| Tampa's Wade Boggs For his entire athletic life, Tampa's Wade Boggs has proven himself one of the hardest workers on Earth when it comes to mastering the intricacies of hitting a ball. Ask him to stand stone still in front of 50,000 screaming fans while a pitcher fires a baseball in his direction at a speed exceeding 100 mph, and he is equal to the task. In fact, he has done it successfully 2,800 times in his career. If he does it another 200 times, a personal plaque bearing his name awaits him in baseball's Hall of Fame. By that time, at least five years after he retires from baseball, Boggs might be on his way to a second athletic career. The challenge of standing stone still before a throng of deadly silent people, then swinging at a ball that coldly stares up, daring to him to hit it thrills him. "Right now," says Boggs, who returns home as a member of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays inaugural team this season, "[golf is] third on my priority list behind hunting and fishing, but I can see that changing once I retire from baseball. I'm fortunate that I can remain in the Devil Rays organization after I'm done playing if I choose, but I know golf will be moving way up on my priority list. I really love it." For now, Boggs is content with golf's place in his life. It's not a game that frustrates the 40-year-old third baseman; it's a game that brings him joy, a game he relishes. "I never get frustrated playing golf," says Boggs, who currently carries a handicap around the 12 mark, "because there's always that one shot you know is going to bring you back. Right now, I don't play enough to get upset. I'm lucky in that I'm a pretty consistent player, and the scores don't get too far out of range." | |
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