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Sporting News, The, Nov 22, 1993 by Gene Collier

Of the hundreds upon hundreds of mostly textbook double plays triggered by, turned by, churned by fluid and frenzied Pirates shortstop Jay Bell, none was so dauntingly complex as this: He won the Rawlings Gold Glove and Hillerich & Bradsby's Silver Slugger awards in 1993. When they first yelled, "Get two!" at Jay Stuart Bell, they never meant this. They suspected some good things would come the way,of this conscientious, Rockwellian kid from Florida, but not this.

The Gold Glove, for defensive excellence, has been awarded since 1957, the Silver Slugger, for highest batting average at the player's position, since 1980, and in the 14 years the two were mutually gettable, the roster for this huge achievement has read predictably like a hagiology of the modern game - Schmidt, Dawson, Winfield, Mattingly, Brett, Puckett, Sandberg, Gwynn, Griffey, Bonds, etc.

Bell is only the fourth shortstop to turn up on this fist. The other three are icons: Milwaukee's Robin Yount in '82, St. Louis' Ozzie Smith in '87, Baltimore's Cal Ripken in '91.

"That's outstanding," Bell says, lifting a hand to cover a smile spreading out of control. "I had no idea about that. I don't know what to say. I've always tried to be as humble as I can about myself."

For a not-insignificant portion of Bell's professional life, humility was more a sentence than an effort. Minutes after pondering his Gold and his Silver, Bell had to settle for the Bronze in recall, amiably pointing out how in 1986, he made 56 errors in 110 games, when in fact that was 1985, and it was 59 in 135 at Visalia (California League) and Waterbury (Eastern). In '86, he made a mere 45 errors, still shaggy enough to lead the Eastern League. He led American Association shortstops in errors with 30 the next year, and he led National League shortstops in errors as recently as 1991.

But this can't be about how Bell always could hit well enough to make it to these unlikely coordinates, and it certainly can't be about a great, latent defensive talent waiting for his bat to turn monstrous. It is more a story of arduous mental adjustments around a nurtured work ethic yielding a pretty good ballplayer. Jay Bell, 27, never was an either/or proposition relative to offense and defense. He almost was neither but eventually both.

"To be honest al)out Jay Bell - and this is probably not true, but I believe it even though I never heard him admit it - when he realized he could hit in the big leagues, he became a great shortstop," Pirates Manager Jim Leyland says. "He was fighting the bat early, but when he finally proved to himself he could hit up here, then he was all right. There's just so much pressure because basically, if you don't hit you don't play.

And yet proving to himself that he could hit was nowhere near as difficult as dealing with the very notion that there existed a burden of proof. In his boyhood, the most challenging thing about hitting to Jay Bell probably was perfecting the idle bottom-hand, finger-fluttering habit he copied from Steve Garvey, a trait still evident.

"I hit .505 in high school and thought I'd hit .505 all my life," Bell says. "I got to Rookie League and hit .220. There was self-doubt."

The psychic journey from the cloying self-doubt of the late 80s to this station, where Bell led the club in hits with 187 (most by a Pirates shortstop since Dick Groat lashed 199 in 1962) and set career highs in runs (102), hits, triples (9), walks (77), stolen bases (16) and average (.310), has been rutted with bursts of temper.

"Up until three years ago, I don't think my temperament would have allowed me to accomplish what I've accomplished offensively," Bell says. "I put too much emphasis in terms of reaction on each atbat. The thing I finally learned is, you can't be afraid to fail. That's the point every player has to get to in his career. If you're afraid to fail, you're not totally free to concentrate. You look at someone like Wade Boggs, who is as great an example of concentration as there is. He wasn't afraid to fail, and therefore he's done everything he's capable of doing."

Leyland always thought Bell was capable with the bat, even as he exiled him to Buffalo after watching him start the 1989 season 1 for 20. It was upon Bell's return that July 22 that Bell's anxieties began to cool. He hit .275 and drove in 27 runs in 65 starts thereafter. Leyland put him in the second spot in the batting order and left him there for the season's final 48 games, and Bell hit .309 and scored 29 runs.

Self-doubt began to blister and flake, and in the four full seasons since it has fallen away, Bell has averaged 156 games, 166 hits, 32 doubles, eight triples, 10 homers, 56 RBIs and 95 runs scored.

"Hitting .300 was the one thing I always wanted to do offensively, but I don't feel like it was a long climb statistically or anything like that," Bell says. "I don't feel like I was any more productive this year than when I hit .264 or .270. I still ended up with 150 or so runs produced, but it didn't feel that much different than other years. It might be the disappointment of not winning."