Boyd Makes Independent League Roster
By Associated Press
May 23, 2005, 7:41 PM CDT
BROCKTON, Mass. -- The "Can Opener" made it. Dennis "Oil Can" Boyd earned a roster spot with the Brockton Rox and signed with the minor league team on Monday, extending his attempt at a big league comeback 14 years after he left the majors. He is scheduled to start for the Rox against the Worcester Tornadoes on May 30 -- his first professional outing since 1997.
"He pitched seven scoreless innings in the exhibition season and deserved to make the team," Rox owner Van Schley said.
The 45-year-old Boyd pitched 10 years in the majors before blood clots in his right arm ended his career. He had 13 complete games for Boston in 1985, was 16-10 in '86 and went 10-6 with a 2.93 ERA with Montreal in 1990.
Boyd was 78-77 in the majors overall. But he also had a colorful lifestyle and quotable outlook that made him memorable long after his career ended.
Boyd made a variety of low-level minor league stops but aborted his first comeback attempt in 1997. He said last week that his goal is to return to Fenway Park and pitch for the Red Sox.
"I'll go to Pawtucket for a couple hours," he said of Boston's Triple-A team, "and then let's go get the Yankees."
― Gear! (can Jung shill it, Mu?) (Gear!), Tuesday, 24 May 2005 15:34 (twenty-one years ago)
Boyd, 45, says he 'could feel it'
Associated Press
BROCKTON, Mass. -- Bouncing around on the mound, challenging the umpires, talking to himself or the baseball or maybe even to Satchel Paige.
The Can is back.
Eight years after his last professional appearance, Oil Can Boyd returned to the low minors on Monday night, pitching six solid innings in his Can-Am League debut for the Brockton Rox. The former Boston Red Sox star allowed two earned runs and seven hits in six innings, walking one batter, hitting another and striking out four to receive a no-decision in a 5-3 loss to the Worcester Tornadoes.
"The atmosphere felt pretty good. The crowd was into me. I could feel it," the 45-year-old right-hander said. "Very good. Very welcome back to the game of baseball. I can still compete, and I feel good about it."
After retiring the first seven Worcester batters, Boyd missed covering first on a grounder in the third inning to allow his first hit. He made up for it in the fourth when he started a 1-6-3 double play, but he left a 3-3 game after throwing 85 pitches.
"You asked how far can you stretch out a 45-year-old pitcher? A normal one, not too ... far," Brockton manager Ed Nottle said. "He's not normal."
Omar Pena, the younger brother of Detroit Tigers first baseman Carlos Pena, hit a two-run double in the top of the ninth to give the Tornadoes a victory in the franchise's first game. Worcester, which had a National League team in the 1880s, hadn't hosted a professional baseball team at any level since 1935.
But most of the crowd of 4,296 was there to see the Can make his first professional appearance since 1997.
"There's a lot of people in a lot of places that want me to succeed," said Boyd, who wrapped up a 10-year career -- most of it with the Red Sox -- in 1991 with a 78-77 record and a 4.04 ERA. "Right now, there's a lot of love going for me."
Although he had significant talent -- he threw 13 complete games and 272 innings in 1985 -- Boyd's career disintegrated quickly because of blood clots in his right arm. He spent a year and a half with Montreal and a disastrous half-season with the Texas Rangers -- 2-7 with a 6.68 ERA -- before his big-league career.
"The big goal is for him to have the satisfaction that he got all the baseball out of his system," said his son, Dennis, a high school pitcher in Rhode Island who's called "Little Can" and "Baby Can." "He always had the feeling that he left before he wanted to go. He always wanted to show people that he still had it in him."
But even after injuries cut short his career, Boyd was remembered as one of baseball's most colorful players, with a country quotability that made him a legend beyond his statistical accomplishments.
"There are charismatic people in the world, and he's one of them," Nottle said. "People react to him, and they always have. On a cold night on Memorial Day, I don't think there would be 4,200 people here."
Boyd fits right in at Campanelli Stadium, where the ushers wear shirts with the logo "Fun is Good" in the spirit of comedian Bill Murray, a part-owner, and consultant Mike Veeck. The Can pitched two exhibition games for the Rox before he made the team, allowing five hits and striking out eight in seven scoreless innings.
But Monday night's game -- billed by the team as the "Can Opener" -- was his first real game as a pro since he appeared with the independent Massachusetts Mad Dogs in '97.
At a table in the stands, fans could have "Oil Can Fan," complete with a dripping oil can, painted on their faces. A luxury box proclaimed itself the home of the "Dennis Boyd Fan Club"; it was probably his family, because no one else calls him that.
He walked to the back of the mound between most pitches, going through his pitch sequence aloud. After getting a double play to escape serious trouble in the fifth, thrust his arms down in triumph, shouting to himself as he walked off the mound and back to the dugout.
"A 45-year-old man doing what he's does on the field -- to me, that's amazing," his son said. "I guess everybody else feels that way, too."
― Gear! (can Jung shill it, Mu?) (Gear!), Tuesday, 31 May 2005 18:37 (twenty-one years ago)
three years pass...
best wiki quotes ever on this guy
He [Oil Can] pitched like his hero, Satchel Paige, but with deception. --William C. Rhoden, of The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
I am The Can, and I am going to come right at you with my best shit, and if you can hit it, I want to see how far Bo Jackson can hit The Oil Can. --Boyd, to Jackson, before he hit Boyd's first pitch over the 71-foot high score board in straight away center field at Fenway Park (the ball landed 515 feet from home plate).
That’s what they get for building a park on the ocean. --Boyd, after a 1986 Red Sox-Indians game at Cleveland Municipal Stadium (on the shore of Lake Erie) was postponed due to fog.
You've got to do what's good for The Can. --Boyd, responding to criticism of his decision to try to play Major League Baseball as a replacement player during the 1994-95 strike
― bnw, Friday, 20 June 2008 00:29 (eighteen years ago)
four years pass...