Glavine stays true to his past

COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. - Tom Glavine could have chalked up his 305 career wins or the huge number of Cy Young shares that place him ninth all-time to something like hockey.

He was, after all, so good that he was drafted by the Los Angeles Kings in the fourth round of the 1984 NHL draft, ahead of such notables as Brett Hull and Luc Robitaille.

But upon his induction Sunday, Glavine left little doubt about how he wound up in the Baseball Hall of Fame.

"I was just taught certain things by my mother and father that stayed with me," Glavine said. "Particularly, my mother."

Glavine was a pitcher who would never give in, a guy who would rather walk a hitter with the bases loaded than give him a pitch to hit.

"My mother was very stubborn, and I got that from her," Glavine said with a smile. "I was always stubborn, whether it was mechanics or a particular sequence with a hitter, or any facet of the game.

"What that did was it gave me a process to follow. Trust that process always, whether after a bad day or a good day. It was always think long term and trust the process."

And you got this from your mother?

"With my mother it was always the same thing," Glavine said. "Get your work done, get done all the things that needed to be done, and then you can go have your fun. It's a process.

"I always approached it that way in baseball. Stay with the process because you know it works. Stubborn."

It was the same way Sunday as he gave his speech, choking up when talking about his folks and his wife, but excited to have fun after the work was done.

"I feel like I'm a rookie again, having to prove myself before being accepted," Glavine said. "Today, I proved myself and now I get to go have fun."

Undoubtedly, after making his parents proud.

brozner@dailyherald.com

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