For Kearns, It's Home and Away

"As old and slow as I am," Dan Kearns said, "I would have tried to score."

So Austin took off for the plate. But Lopez pounced on the ball, and King covered home. King, who is listed at 240 pounds, collided with Kearns as he tagged him out. "It was ugly," Dan Kearns said, "and it was awkward."

Austin Kearns returned to right for the top of the eighth. He finished with three RBI. The Reds won that night, and at game's end, Kearns was hitting .309, slugging .599. He had played in 45 games, had 44 RBI.

The next day, he couldn't raise his arm above his head. He played anyway. He underwent daily rehabilitation. His shoulder got no better. He stopped hitting. He kept playing.

"I'm stubborn," he said. "I've always kind of thought if you can be out there, you should go out there. That's one of my biggest pet peeves. I hate it when a guy gets nicked up or something and goes down like he was shot, and all the trainers and everybody comes running out, and then he stays in the game. I've just never been like that.

"But looking back, it probably wasn't the smart thing to do."

Over the next 37 games, Kearns hit .208, slugged .277. In July, he went on the disabled list. Doctors found damage in his right shoulder. He underwent the surgery.

That September, the Chicago Cubs came to Cincinnati fighting for a playoff spot, creating a buzz. One night, Kearns watched the first few innings from the dugout. But he couldn't stand it.

"I was going nuts," he said. He headed to the clubhouse. If he couldn't play, he wouldn't watch.

All that, he said, was the hardest. Harder than being sent to the minors in 2005. Harder, even, than the trade. Kearns met the Nationals in Pittsburgh for his first series with his new club. He promptly had one hit in the series, prompting then-manager Frank Robinson gave him a day off. At the end of a six-game road trip, Kearns was 4 for 22 as a National.

"It was just the surprise factor," Dan Kearns said. "Usually, rumors are flying around, and people hear things and expect things. He didn't have a clue."

Abby Kearns was pregnant with the couple's second son. He didn't know where they would live. He didn't know who he would get along with.

And then he arrived in Washington. The team was in last place, where it spent almost all of 2006. But the sale to the family of Theodore Lerner was complete. The new owners held a ceremonial "grand reopening" of RFK Stadium. Each game of the six-day homestand drew more than 29,000 people.

"I'm telling you, those fans made a difference for him," Dan Kearns said. "They talk about Cincinnati being a great baseball town, but they look for you to strike out so they can boo. Here they were, Washington, in last place, and they cheered everything."

Kearns finished out the year with the Nationals, hitting just .250 for his new club. But General Manager Jim Bowden, who drafted Kearns when he was with Cincinnati, still saw what Kearns could do, not what he had done. As Boone said, "The sky's still the limit."

So in January, Kearns signed his three-year deal, which guarantees him $17.5 million and, should the club pick up an option for a fourth season, would pay him $26.5 million.

"I just got convinced that the team was going in the right direction," he said.

On Sunday afternoon, after he went hitless in three at-bats of a Grapefruit League victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers, Kearns stood in the Nationals' clubhouse, his locker squarely in the middle of the other pieces of the team's future, Lopez, third baseman Ryan Zimmerman, catcher Brian Schneider and first baseman Nick Johnson. Zimmerman said goodbye as he ambled out, and Kearns pulled on that Kentucky basketball cap backward. He headed out himself, as comfortable as could be.

"I feel like what I'm supposed to do," Kearns said, "has just been postponed."