He first commanded attention with his bat, Tall and lean, at 6-3 and 190 pounds, muscles tightly wound and stretched to the breaking point, Tony C epitomized the powerful, young, aggressive hitter old baseball men spend half their lives looking for. He had the swing. Viewing the 19-year-old Conigliaro for the first time, Ted Williams commanded, "Don't change."

"He was so perfect," recalls teammate Rico Petrocelli. "He fit in so well with being a major league ballplayer. A young, single guy in his own hometown. It was amazing."

Buoyed by an adolescent's blind confidence, Conigliaro hovered over the plate and dared pitchers to throw it past him. He swung hard and often, and he could scarcely believe it when he missed. In the pantheon of Red Sox sluggers, Conigliaro alone was made for Fenway Park. He was that rarest of things, a natural pull hitter with power. His talent was prodigious, his potential unlimited.

In 1964, as a 19-year-old major league rookie, Conigliaro hit 24 home runs, more than any other teenager in big league history. At 20, he led the American League in home runs, the youngest champion of all time. He hit his 100th homer at 22, again the youngest player ever to reach that mark. By the conclusion of the 1967 season, after only four seasons, he had hit 104 home runs. He accomplished all that despite being injured and missing a total of 144 games, which would have been worth perhaps another 30 to 40 more homers.

Off the field he was no less precocious. As he later observed, "When you're a major league baseball player and you ask a girl out, she'll go." Girls loved Tony C, and Tony C loved girls. If love was all you needed in the sixties, then Tony C had it all. He was Beatles-cute, bashful, and brash at the same time--a typical kid, in a most untypical profession during the most atypical time in recent history. He liked fast cars, late nights, Revere Beach, and rock and roll. He appeared in a movie, made records, sang in clubs, dated beauty queens, and still hit the slider over the Wall.

Born in Revere and raised in East Boston as a Red Sox fan in the age of Don Buddin, Conigliaro went to St. Mary's High School in Lynn. In 1962 he was signed by Red Sox scout Milt Bolling for $45,000. He bought a Corvette. That fall the Sox sent Conigliaro to the instructional league, where he saw good curveballs for the first time and hit .220. Disappointed, he spent the winter in the basement of his parents' Swampscott home, swinging a leaded bat and working part-time as an extra in Otto Preminger's film The Cardinal. The following spring the Red Sox assigned him to Class A Wellsville, in the New York-Pennsylvania League. After going hitless in his first 16 at bats, he finished the season with a .363 average and was named league MVP and Rookie of the Year. He was 18 years old.

When the veterans called him "Bush," Conigliaro lashed out, fighting for his time in the batting cage, refusing to take any crap, and generally being a pain in the ass.

In November, President John E Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas. In February 1964 the Beatles appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show. In March, Tony Conigliaro went to spring training in Scottsdale, Arizona, and became Tony C.

The Red Sox were terrible, but the farm system was bursting with talent. Baseball rules then required teams to keep a certain number of bonus babies on the major league roster. Tony C was determined to stay.

During an intrasquad game on March 6, he homered. Boston baseball writers jumped on the "local boy makes good" bandwagon, figuring, like everyone else, that Tony C would soon be farmed out. In the meantime, he was an easy story.

But he kept hitting. Though ignored by most Red Sox veterans, Tony C refused to be intimidated. When the veterans called him "Bush," Conigliaro lashed out, fighting for his time in the batting cage, refusing to take any crap, and generally being a pain in the ass. He was precisely what the Sox needed. The writers loved him. "If he doesn't aggravate someone into murdering him," one columnist observed, "he may become one of baseball history's true superstars." He was the Sox's most colorful rookie and best young hitter since Ted Williams some 25 years before.

He was having a blast. Scottsdale was nothing like Swampscott. When he wasn't hitting home runs, he was hitting on girls and discovering rock and roll. Conigliaro, Petrocelli, Tony Horton, and other rookies hung our at a local bar called J.D.'s. "Downstairs was rock and roll, upstairs was country and western," recalls Petrocelli. "They had a live band and Tony would sing." (Upstairs was an unknown country and western singer named Waylon Jennings.)

On March 22, Conigliaro elbowed his way into the starting lineup. In a 5-4 loss to Cleveland, he hit a home run to center field. No big deal--usually. But this center field fence was 30 feet high and 430 feet away. Only Ted Williams had ever homered to the same spot. A few days later Sox manager Johnny Pesky made official what was already apparent to everyone. Although he would play most of his career in right field, Conigliaro became the new Red Sox center fielder.

The timing was perfect. People had been looking for a hero ever since John Kennedy's death, the previous fall. Young and handsome, Conigliaro was tailor-made for the role. All he had to do was perform on the field, and that was hardly ever a problem.

The Red Sox season was scheduled to open on April 15 in New York. It rained. Conigliaro awoke, looked outside, ordered breakfast, and went back to bed. His roommate, Frank Malzone, was already up, visiting with relatives. "He was a youngster and I was a veteran," recalls Malzone. "I think they were thinking I could lead him in the right direction." Conigliaro didn't need much direction. But he did need an alarm clock.

The weather cleared and although the game was canceled, the Sox scheduled a workout. Conigliaro slept on. Then he finally awoke and learned of the practice, he jumped in a cab. The cab broke down. Conigliaro was 45 minutes late.

"I ought to be fined $1,000," Conigliaro blurted to the writers. "I ought to be suspended." An understanding Johnny Pesky let him off with a stern warning and a $10 fine. "What a way to start my career," moaned Conigliaro. "I can hear my kids asking me someday, 'What did you do your first day in the big leagues, Daddy?' And I'll say, 'I slept.'" As a ballplayer he was still a rookie, but Conigliaro was already a veteran at being Tony C.

Things went better the following day. The Sox edged New York 4-3 in 11 innings. From the beginning, it was a typical Tony C day, equally exhilarating, exasperating, and endearing. In his first at bat he hit a scorcher that Clete Boyer at third nearly turned into a triple play. In the second inning he made a fine catch off Tom Tresh; later he singled and scored a run. He also accused Yankee pitcher Whitey Ford of throwing a spitter. Rookies don't normally do things like that, but Tony C, obviously, was no average rookie.