FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — The baseball season hasn't even started, and Sidney Ponson is already making headlines — the kind that are becoming increasingly bothersome to the Baltimore Orioles.
The right-hander spent 11 days in an Aruban jail after slugging a local judge on Christmas Day, and he hurt his pitching hand Tuesday during a bar fight that he contends was started by a drunken patron in a restaurant.
The pitcher's problems intensified when the Orioles learned late Thursday that he had been arrested in Florida on Jan. 21 for driving under the influence of alcohol. According to the police report, Ponson failed the sobriety test and then refused to consent to a Breathalyzer test.
Once the ace of the staff, the Orioles now consider Ponson a potential distraction.
"I'm not happy about it. I don't like it," manager Lee Mazzilli said Friday. "This club stands for tradition, it's got a long history. It's just a black eye for us, and we'll deal with it internally."
After being released from jail in early January, Ponson said the ordeal was a life-changing experience. Within a month, however, he was pulled over by the Florida Highway patrol for traveling at 85 mph in a 65 mph zone, and the trooper administered a sobriety test after smelling alcohol on Ponson's breath.
"I wasn't drunk, and the thing is going to go to court," Ponson said in the clubhouse Friday morning. "If you have one beer you can be over the limit. That doesn't mean I'm drunk. You guys are making such a big deal over everything that goes on off the field. How we're playing and who's hurt, you guys don't even care about that."
It's been a regular occurrence this spring, reporters gathering around Ponson and asking him questions about his off-the-field behavior. The pitcher finally got sick of it Friday and made no effort to mask his displeasure.
"Why do you guys have to know everything that goes off the field with me?" he said. "Off field is our private time, and if something happens we have to deal with it. Not you guys, not the millions of fans of baseball.
"I'm a grown man. I made a mistake. Nothing came out of it, so what?"
The Orioles aren't nearly as cavalier about his behavior, and they weren't happy to learn about his drunk-driving arrest by reading about it in the newspapers.
"We were not aware of the incident," Orioles vice president Mike Flanagan said. "We're going to handle it internally."
Said Ponson: "I'm going to sit down and talk to Flanny. We'll come to conclusion with this. If they want to punish me, punish me. We'll see what happens."
He finished the interview by saying he wouldn't talk to reporters anymore except for days he's scheduled to pitch.
Ponson, 28, never had a winning season before going a collective 17-12 with Baltimore and San Francisco in 2003. He became a free agent after that season and signed a $22.5 million, three-year contract with the Orioles.
He started on opening day in 2004 and was 2-0 on April 20, but finished the first half of the season with a miserable 3-12 record. He rebounded to win eight of 11 decisions after the All-Star break, and the Orioles hoped he would pick up where he left off in 2005.
His value to Baltimore, however, extends beyond mere wins and losses. Ponson has topped 200 innings in each of the last two seasons and has done it four times in his career. That, and his strong second half in 2004, make him a valuable part of the rotation.
For those reasons, the Orioles can only hope his off-the-field behavior won't influence his effectiveness on the mound.
"Certainly I don't condone anything, but I hope everything gets straightened out and I can get those 200 innings out of him," pitching coach Ray Miller said. "Unfortunately, when you're in the limelight everything about your life is known. If everybody was perfect, then Babe Ruth wouldn't have been an idol."