid right now. :afro
February 8, 200422 yr Dont like that he did a spot for the IRA. dude, calm down, he did a spot for the NRA, not the irish republican army.
February 8, 200422 yr The National Rifle Association called, wanting to use Beckett -- an avid hunter -- in its promotional ads. Beckett -- no ''tree hugger,'' he says -- agreed despite warnings from the group that he could be subjected to criticism. Total badass.
February 8, 200422 yr Lynn Beckett, Josh's mother, says some of the questions have bordered on the ridiculous. ''Somebody asked me what we had for dinner one night,'' she says. ``Come on, people. That's not even interesting. I told them it was something a million other people had last night.'' *raises hand* I wanted to know! Sorry Lynn.
February 8, 200422 yr Author Dont like that he did a spot for the IRA. dude, calm down, he did a spot for the NRA, not the irish republican army. lol my bad I meant NRA
February 8, 200422 yr Sorry ladies Beckett is now offcialy taken by Leaann Tweeden from the Best Damn Sports Show. i am not worthy good job Josh
February 8, 200422 yr Similar article in the Palm Beach Post this morning: Amid whirlwind, Beckett escapes to Spring By Joe Capozzi, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer SPRING, Texas -- The baseball remains tucked inside his glove, right where it landed at 10:54 p.m. on Oct. 25. That night, in front of 55,773 at Yankee Stadium and millions more on television, pitcher Josh Beckett scooped a grounder inside the first-base line and swiped his glove at Jorge Posada's jersey for the out that clinched the 2003 World Series championship for the Florida Marlins. Perhaps more amazing than Beckett's shutout against the heavily favored New York Yankees on three days' rest is that the ball didn't fall out of his glove -- or that his glove didn't fall off his hand -- in the wild celebratory pileup. After his teammates had hoisted him on their shoulders, Beckett handed the glove to a clubhouse attendant who whisked it to safety. More than three months later, the final out of the World Series -- the most memorable moment in Florida's 11-year history -- sits in a wooden case. But it's not on display in the Baseball Hall of Fame or the Marlins' offices at Pro Player Stadium. It's at the foot of Beckett's bed, deep inside the 6,000-plus-square-foot home he built north of Houston with money from the $7 million contract he signed out of high school after the Marlins nabbed him with the No. 2 pick of the 1999 draft. "It was funny,'' said Caleb Beckett, Josh's 17-year-old brother. "After the sixth game, the Hall of Fame called. 'We want your jersey. We want your glove. We want your cleats.' He said, 'I'll give you my jersey and that's all you'll get.' " The MVP of the World Series says his precious mementos will go in a display case he plans to build in his home, not in some museum in upstate New York. "They wanted everything,'' said Beckett, 23. "That ball has never been taken out (of the glove). I think I'll just leave it in there. It's kind of neat. Maybe someday some guy will give me a hundred-million bucks for it.'' Beckett an avid hunter The keepsake fits nicely in his house, which is something of a museum with 10-foot ceilings where bats, balls and framed Marlins photographs share wall space with the mounted heads of 11- and 13-point point bucks and paintings of western scenes. Beckett shares the house with his parents and two brothers, who live in separate buildings on the four acres surrounded by a barbed-wire fence. The driveway, at the end of a dirt road marked with "Keep Out" signs, is patrolled by Shadow, J.J., Hunter and Chrissie, four hunting labs who stick their noses in between the rungs on the wrought-iron gate at the end of a driveway. The electronic gates, each decorated with "J.B.,'' are mounted on a stone wall decorated with a crucifix made of sticks that reads "God bless Texas.'' Out back is a swimming pool and a deer feeder, but Beckett does his hunting 4 hours southwest of Spring at the Treehouse Ranch, a 1,723-acre spread near San Antonio he bought three years ago for $1.5 million. It's for sale, he says, "so I can buy a bigger ranch.'' The Marlins' ace also is an avid hunter who agreed last month to allow the National Rifle Association to use his name, a relationship that began in the hours after his Game 6 victory. Facing TV cameras in the post-game interview room after being named World Series MVP, he was asked what's next. "I get to go deer hunting,'' he replied. Watching at home in Fort Lauderdale was Bob Morrison, executive vice president of Miami-based gun maker Taurus International. "When I heard that comment, I called my marketing guy. 