January 24, 2002

Shawn Estes was asked how it felt to be traded. He was asked how it feels to strike someone out. He was asked about his favorite cuisine, about the impact of Sept. 11 and about his reaction to being approached by fans in public.

And the new Mets pitcher answered each one honestly. It's the least he could do for two classes of fifth-graders at Francis F. Wilson Elementary School in Rockville Centre.

He was honest when a student asked the former San Francisco Giant if he had wanted to get to know Barry Bonds better. "I knew him as well as I wanted to know him," Estes said.

The point is, Estes is approaching his fresh New York slate in earnest. He is honest about looking at himself and the reasons the Giants gave up on him, even though he is lefthanded and not yet 29. "I won 19 games my first year, and I haven't done it since," he said.

He promised to give the Mets an honest effort. And he honestly sees himself as an unfinished product.

"I'm not a head case," he said in an interview in the hallway. "People like to throw labels, and I think they're unfair. What is a head case? Who knows?

"I'm an intense player, a competitive player. I demand a lot of myself. If you want to call that being a head case . . . " Estes said, letting the thought trail off. "I'll prove everybody wrong this year."

No one ever has questioned his heart. His competitiveness has been obvious since he was 3, and recovering in a hospital from a broken leg. His grandmother used to visit him and kept him company by playing cards. Estes tried to fix a game of Old Maid. "I rigged the Old Maid [card] so I could tell what it was the whole time," he said. "My grandmother couldn't figure out why I was winning every game, then she realized. Then she tricked me and I lost - and threw the cards across the room."

For that matter, people know Estes has a good head. A competitive student, he had a 4.0 grade-point average at Douglas High in Minden, Nev. "I hated school, I really did," he said. "I didn't like to do homework, I didn't like to take tests and I didn't feel like I wanted that stress in my life. More than anything, I got good grades because I knew I had it in me and I felt I would sell myself short if I didn't get good grades."

He's honest enough to acknowledge that people believe he has sold his pitching talent short. He can understand that people are mystified about the fact he has been wildly inconsistent despite a devastating curveball and a good fastball (about 93 miles per hour).

Estes knows there is no easy way to explain why he isn't the pitcher he looked like he was going to be when he went 19-5 with a 3.18 earned run average in 1997 for the Giants.

"I think they lost patience," Estes said of his trade to New York.

He pointed to the word "patience" on a poster in the school hallway and insisted that he will prove he is someone worth having patience in. He is working on having more patience in himself.

"How many pitchers do you see pitch their whole career with one team? It usually takes a guy getting traded for his career to take off. Greg Maddux was traded before he was 30 and look what he did," he said. "It happened with Mike Hampton, and a lot of guys."

Estes seems ready to try. He was cheerful, obliging and encouraging with the children during an appearance on behalf of the Mets' sponsorship of Athletes Helping Athletes - a program that recruits high school athletes to mentor younger students.

He talked of being happy with the trade after being disappointed at first, of having always liked watching Edgardo Alfonzo play, of loving Italian food.

Later, in the hallway, he added: "People have told me in the past I'm almost too smart for my own good, that I think too much. If that's the worst thing wrong with me, I'll take it."
Copyright © 2002, Newsday, Inc.