ALL-STAR GAME : A REAL STAR : Named One of NL’s Best, Burke Is So Much More Than That to One Boy

Tonight, in a game of heroes, he will play the position of hero. In baseball’s 60th All-Star game at Anaheim Stadium, Montreal’s Tim Burke will be one of the National League’s four relief pitchers, a guy who could be called to make a pitch to win a game. At 30, making his first All-Star appearance, it is a call he has long awaited.

So it’s interesting that, when Burke is called, he might not be there. If the game goes late, Burke has already said he’s leaving early. At midnight, he has to be aboard a jet at Los Angeles International Airport on a flight bound for Guatemala.

“Even if I leave the game . . . even if I have to steal a helicopter to get there, I will not miss that flight,” Burke said.

Waiting in Guatemala City is a 2-year-old boy. He was abandoned in front of an orphanage at birth. Because of a thyroid problem, his arms and legs aren’t quite big enough for his body, and he may have suffered some mental retardation. Doctors have recommended against bringing him into this country.

Shortly after Burke arrives Wednesday morning, the boy will become his son.

“My son. Think about that--I’m going to see my son for the first time,” said Burke, who will sign adoption papers with wife Christine. “You put it that way, and this game isn’t so important.”

The boy, to be named Ryan, will be their second adopted child. The first, a girl they named Stephanie, was taken two years ago from an orphanage in South Korea. In both cases, they worked through Holt Children’s Services International out of Eugene, Ore., and their request was simple.

“We wanted some child, somewhere, who was unwanted,” Burke said. “Maybe a child with a problem, a child nobody else would take.”

Why? It may have something to do with the very tag Burke may be denying himself tonight, something about being a hero.

“I think a lot of us are heroes whether we like it or not,” Burke said of his baseball peers. “But a lot of people don’t think being a hero comes with responsibility. I do.”

And so tonight, he said, will be bittersweet.

“There are so many emotions going through my head,” Burke said. “I’ve always dreamed of being here, but it’s hard to be here. There’s some disappointment at not being with my son. There’s heartache and at the same time it’s a thrill. I know I may never have this chance in an All-Star game again. The whole thing is just very emotional for me.”

Burke actually became so excited by the adoption, which they have been working on since Christmas, that he announced to his wife last week that he would not attend the All-Star game if selected.

“I told her no way, our son is more important than any game,” Burke said. “But then she talked me out of it. She told me, you go through with it because you’ve worked so hard for it.”

Good for baseball, and good for the Expos, who need all the recognition they can get, despite being 49-38 and leading the National League East by 1 1/2 games.

“People in the other league think we are in the frozen north,” said Expo Manager Buck Rodgers, who will coach third base for the National League. “They think we are in a foreign country.”

Well, uh, Buck, hate to tell you but. . . geography aside, the most unknown hero of this unknown team is the right-handed Burke, who has a 5-1 record, a 2.82 ERA and 17 saves.

“I know that not many people in baseball know me, they know all the other guys in this room,” said Burke, gesturing to his teammates after Monday’s workout. “But that’s OK. I’m not into that.”

Burke has been more into other things ever since 1985. That’s when he and his wife learned that medically, their chances of having a child weren’t great.

“My wife immediately talked about adoption, but I didn’t want anything to do with it,” Burke said. “I never thought I could love another child. I told my wife, ‘I’m sorry, I just can’t.’

“She said fine. And then she started praying behind my back.”

A few months later, one winter day, Burke and his wife were driving around when he felt something.

“All of a sudden I saw a little Korean girl in my mind, and I wanted to adopt her,” Burke said. “It was crazy, because I had never seen Koreans before, and I didn’t even know if you could adopt them. But I told my wife this and she nearly fell out of the car. She then told me that’s what she had been praying for.”

Stephanie was sent to them two years ago as an infant, and quickly became a favorite member of the Expos extended family.

Said Rodgers: “I remember his wife got on a bus in Puerto Rico during one spring training, and on the baby’s head was a little gold seal that read, “Made In Korea.” We all thought it was great.”

Last winter the Burkes decided to adopt another child, only this time one with less chance of being adopted than an infant.

“We wanted an older unwanted child,” Burke said. “We thought maybe that would help more.”

The adoption agency gave them a thick book with children’s photos, and after 30 minutes, Burke and his wife found the future Ryan.

“We saw all these children with no chance to be loved, any one of them we could have taken . . . and then we saw Ryan and that was it. He was the one.”

Upon learning of his medical problems, Burke took the boy’s file to two doctors. Both of them recommended against adoption.

“But we still had him in our heart and we decided, no matter what happened, we wanted him,” Burke said. “And you know what happened? He got better. The more we’ve seen of him in pictures, the more it looks like his arms and legs are growing into his body, and the more he is doing normal things.

“It has been like a miracle.”

One day, perhaps, when he is old enough to understand, Burke’s son will think of his parents like that.

“I just know that as ballplayers, we influence a lot of people,” Burke said. “They see us do something, they want to do it. When I was a kid, I saw Don Drysdale wind up, I wanted to have a windup like that. If today’s kid see you out partying and going wild, then they want to do the same thing.

“I guess I just want to lead somebody the right way.”