"Of course (the fans) are going to have their fun with me… I'm already prepared for it," he said. "So you let them have their fun. That's what they've paid to do."
As for the umpires, he is glad that the full-time AMLU umps are back on the field after settling their two-and-a-half month long strike.
Couch Time
The pressure to succeed, and the long wait for a shot at the big leagues, not the officiating seem to be taking their toll on Young’s young career. Even if he has the big league bat, that’s only part of the equation. If he can’t control his temper with a minor league rent-an-ump, what will happen in the free-wheeling world of major league stardom, where self-discipline is about the only discipline most players get these days?
"I'm sure everybody gets frustrated who thinks they should be in the big leagues right now," Durham manager John Tamargo said. "They see guys on TV and think 'Hey, I can do just as much as they can.' That'll put you in a bit of a frustrated mode, but you've got to continue to work and hopefully that'll give you that opportunity sooner than later.
Bad Boy Bulls
The Bill Evers era of Durham Baseball was filled with many of the same personalities, but no incidents. Under the new stewardship of Tamargo, who provided his own distraction in the clubhouse last month when he served a 10-game suspension after bumping an umpire, Young’s outburst is just the first of a rash of embarrassing incidents that have roiled the Bulls' clubhouse.
- Shortstop B.J. Upton, Tampa Bay's No. 1 draft pick in 2002, was benched for one game last week after his arrest in nearby Chapel Hill, N.C., for speeding and driving while impaired charges (See the Devil Goes Down to Durham).
- Outfielder Elijah Dukes was suspended indefinitely Saturday by the Devil Rays for what team sources said was "a clubhouse incident." Sources tell MLN that the incident was an altercation with teammate Ryan Knox at the club's hotel after Saturday night's game with Charlotte. Dukes was also reportedly suspended earlier this year after another off-field altercation during the week in April of the Delmon Young bat toss.
The questions that Young and his fellow Bully Bulls raise is more about the whole D-Rays farm system itself. What does it say about their development of the full player when one of their stars with several years in the farm system is discovering the joys of community service at the end of a forced suspension?
For the D-Rays, even in light of Monday’s media mea culpa, the specific question at hand is whether Young can develop the big league self-discipline over his now infamous temper to go along with the power of his bat. (See “The Devil Goes Down to Durham” – MAJOR BLOGS of Minor League News for our take).
The larger question is: How does the organization plan to take talented and gifted children who, as Delmon himself says, want to have “fun,” and discipline them into young men who can cope with the stresses of the kids’ game that turns into a high-dollar, high pressure business?
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