Nomar Garciaparra
Nomar Garciaparra
Anthony Nomar Garciaparrais a former American Major League Baseball player and current SportsNet LA analyst. After playing parts of nine seasons as an All-Star shortstop for the Boston Red Sox, he played third base and first base for the Chicago Cubs, Los Angeles Dodgers, and the Oakland Athletics. He is one of 13 players in Major League history to hit two grand slams during a single game, and the only player to achieve the feat at his home stadium...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBaseball Player
Date of Birth23 July 1973
CityWhittier, CA
CountryUnited States of America
I wish I was playing all year, that's for sure. I had an injury, I'm glad I came back, glad I'm playing the way I'm capable of playing.
No, I can't remember the last time I played outfield -- not even in high school.
What happened is part of the game. I'm not going to sulk about it. I'm glad to be playing the game that I love.
Not at all. I cried. I was crushed. The city and the fans meant that much to me, and they still do. I played for those fans, my teammates, the history of that franchise. It was hard to take the way it went down, but the thing I'm proudest of from my time in Boston is that we raised more than $1 million for charity and there is still a playground that has my name on it.
It's nice to get some wins. We played well as a team. We did the little things right. Our pitching and bullpen did their thing and that's why we came away with three wins.
It's good to get plays like that under your belt. You want to experience plays like that in spring training. You just can't simulate it, no matter how hard you try, at the speed of the game. Sele did a great job of getting over there.
Back then, my idol was Bugs Bunny, because I saw a cartoon of him playing ball - you know, the one where he plays every position himself with nobody else on the field but him? Now that I think of it, Bugs is still my idol. You have to love a ballplayer like that.
If I had something to prove, I wouldn't have had so many teams talking to me. I had opportunities to take more than one year. I could have played short for a couple teams.
My inspiration was the game itself, not any individual player in it.
It's great that fans have people they can enjoy and watch play.
You'll have games where you're out there a long time. Being able to go through that and not get stiff was a good thing for me, ... As I went along, it felt better, and on that last play [a nifty move to his right and a throw across his body for the final out in the seventh] had a lot of body torque to it, and no problems.
All players are their own worst critics. We are harder on ourselves than anyone else is.
People expect you to play your best, so I go through a routine to prepare myself so that I know I'm physically and mentally ready - prepared for the game.
The effort is there. The effort is always there. Everyone is a professional. If you played against us on a Sunday in a park with our families, you're going to see effort there. That's the nature of us. None of these guys would be here in the big leagues if they didn't have that attitude every day.