Williams always speaks of Mattingly with reverence. Williams was a gawky rookie in 1991, and it was Mattingly, he said, who told teammates to go easy on him. Williams also learned an important lesson.

"He taught me a piece of advice that I take even to this day," Williams said Sunday. "He said to me: 'I don't really care what you do the night before or the week before — when you come to the field, you come ready to play. Mentally ready to play. You've got to be all there. You can't worry about maybe I don't feel too good today, or I don't feel 100 percent. You've got to go like: dude, get it done.' "

Almost 2,000 times now, Williams has taken the field, with aches most fans never hear about. He estimates that players are in top shape only 25 percent of the time. The other days are a grind, Williams said, but it is important for young players to see veterans playing hurt.

"It has more of a positive influence than you would ever know," he said.

You kind of had to see this to believe it. But after the game today, Hideki Matsui went out on the field and did several running drills with his broken left wrist in a plastic cast. He then played catch with his translator, Roger Kahlon. Matsui threw a baseball to Roger, who caught it with a glove then rolled it back to Hideki.