Sitting in the home team dugout at Shea Stadium, Octavio Victor "Cookie" Rojas, the Mets third base coach for the last two seasons, is the very picture of baseball nonchalance.

Perched soberly in the growing shade of a late afternoon, Rojas has almost the entire padded bench to himself.

It is still hours before the twilight game this evening, and he sits with his knees apart and a bat in his hands, its fat end touching the concrete floor.

Next to the coach lies a baseball glove, but like much else around him, he appears to be ignoring it.

Despite his surroundings and the proximity of the tools of his trade, he looks to all who pass like a man who doesn't have a care in the world at the moment.

A closer look at his eyes, however, masked behind a dark pair of shades, belies that notion.

He is, in point of fact, watching intently as former Mets Bobby Bonilla and the rest of the Los Angeles Dodgers' starting line-up proceeds to take batting practice.

Without taking his eyes off his team's adversaries this given day, he also talks to a reporter about young people, and particularly, young people getting involved in sports.

"It's a matter, really, of having to keep practicing every day," said Rojas, who began his own pursuit of his baseball dreams in Havana, Cuba and made it to the major leagues here in 1956.

"On the plus side, if it's something they like doing, whether it's playing baseball or participating in some other sport, it's not hard to keep a young person motivated to keep doing it.

"At the same time though, I think it's important that young people -- and their parents and mentors too -- realize, early on, the importance of doing well in school.

"I mean, you never know what's going to happen in life, right? But at the same time, looking at the situation in an optimistic light, getting a solid education and doing well might afford you the chance to attend college on a scholarship."

"That will then allow you to spend more time playing baseball, and perhaps even give you a chance to be in the big leagues," the coach continued.

After 42 years in the majors as a player, scout, manager and coach, Cookie Rojas said the fundamentals behind fulfilling one's destiny in sports are little changed from the days when he started out as a second baseman playing minor league ball in West Palm Beach, FL, Savannah, GA, and Jersey City, NJ.

"You have to stay in shape," he advised. "You have to maintain a good diet, and stay away from alcohol, drugs and cigarettes.

"Beyond that though, you can't get around the fact that you have to have the natural ability to play the game. You have to be able to produce. Nothing will be handed to you.

"Again, to return to the point I made earlier, you've got to devote the time to practice. The more you practice the sport that interests you, the better you get at it."

"And you have to learn to cope with failure," Rojas added abruptly, as the Dodgers left the home plate area and spread out across Shea's wide expanse of green for fielding practice.

"If you can't deal with failure, you won't be successful."

Without question, "Cookie" Rojas knows a thing or two about success.

Initially signed with the Cincinnati Reds in 1956, he made his major league debut with that ball club in 1962.

As the team's starting second baseman, he played in the first game ever held at Dodger stadium, on April 10, 1962, and collected his first big league hit against the legendary Sandy Koufax.

Over the next eight years, Rojas would play for the Philadelphia Phillies and the St. Louis Cardinals in the National League, before finding a more or less permanent home with the Kansas City Royals in the American League.

While his might seem from that brief recitation to be the typical baseball journeyman's story, Rojas was anything but just another face in the crowd.

In 1965 he appeared in the first of his five All-Star Games (one with the Phillies, the rest with Kansas City, 1971 through 1974, making him just the ninth player in major league history to play in an All-Star Game for both the American and National Leagues). In 1969, he was named the Phillies greatest second baseman ever during major league baseball's centennial, and from 1970 through 1975, he and Kansas City teammate Fred Patek, were considered the American League's top double-play combination.

A career .263 hitter over 1,822 games, Rojas hit for a .303 average with the Phillies in 1965, .300 with the Royals in 1971, and batted .308 (four-for-13) in two league championship series against the New York Yankees in 1976 and 1977.

Asked if he achieved everything in baseball he'd wanted to, Rojas looked off toward the outfield and then laughed softly.

"When I started out, I guess when anybody starts out to be in baseball, their goals are pretty much the same -- you want to play in the major leagues, stay a long time, and play amongst the best there is.

"I think I've done that," the coach continued. "So in that sense I guess I have to turn the question back to you and say, 'What do you think?'"

After his team came up short in the 1977 American League Championship Series, Rojas decided to call it a day as a player and began his second life in baseball as a coach.

From 1978 until 1982, he served as an infield coach for the Chicago Cubs before moving on to the California Angels, where he not only coached, but served as an advanced scout and ultimately, as the team's manager for the 1988 season.

With that designation, he became only the third Cuban-American to manage in the major leagues, joining Mike Gonzalez (who managed the Cardinals) and Preston Gomez (who managed the Houston Astros and the Cubs).

From 1991 until he joined the Mets in 1997, Rojas, who now resides with his wife Candy in Aventura, FL, worked in the Florida Marlins organization, as a coach, major league scout, and special assistant to the general manager.

"I guess the real key to aspiring to and eventually spending your life in baseball is this: you have to keep producing," Rojas said. "You have to be consistent in your production.

"Getting here [to the majors] is not the difficult part. Staying here is. No matter who you are, you have to keep working hard and honing your skills... and then you have to produce."

"You know, earlier, I turned a question back on you and I've been thinking some more about it," the coach said as the Dodgers left the field and the first of the Mets players to appear from the club house began preparing for batting practice.

"For me, baseball has been everything I thought it would be. I did what I liked to do and I'm still in it, despite the fact that my playing days are long over.

"To me, it's been a very good life," "Cookie" Rojas concluded.