For those two hours, Martínez, the Mets star known for his intensity and cleverness on the mound and his quirkiness off it, is in the yard outside his six-bedroom Tudor revival home in Greenwich, Conn. He is planting. He is pruning. He is talking to his tulips. "What about you, beauty?" he will ask in language rarely, if ever, heard on a baseball field. "Aren't you going to grow up to be so pretty?"

¶ 9:11 AM