Hawkins keeping up prankster tradition

Baseball is the one professional sport where there are games played every day for seven straight months. So it is not surprising that in order to relieve daily tension and the occasional monotony of routine, that baseball is the one professional sport where the locker room conduct most closely resembles an episode of the Three Stooges. Practical jokes run rampant in the Grand Old Game. Former player Luis Gonzalez may not make it to Cooperstown after his slugging exploits over 19 seasons but he is certainly a candidate for the Hijinx Hall of Fame. When Gonzalez discovered that then Arizona bench coach Bob Melvin had a fear of circus clowns, he hired two clowns to show up at the Diamondbacks clubhouse. As a Florida Marlin, Gonzalez took great pains to fill a jelly doughnut with mustard and watched with great amusement as one of the team's equipment managers ate it. One of the most well coordinated pranks involving a large and highly organized group of co-conspirators was perpetrated upon Phillies pitcher Kyle Kendrick. Kendrick was informed he'd been traded to Japan for a hot young prospect named Kobayashi. An original contract was drawn up. Kendrick was presented with a jersey with his name on the back in Japanese. The entire team, Kendrick's agent and even his own mother were in on the gag. Kendrick sat stone-faced in front of his locker for 15 minutes until his teammates told him that he was still with the Phillies and that Kobayashi was not a baseball player but the competitive eating world champion. Of course the number of practical jokes corresponds directly with a team's winning percentage and as the Brewers are solidly in the 20 games over .500 neighborhood, the goofiness quotient increases by the day. Enter LaTroy Hawkins, a highly respected veteran who at the age of 38 brings great wisdom and experience to the bullpen but who occasionally has no problem acting like he's 12. "You always have to be watching your back. You never know when he's gonna jump out and put a pie in your face," said Brewers catcher Jonathan Lucroy, who was "pied" by Hawkins during a recent postgame interview on FOX Sports Wisconsin. "You've just gotta be ready for it." Hawkins also gave a shaving cream facial to bullpen coach Stan Kyles during a pregame interview at the precise moment Kyles was talking about Hawkins value to the staff. (SEE THE VIDEO HERE OR EMBEDDED IN THE STORY, AT THE 2-MINUTE MARK.) "I couldn't have had better timing," said Hawkins who never makes elaborate plans for his foamy forays. "It has to be spur of the moment." "He does a good job at it," said Lucroy. "He's a good sneaker. He sneaks up right behind you and you don't even know it. He's gotten several guys so far." "It's always fun when you're winning," Hawkins said. "So that makes it even better. But we've got to get some whipped cream in the clubhouse. I'm tired of using shaving cream." "I think the guys would appreciate it more if it were whipped cream. But you've gotta go with what you've got." Hawkins talks of a long and proud history of capers. "I stole a teammate's car once in Spring Training. I can't tell you who," Hawkins smiled. "It's top secret." But he has also been on the receiving end of baseball mischief. "I was in Triple-A and guys snuck in my room and wet my mattress. My roommate let 'em in. I got into bed and it was soaking wet and I'm all on the ceiling saying, 'Where's it coming from?' My roommate was over there cracking up." Hawkins says that no one is off-limits. "I've pied (Twins manager) Ron Gardenhire when I was in Minnesota. I've pied (Twins pitching coach) Rick Anderson. Because they're pranksters. You've got to be a prankster." Hawkins realizes that as his list of victims grows so does the number of teammates looking to get even. "My head's always on a swivel, like a bobblehead doll. I'm looking over my shoulder also." "We're having some fun. I've done it in other places I've played. It's fun." "You've got to break up the monotony every now and then," Lucroy said. "He does that very well." "I think he likes doing it just to keep everybody loose, jokin' around, not too serious. This is a game; it's meant to have fun when it's played. He likes to mess with people and keep them loose." LaTroy Hawkins will continue to mess with people and keep them loose, with a sense of humor, a sense of timing and perhaps even some whipped cream to make the gags a bit tastier.