'We've got to get him a gun. This is our kind of guy,' " said Morrison, who has a daughter in Jupiter Farms. "Here he pitched a shutout against the Yankees to win the World Series. You expect him to say, 'I'm going to Disney World,' and he says, 'I'm going deer hunting.' " On Jan. 2, Beckett hunted white-tail deer with Morrison and Abe Walsh, executive publisher of the NRA's publications. The two men flew to Texas to present the World Series hero with a 454 Casull "Raging Bull" -- a custom-made pistol decorated with Beckett's name, silver flaming baseballs and the words "Throwing Heat.'' "It's too pretty to use,'' Morrison said, "so we gave him one to shoot. The very first thing he shot was a 6-foot diamondback rattlesnake. We were hunting. We heard the rattle. Josh pulled the revolver out and shot it. It had 19 rattles on it. We took it back to the ranch and skinned it and we ate the rattlesnake that night.'' Beckett puts his off-season hunting tally at three bucks, including a 12-pointer shot with Morrison, one wild hog and a one rattlesnake. "I don't count that,'' Beckett said of the snake, ''because I'm a deer hunter.'' An instant celebrity That rattlesnake made for better eating than the crackers forced into Beckett's stomach hours before he took the mound for Game 6. Manager Jack McKeon had been criticized for starting Beckett, who had struck out 10 in Game 3, on three days' rest for the first time in his career. "I wasn't nervous,'' Beckett said in between bites of his steak-and-eggs breakfast at International House of Pancakes. "I don't get nervous. I don't really know that feeling. I know anxiety.'' And it was anxiety he felt on Oct. 25. "All I ate that day was six Saltine crackers,'' he says. "That's why I had such a bad hangover the next day. We partied all night and I hadn't eaten anything.'' Brad Penny became just the fourth pitcher since 1963 to beat the Yankees twice in the same World Series. Carl Pavano went 2-0 with a staff-best 1.40 ERA in the post-season. But it was Beckett, who said during the division series that the young Marlins "just might be stupid enough to pull this off,'' who got the notoriety. "I don't think he even realizes what he did,'' said Marlins relief pitcher Chad Fox, a Spring resident who works out with Beckett in the off-season. "He isn't fazed by anything. When he left (Yankee Stadium), the gust of wind went with him.'' After the parades in South Florida, Beckett blew into Los Angeles and wore jeans and a ball cap on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno. In November, he was honored at a Houston Texans football game and sat with NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue in the suite of Texans owner Bob McNair. Last month, he met President Bush at the White House and Hugh Hefner and Kato Kaelin at Super Bowl parties. Two weeks ago, he was spotted at various Super Bowl week parties with his high school catcher, Stephen Ghutzman, and girlfriend Leeann Tweeden, a lingerie model who appears on Fox's Best Damn Sports Show Period. In between it all, he managed to go to the movies -- he saw Bad Santa twice. Not bad for a guy with a career record of 17-17, who is still looking for his first full injury-free season and who hasn't won more than nine games in a year. "That's what I said in the World Series after we won: 'I've got to do this for a full season,' " he says. "I've got personal goals and stuff.'' He shares one -- to pitch at least 200 innings, which would be 58 more than his career high last year. "If you throw all those innings, everything else comes,'' he said. But this year he won't be throwing to Pudge Rodriguez, who signed with the Tigers last week. "What team didn't make some changes?'' Beckett said. "Scary" is all he allowed when asked about Rodriguez's spurning the Marlins to sign for more money with Detroit, which finished with the worst record in American League history last year. Beckett called his new catcher, Ramon Castro, last week. "He's my catcher. I wanted to see how he's doing,'' he said. "Castro has got a good hose. He throws almost as good as Pudge.'' Bump gives motivation Although the World Series seemed like Beckett's coming of age, he traces his blossoming to just before the All-Star break, when he was bumped from a start in Chicago and replaced by rookie Dontrelle Willis. At the time, Beckett had just allowed six runs in six innings