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Fowl Ball! The numbers speak for themselves: more than 200 home runs, close to 800 RBIs, twotime American League All-Star, and World Series champion. This is the major league resume of Ducks' outfielder Carl Everett. Through the years, numerous big name players have come to play in the Atlantic League with dreams of getting back to the majors. However, most were far removed from success at the highest level. This is not the case with Carl Everett. The 35-year-old Everett contributed 23 homers and 87 RBIs while playing 135 games with the title-winning Chicago White Sox two years ago, and last season hit another 11 home runs in only 92 games with the Seattle Mariners. Now Everett finds himself without a major league job having to adjust to a new league and team. By his standards, his first month with the Ducks has been a disappointing one. Everett missed a few games with a calf injury and had one of the lowest batting averages on the roster, yet his manager and teammates never had any doubt that Carl would overcome the slow start sooner, rather than later. "Carl was so successful in the big leagues for a reason," Ducks pitcher John Riedling said of his teammate, "He knows what he is doing and with that kind of talent, we know he is about to come around." Ducks manager Dave Lapoint points to a few reasons why Everett got off to such a slow start. "Right from opening day it seemed like the pitchers were being extra careful with Carl," says Lapoint, "They would rarely give him anything to hit and Carl might have been pressing a bit but now with the weather warming up I think he is about to break out of this." Sure enough, with the outside temperature increasing, Everett's bat has come to life and he looks ready to break out of this early funk. In his first 14 games of the season Everett did not have a single home run and had only five RBIs, but in the Ducks' three-game series against the Road Warriors over the weekend, Carl hit two out of the ballpark and knocked in a total of three runs. "It felt good to finally get that first one," Everett said of his first home run, "Lately I had been taking good swings and now today I got some pitches to hit and I was taking even better swings." These first few weeks of the Atlantic League season have essentially been an extended spring training for Everett. Having spent the last decade at the major league level, Everett is used to playing 20-30 games before the regular season even gets underway. In the Atlantic League, the exhibition schedule consists of only five games for each team. "Normally this amount of games is still spring training for guys like me and Fonzie (Ducks Third Baseman Edgardo Alfonzo) so we are on a slightly different timetable than everybody else," Everett says, "We are still in the mode of getting our swing down but it is starting to come and I think you will see more results out of both of us over these next few days." Everett also agrees with his manager's statement that the warm weather. "I'm a Floridian, so obviously I love hot weather," Everett says with a smile, "When it heats up you tend to stay healthier." Most newcomers to the Atlantic League who have spent the majority of their careers in the big leagues are actually surprised by the quality of pitching they face here. "I would definitely compare this league to the Triple-A level," states Carl Everett, "Just like in Triple- A, there are a lot of major league veterans and other established guys playing here who want to make it back to the big leagues." With that being said, Everett says it is a bit easier to feel at home playing on a team like the Ducks because of the presence of so many guys with major league experience. "I have been on eight major league teams and maybe two of them had a clubhouse as loose as this one," says Everett, "This team just goes out on the field and does its thing and I bet if some major league clubs were as loose they would be playing much better baseball." Everett admits he knew very little about the Atlantic League before coming here but had heard about the Ducks' reputation of getting guys back to the big leagues. "To be honest I really let my agent handle all of that stuff about where I was going to play," Everett says, "I did reject some offers to go play in Japan because I have a family and that situation just would not have worked for me. This team here wanted me, so I came to Long Island and I really think that this was a good choice." Ahearne Goes Cross-Sound After Release From Ducks In a somewhat shocking move, the Long Island Ducks announced last week that they had released starting pitcher Pat Ahearne. Manager Dave Lapoint says this was done at his request because he did not like the way Ahearne was throwing in his four starts with the team this season and also because he wanted to work James Garcia into the starting rotation. In an ironic twist, Ahearne was quickly picked up by the Ducks biggest rivals, the Bridgeport Bluefish, and made his first start since being released against, you guessed it, the Ducks. Ahearne picked up a no decision in the game which was eventually won by the Bluefish. It has been quite a sudden fall from grace for Ahearne over the first month of the 2007 season. The 37-year-old right handed pitcher was arguably the Ducks best starter last year with a record of 12-4 and an ERA of 3.47, which earned him a selection to the Atlantic League All-Star game as well as the nod in game one of the playoffs. Based on last season's performance, Ahearne was named the opening day starter this season by manager Dave Lapoint, but the former Detroit Tigers draft pick has not come close to the level of play he showed consistently all season in 2006.
In four starts this season, Ahearne had a record of 1-3 and an ERA over eight. In fairness to Ahearne, it should be noted that all of the blame can not be placed on one player's shoulders when considering the fact that the Ducks currently have the worst ranked pitching staff in the entire league. The Ducks pitching staff has been giving up ridiculous amounts of runs for at least the past week or so and the pressure has squarely been on the offense to win games.
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