Curt Schilling

Curtis Montague Schilling (born November 14, 1966 in Anchorage, Alaska) is a right-handed starting pitcher for the Boston Red Sox, acquired in a trade with the Arizona Diamondbacks following the 2003 season.

One of the most dominant pitchers in the game today, Schilling has won League Championship titles with three dark-horse teams; in 1993 with the Philadelphia Phillies (who overcame a last-place finish in the National League East in '92 to earn the slogan "Worst to First"), in 2001 with the Diamondbacks (who became the youngest expansion team to win a title) and in 2004 with the Boston Red Sox (who made baseball history to overcome the fabled Curse of the Bambino to win their first title since 1918). He also went on to win World Series titles with two of them: the 2001 Diamondbacks and the 2004 Red Sox.

Schilling began his career with the Baltimore Orioles (1988-1990), spent one year with the Houston Astros (1991), and then spent the bulk of it with the Philadelphia Phillies (1992-2000). He was traded mid-season to the Diamondbacks in 2000. With Arizona, he went 22-6 with a 2.98 ERA in 2001 and went 4-0 with a 1.12 ERA in the playoffs. In 2002, he went 23-7 with a 3.23 ERA. Both years he finished second in the Cy Young Award voting to teammate Randy Johnson. On September 16, 2004, Schilling won his 20th game of the season for the Boston Red Sox, becoming the 5th Boston pitcher to win 20 or more games in his first season with the team, and the first since Hall of Famer Dennis Eckersley in 1978. Schilling would go on to another win, ending his regular season with a 21-6 record. On October 19, Schilling won Game 6 of the 2004 American League Championship Series to help the Boston Red Sox become the first team in postseason Major League Baseball history to come back from a three-games-to-none deficit to force a Game 7. He pitched (and won) Game 2 of the 2004 World Series for the Red Sox against the St. Louis Cardinals, making use of the Schilling Tendon Procedure to stabilize his right peroneus brevis tendon, after the tendon sheath was torn during his Game 3 ALDS appearance.

He was the NLCS Most Valuable Player in 1993, and shared the 2001 World Series MVP Award with teammate Randy Johnson. He and Johnson also shared Sports Illustrated magazine's 2001 "Sportsmen of the Year" award. Schilling was once more runnerup in Cy Young voting in 2004, this time to Minnesota Twins' Johan Santana who was the unanimous choice of the voters. Schilling received 27 of the 28 2nd place votes. Later, the entire Red Sox team was named SI's 2004 Sportsmen of the Year, making Schilling only the second person to have won or shared in that award twice (after Tiger Woods, who has won the award twice as an individual).

For the last 10 years, Schilling has been a supporter of care for ALS sufferers. His Curt's Pitch for ALS program allows fans to sponsor him, donating to the ALS Association for every strikeout he throws.

Outside sports, Schilling is a gamer. A fan of Advanced Squad Leader, he helped found the small gaming company Multi-Man Publishing to maintain ASL and other old games by Avalon Hill. Schilling also plays EverQuest, and has reviewed two of the game's many expansion packs for PC Gamer magazine. He is an avid web communicator, feeling this is the best way to speak to the fans.

Schilling has a tendency to get carried away with his criticism of management, opposing players, and, on occasion, his teammates. When Red Sox relief pitcher Scott Williamson began to experience arm pain mid-way through the 2004 season, Schilling reportedly told Williamson to stop "acting." Williamson then lost the remainder of the season to reconstructive arm surgery. While with the Phillies, Schilling was a vocal critic of team management, stopping just short of calling the front office incompetent. Schilling has a running feud with Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez.

External links

• Template:Baseball-reference
• Template:Espn mlb
• Interview with GameSpy.com (http://archive.gamespy.com/interviews/march03/schilling/)
• Curt's Pitch for ALS (http://www.curtspitch.org/)
• Curt's interview on Everquest II (http://eq2.warcry.com/scripts/news/view_news.phtml?site=68&id=46161/)ja:カート・シリング