Quirks and all, Fernando Rodney brings fun to D-Backs

No matter how likable you are, nobody is going to like you 100 percent of the time.

“Believe me,” Fernando Rodney said. “I know of this.”

Rodney, the Diamondbacks’ new closer, lets out a hearty laugh as he throws on his cap and shapes it a handful of inches to the left in his trademark style. That’s one of the things some people don’t like about the 40-year-old Dominican. One of many.

Some are put also off by his antics on the mound, where he may repeatedly step on and off the rubber and shoot stares at the opposing dugout or suddenly start making loud and intimidating animal noises, like that of a screeching hawk or a snarling feral hound.

They don’t always particularly care for his bow-and-arrow routine, either, when he fires an imaginary arrow high into the sky after registering a save. He calls it the “La Flecha,” which is Spanish for the word “arrow” and is the name of a local village near his hometown.

You may not approve of all of Rodney’s quirky antics and you may not always like his approach, but you’ll love him if he’s pitching on your team and he records a truckload of saves. That is, after all, why the Diamondbacks signed him to a one-year deal worth $2.75 million plus incentives.

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“If you play sports or you’re an artist, whatever you do – and maybe it could even be the police – you’re going to find some people who no like you,” Rodney said. “They don’t like how you walk. They don’t like how you talk. It’s the same way in baseball.

“Sometimes, they don’t like how you wear your hat, how you flip your bat, how you step off home plate and remove your batting gloves. But me? I’ve always been the same guy. I’m not going to change. I like who I am.”

He also likes where he is. Now on his eighth major league team since breaking in with the Tigers in 2002, Rodney has notched a career-high 48 saves twice (with the Rays in 2012 and the Mariners in 2014) and the hard-throwing right-hander made his third All-Star appearance just a year ago after a fabulous start with the Padres.

He registered 17 saves with a 0.31 ERA over his first 28 games in San Diego. But then he was traded to Miami in June and struggled in a set-up role with the Marlins, never really finding his grove. He thinks he can find it in Arizona, where he posted a 0.00 ERA in four Cactus League outings.

But what kind of stuff can a 40-year-old still possibly have left in his arm? Manager Torey Lovullo thought about that question for a full five seconds before answering.

“Unbelievable stuff,” Lovullo finally said. “I watch him wipe out hitters with a quality change-up. It’s set up by a fastball that sits in the mid-90s and that is a really impressive combination no matter what your age is.”

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Rodney knew the Diamondbacks were a young team when he came aboard in December, but he was shocked when told Arizona finished last season as the youngest team in all of baseball with an average age of 26 years, 313 days.

“I didn’t know they were that young,” he said, widening his eyes. “That’s pretty young, man. But hey, we were all young once, yes? That’s good. There’s a lot of young guys around me and that means there is a lot of young guys who are going to continue to learn and have good careers in this game.

“We have enough older guys around, including me, who can help these young guys get better and better during the season. That’s baseball: You don’t know what’s going to happen. All I know is if we can compete in this division with our starting pitching, I think we will win a lot of games because we’ve got a lot of talent in here.”

More than a handful of younger players came up to Rodney during spring training to ask him for advice and to find out how he’s lasted this long in the big leagues. He shared with them everything he could and told them all that asking veteran players for help was one of the reasons he’s still pitching.

He wouldn’t be here at all, however, if it wasn’t for his father. Ulise Rodney was a fisherman in the Dominican Republic who taught his son the value of a hard day’s work and to keep pushing when life is busy dealing you setbacks.

“My father inspires me to be who I am today,” Rodney said. “I have the dedication to follow all the things he taught me and it’s helped me so much. He’s why I wear my hat this way, tilted like this to the left. That’s the side where the sun would also hit his face so I wear it that way in his honor.”

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Rodney’s father died in 2002, three days before he was called up to the major leagues for the first time.

“I think of him all the time,” the son says.

There is both a serious and fun side to the aging closer. Sometimes, he’s all business and at others, he’ll be a motormouth who never stops clowning around.

“He’s a good teammate who keeps it loose and is always having fun,” said Diamondbacks catcher Jeff Mathis, who played with Rodney last season in Miami. “That’s something you’ve got to have. You need a good mix of seriousness and there’s also a time to keep it loose and he definitely brings that side of it, too, so that’s good.”

“He’s a crazy guy,” Diamondbacks outfielder David Peralta added, “but, you know, in a good way.”

Reach McManaman at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @azbobbymac and listen to him live every Wednesday night between 7-9 on Fox Sports 910-AM on The Freaks with Kenny and Crash.