in Chicago in his second start since coming off the disabled list. He sprained an elbow ligament in May. Now, a blister had formed on his middle finger, and the Marlins didn't want to take any chances with Beckett, who was 3-4. They started Willis, who was 8-1. "As soon as they skipped my start because I had that blister, I was hot. Furious. I didn't talk to Jack for two weeks, and when I finally talked to him we were in his office yelling at each other. It was definitely motivating: 'Screw these guys. I'll show 'em.' " Beckett went 6-4 the rest of the way to finish 9-8, then went 2-2 with a 2.11 ERA in the playoffs, including 1-1 with a 1.10 ERA in 16 1/3 innings in two World Series starts. Willis had a rough second half but was named Rookie of the Year -- an award Beckett was favored to win in 2001 before blisters ruined his rookie year. Florida's World Series victory erased any bad feelings that lingered. Now, Beckett has nothing but good things to say about McKeon. "He's a good man. He genuinely cares about us as people. A lot of people may say he doesn't but he does.'' Rigorous training Since the middle of December, Beckett has been working out at Texas Sports Medicine Center in nearby Tomball, lifting weights three days a week mixed with two days of rigorous swimming drills that include treading water while wearing a 20-pound vest. "It's like boot camp,'' said Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Kip Wells, a native Texan who first brought Beckett to the facility in 2002. After a recent workout, Beckett drove his Ford F-250 pickup to his favorite eatery, Luby's Cafeteria, only to arrive an hour before it opened. His went to his second-favorite restaurant where he blended into the IHOP crowd unnoticed. "It's kind of a hassle,'' Ghutzman said of the recognition his best friend gets in public. "Pretty much everywhere we go.'' He got more recognition after the Super Bowl when a Major League Baseball commercial aired during Survivor. In it, Beckett grooves a Wiffle ball to Derek Jeter, who slams it against a wall. "We filmed that in a house in New York. Took us five hours to do it,'' Beckett said. Back at the house, Beckett, in Houston Texans shorts and T-shirt, slumped on a leather couch and programmed TIVO to The Best Damn Sports Show Period. Across the room, Ghutzman snoozed on another couch. "This is all we do, by the way,'' Beckett said. Finally, after some coaxing, he went to his bedroom and reached into the case, cradling the black glove with the Game 6 baseball in the pocket. He wouldn't let anyone hold it. "He's taken the ball out of the glove before. I saw him,'' Caleb said. "He's wrong,'' Beckett said. Ghutzman pokes his head up. "Tell them about Leeann. Leeann's held it.'' A couple of weeks ago, Beckett's girlfriend held the glove. "She said, 'What if I took the ball out?' " Beckett recalled, rolling his eyes. "I told her, 'That would be a bad move. Bad move.' "
February 8, 200422 yr Tweeden is his girlfriend...not bad... Member of NRA - that is great! Maybe he will take over as their spokesman someday, when Heston steps down...and I hope he GETS the big contract from us here in Florida...get that new stadium and it will happen. :shifty
February 9, 200422 yr He is definately 'big time' now. To think before the offseason, no one really even knew who he was.
February 9, 200422 yr how badass would it be if the Beckett's involvement in hunting led to naming rights of the new stadium (I know this is unrealistic, but I find it amusing, so bear with me...Remmington Stadium. Or Browning Stadium. Ruger Stadium. Savage Stadium. Oh, the possibilities....drool
February 9, 200422 yr Leeann Tweeden , that chic is BANGIN!!! It kind of has to suck knowing she's using you for the money and fame. its a good move unless he marries her.
February 9, 200422 yr Leeann Tweeden , that chic is BANGIN!!! It kind of has to suck knowing she's using you for the money and fame. I dunno, I think I'd allow her to use me for pretty much anything....
February 9, 200422 yr They are using each other. He is using her for his status for having the hottest girl and she is using him for his fame.
February 9, 200422 yr Leeann Tweeden , that chic is BANGIN!!! It kind of has to suck knowing she's using you for the money and fame. I dunno, I think I'd allow her to use me for pretty much anything.... bingo
February 9, 200422 yr will you be saying that when half of your 5 year 60 million dollar deal goes to the you know what (female dog)?
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