Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Babe Ruth Move Over!
Every boy dreams of one day becoming a super athlete. I was no exception. My first meaningful athletic experience came in the third grade. I was envious of a group of kids playing a game of unsupervised baseball during the lunch hour. I borrowed a glove and positioned my self slightly to the right of second base, what would be called shortstop today. I pounded my glove like a major leaguer and waited. After three or four pitches the batter drilled a ground ball straight at me. I charged the ball just like they do on TV with my glove at ground level. The ball took a bad hop, came up and zapped me right in the eye. I was sent to see the school nurse who put an eye patch on my eye. My next stop was the principal’s office. I never saw a big leaguer being sent to the principal’s office so this was strange ground for me. The principal explained that baseball was not permitted on the school’s ground and that I was grounded during the lunch hour for the next few days. After my harsh chewing out I figured that this was good experience if I ever came face to face with an angry manager in the future. I removed my eye patch before I got home since TV had not prepared me for a confrontation with my mother. That was a critical mistake. I walked in and mom said, “How did you get that black eye?” Mom was not known for her bedside manner! I quickly realized that there would always be one major obstacle between me and the big leagues—my Mother.
A second obstacle emerged soon enough. Mumps. I got a good case of them in the seventh grade and missed more than three weeks of school. When I returned I got a hero’s reception from my classmates. They thought that I had died. But there I was alive and a kicking—well, almost. Now my doctor was another story. He did die during my convalescence, but not from mumps. I was a pale shadow of my old self; quite literally I was ghostly white. I was on a regimen of cod liver oil, which just about succeeded where the mumps had failed. I figured that if I could survive that I could survive anything. For the next few weeks I was excused from PE. Everyone figured that if I could barely pick up a pencil there was no chance that I could pick up a bat. I was one happy soul when I made it back to the softball diamond. It would have been nice if I could have forgotten my first at bat—three swings—three strikes. I never came close to hitting the ball. All of that cod liver oil was apparently for naught. The next day was no better. Nor was the next. I must have set a record for futility at the plate. I struck out 90-something straight times. That cod liver oil wasn’t worth a darn and it tasted worse by the day. And then a miracle occurred. I hit the ball for a solid base hit—well, the ball did make it out of the infield. Everyone was surprised, but no one more so than myself.
By the time I was in the eleventh Grade, I had become a legend on the softball field. Or at least that was what my chemistry teacher told me one day during class. My forte was pitching. I did not have a hundred mile-per-hour pitch. One must remember that this was softball. In fact, the only real pitch I had was a soft changeup—very soft. The legend was built on my pitching strategy. All the big studs tried to knock the stuffing out of the ball. My strategy was to accommodate them—a soft pitch about six inches off the plate about shoulder high. True it was a tempting creampuff, and they did knock the stuffing out of the ball, but the ball almost always went foul. Sometimes in their eagerness to hit the ball, they missed. They kept creeping off the plate to get a better angle at the ball and then I would toss a soft one right off the outside of the plate. Whoosh! As often as not they missed. So that is the story of how I became a pitching legend. Not particularly good, but effective. By the way, I did make an A in the chemistry class. Later in my college years I tried the same tactic. No one would swing at the high inside pitch. College guys had finally learned the strike zone. But in high school who wants to get on base with a walk. That just would not be macho.
Every boy dreams of one day becoming a super athlete. I was no exception. My first meaningful athletic experience came in the third grade. I was envious of a group of kids playing a game of unsupervised baseball during the lunch hour. I borrowed a glove and positioned my self slightly to the right of second base, what would be called shortstop today. I pounded my glove like a major leaguer and waited. After three or four pitches the batter drilled a ground ball straight at me. I charged the ball just like they do on TV with my glove at ground level. The ball took a bad hop, came up and zapped me right in the eye. I was sent to see the school nurse who put an eye patch on my eye. My next stop was the principal’s office. I never saw a big leaguer being sent to the principal’s office so this was strange ground for me. The principal explained that baseball was not permitted on the school’s ground and that I was grounded during the lunch hour for the next few days. After my harsh chewing out I figured that this was good experience if I ever came face to face with an angry manager in the future. I removed my eye patch before I got home since TV had not prepared me for a confrontation with my mother. That was a critical mistake. I walked in and mom said, “How did you get that black eye?” Mom was not known for her bedside manner! I quickly realized that there would always be one major obstacle between me and the big leagues—my Mother.
A second obstacle emerged soon enough. Mumps. I got a good case of them in the seventh grade and missed more than three weeks of school. When I returned I got a hero’s reception from my classmates. They thought that I had died. But there I was alive and a kicking—well, almost. Now my doctor was another story. He did die during my convalescence, but not from mumps. I was a pale shadow of my old self; quite literally I was ghostly white. I was on a regimen of cod liver oil, which just about succeeded where the mumps had failed. I figured that if I could survive that I could survive anything. For the next few weeks I was excused from PE. Everyone figured that if I could barely pick up a pencil there was no chance that I could pick up a bat. I was one happy soul when I made it back to the softball diamond. It would have been nice if I could have forgotten my first at bat—three swings—three strikes. I never came close to hitting the ball. All of that cod liver oil was apparently for naught. The next day was no better. Nor was the next. I must have set a record for futility at the plate. I struck out 90-something straight times. That cod liver oil wasn’t worth a darn and it tasted worse by the day. And then a miracle occurred. I hit the ball for a solid base hit—well, the ball did make it out of the infield. Everyone was surprised, but no one more so than myself.
By the time I was in the eleventh Grade, I had become a legend on the softball field. Or at least that was what my chemistry teacher told me one day during class. My forte was pitching. I did not have a hundred mile-per-hour pitch. One must remember that this was softball. In fact, the only real pitch I had was a soft changeup—very soft. The legend was built on my pitching strategy. All the big studs tried to knock the stuffing out of the ball. My strategy was to accommodate them—a soft pitch about six inches off the plate about shoulder high. True it was a tempting creampuff, and they did knock the stuffing out of the ball, but the ball almost always went foul. Sometimes in their eagerness to hit the ball, they missed. They kept creeping off the plate to get a better angle at the ball and then I would toss a soft one right off the outside of the plate. Whoosh! As often as not they missed. So that is the story of how I became a pitching legend. Not particularly good, but effective. By the way, I did make an A in the chemistry class. Later in my college years I tried the same tactic. No one would swing at the high inside pitch. College guys had finally learned the strike zone. But in high school who wants to get on base with a walk. That just would not be macho.
