Crisp catches his breath

KANSAS CITY -- Coco Crisp sat in the clubhouse yesterday afternoon talking fantasy football with Kevin Youkilis, flipping through a stack of magazines, and holding an impromptu meeting with reporters.

It was a day off for the center fielder, who was replaced in the lineup by Gabe Kapler for the second matchup of this three-game series in steamy Kansas City. With little to prepare for, Crisp seemed more relaxed than he has been in quite some time, flashing that big, bright-white smile while talking about his season -- the ups and downs, the adjustments, the broken finger, and why he can't seem to find a groove at the plate.

``It's frustrating," said Crisp, who came into the game in the ninth inning last night for defensive purposes. ``Pressure-wise, there's no pressure. I just try to go out there and play the game. It's frustrating when you get out a couple times, like `good God,' you know? `Here we go.' You just try to stay focused, though. Then your bat comes back, and OK, here we go the other way."

Crisp's most recent try batting leadoff, a spot he seems unlikely to regain on a regular basis, was caused by circumstance -- Youkilis moved to the middle of the lineup after injuries took out Trot Nixon and Jason Varitek, and Crisp moved to the top. In those four games, Crisp hit .250, going 5 for 20 with two doubles and an RBI.

Since returning to the team May 28 after missing 42 games with a fractured left index finger, Crisp is batting .269 (.275 for the season) with four home runs and 21 RBIs. After hitting .278 in June and .243 in July, Crisp is averaging .323 in August.

``You feel like you're on the rise, [then] you throw the emergency brake on. And you take it off and go full steam ahead, and then throw the emergency brake on [again]," Crisp said. ``It's been like, `He's on fire -- oh, wait a second -- there he goes again.' You just try to keep at it, and hopefully you can get that good stuff going and keep it going."

Most recently -- well, until Tuesday, when Crisp's four-game hitting streak ended with an 0-for-4 night -- he'd been doing well offensively. In his last eight games, Crisp, who has started 67 games at center, is hitting .353 with five multi-hit games. His stolen base Tuesday night was his fourth in as many games and his 16th for the season, one more than he had last year with the Indians.

The inconsistency at the plate, Crisp said, is the worst it's been in his career. Is it the finger? Crisp fractured his finger sliding into third base April 8 at Baltimore, but he said that's not to blame.

``It can't be the finger," he said. ``Because you go 3 for 4, 2 for 4, 2 for 5, it's not your finger at that time, so it's not your finger when you're going the other way. The finger's fine. It's the way it's been up to this point. Hopefully it can be more consistent, but I can't pinpoint on anything like that . . . It's a matter of finding the holes, getting some of those soft ones to get in the holes and getting those hard ones to fall in, too."

Perhaps it was his lackluster hitting that caused Crisp's name to come up in trade rumors before the July 31 deadline. Crisp said the rumors didn't mean much to him.

``The first time I heard about it," Crisp said, ``was when I was in the dugout and [manager Terry Francona] came in and said `Did you read the newspaper today, it's in there?' I didn't read it and said no, and he said `Well, it's not true,' and that was it. After all that it was just everybody else asking me about how I felt about it. There was no real feeling because I knew right away that nothing was going on."

What he can think about, Crisp said, is being a more stable contributor to the Sox' offense. Pressure to prove himself as a fit replacement for Johnny Damon, he said, is not on his mind.

``I'm not really a pressure kind of [guy]," Crisp said. ``I just go out there and play, and if I do well, then that's what I was trying to do. If I do bad, that's not what I was trying to do."