Fate of the Seams

79 have done it in baseball history. 50 of those were in the Senior Circuit. While the game has been played for well over a Century, no Ranger ever did it, including the time as the Senators. No Twin has ever done it, including the time as the Senators. Needless to say, no Senator ever did it. Sandy Koufax is the only pitcher in history to do it three times for the Dodgers. Nolan Ryan, was only one of three pitchers to ever do it twice. And of course as a member of the Hall of Fame, he did it once in each league, the only player to accomplish that feat. Dodgers did it six times. The Yankees did it five times. The Brewers and Athletics are the only teams to have done it four times.

This past Thursday, Milwaukee Brewer, Mike Fiers did it…he struck out all three Dodger batters he faced, Enrique Hernandez, Carlos Frias and Joc Pederson, perhaps the hottest hitter in the league, in the top of the 4th inning. Nine pitches. Three strike outs. 9 pitches, 9 strikes and 3 outs. It is called the ‘Immaculate Inning’.

This obscure stat began on June 4, 1889 when John Clarkson of the Beaneaters struck out Jim Fogarty who led the league in stolen bases (99), Big Sam Thompson, the right fielder who led the league in home runs that season with 20, and the big first baseman, Sid Farrar, of the Philadelphia Quakers in the top of the 3rd in Boston.

The famous names that have done it are impressive. Rube Waddell of the Athletics did it in 1902, Lefty Grove was the other pitcher who did it twice in 1928 for the Athletics. Billy Hoeft of the Tigers did it in 1953. Jim Bunning of the Tigers did it in 1959. Al Downing of the Yankees did it in 1967. Ron Guidry of the Yankees did it in 1972. Roger Clemens of the Blue Jays did it in 1997, Pedro Martinez of the Red Sox did it in 2002. Felix Hernandez of the Mariners did it in 2008. Dazzy Vance of the Dodgers did it in 1924; Robin Roberts of the Phillies did it in 1956; Sandy Koufax did it three times for the Dodgers in 1962, 1963. Tony Cloninger did it for the Milwaukee Braves in 1963. Bob Gibson did it in 1968. Milt Pappas did it for the Cubs in 1971. Bruce Sutter of the Cubs did it in 1977. David Cone accomplished the task in 1991. Orel Hershiser did it as a Giant in 1998. Randy Johnson did it twice, once in 1998 as an Astro and the other in 2001 as a Diamondback. Ben Sheets accomplished the task for the Brewers in 2004.

So where does Fiers accomplishment rank, a portend of the future as a great pitcher or along with the likes of Pat Ragan, Joe Oeschger, Bob Bruce, Pedro Borbon, Lynn McGlothen, Joey McLaughlin, Jeff Robinson, Rob Dibble, Sloppy Thurston, Danny Jackson, Jeff Montgomery, Stan Belinda, Doug Jones and the like.

Only 79 did it. As beautiful as it was, it is a ‘Fate of the Seams’.

Play Ball!

Magnification Of Blunders

With the wind whirling all around us, the center of the storm is often calm. We are in the center of baseball’s annual storm. The playoffs, where pitchers dominate and star hitters rarely come through in the clutch, was best described in Ernest Thayer’s legendary poem written in 1888 “Casey at the Bat: A Ballad of the Republic Sung in the Year 1888”, first published in The San Francisco Examiner on June 3^rd in that year. While we no longer have the Mudville Nine to worry about, today’s game during the baseball’s playoffs, still are dominated by good pitching.

Take for example game #1 of the NLCS: The visiting Dodgers put multi millionaire, Zach Greinke on the mound. With a 1-2 post-season record, his only career win coming against St. Louis for the Milwaukee Brewers in the 2011 NLCS, he responded with ten strikeouts and only one walk. However, that one walk would come back to haunt him as the runner scored on a double that should have been caught in centerfield. You might question, ‘should have caught’ statement because it was a ball, high off the wall, which would have been a good catch. But it was a catch that was possible to make. It was simply misjudged by Andre Ethier. Yet little is said about that play. Rather, the emphasis for pointing fingers is that Dodger manager, Don Mattingly, pulled his star first baseman and one of its best hitters, Adrian  Gonzalez, who had singled to put the lead run on first while the game was tied 2-2 and was hitting .333 in post season. No one knew that this game was going to go 13 innings and this was only the eighth inning. Dee Gordon came in to run and was quickly retired by a weak ground ball by rookie sensation, Yasiel Puig. One of the Dodgers star hitters was now out of the game. The point here is that he was ONE of the star hitters, not the only one.

“Then from 5,000 throats and more there rose a lusty yell;                                                           It rumbled through the valley, it rattled in the dell;                                                                         It knocked upon the mountain and recoiled upon the flat,                                                         For Casey, might Casey, was advancing to the bat.”

There were other hitters in the Dodger lineup to do what Gonzalez had done so well. There was Hanley Ramirez, Carl Crawford, Puig, Uribe, Ethier and Mark Ellis to deliver. But this game, during this time of the season is not about the hitters. It’s about the pitching.

The Dodgers were no longer calm in the center of the storm.

“The sneer is gone from Casey’s lip, his teeth are clenched in hate;                                       He pounds with cruel violence his bat upon the plate.                                                           And now the pitcher holds the ball, and now he lets it go.                                                       And now the air is shattered by the force of Casey’s blow.”

On the St. Louis side, steeped in tradition with one of their greatest marked by a symbol on their sleeves with the number 6 set in a circle, and legendary pitcher, Bob Gibson in the dugout before the game, did what every winning team has done from time in memoriam in the post season…they won the game with tremendous pitching.

You can’t forget the work of Joe Kelly, a Los Angeles area native, beginning the game with six solid innings coming off a 7-2 record since August 11^th with a 2.32 ERA. Don’t forget, he struck out all of the Dodgers in the first inning and then struck out Gonzalez with runners on in the second and Puig with runners on in the third. It’s not the time to forget Randy Choate and Seth Maness for their combined shutout inning of work. Carlos Martinez had a good inning and then came Trevor Rosenthal, who struck out two in his great couple of innings.

But the shock of shocks, was John Axford’s second lifetime entrance into post-season play. The boy from Simcoe, Ontario, Canada, was traded by the Brewers to St. Louis (that’s another story for another day) after being counted on to be able to loose more TV viewers than NBC. When he came into a Brewer game this season, fans would change channels just to miss the predictable debacle that would surely follow. But here he was, banging his fastball and making an inning interesting. Giving up a hit and walking another, he came in with a fastball of old to strike out the not so mighty Casey of the Dodger Nine, former Cardinal Nick Punto, to allow the game to continue. This game didn’t end suddenly as most had previously when ‘Ax’ entered a Brewer’s game. It left many in Milwaukee wondering where was this performance a few months ago for The Crew? There’s ‘beer pride’ here. This moment of past glory now resided on the hill at Busch and not at Miller.

To put the exclamation point on this note of post season pitching importance, Lance Lynn’s work for two innings wrapping up the game and the win cannot be over looked nor over stated.

“Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright;                                                The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,                                              And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children should,                                         But there is no joy in Mudville – mighty Casey has struck out.”

It’s not the magnification of blunders that decided this game. It wasn’t Ethier’s late start and misplay in center or a managerial decision that would do in the Dodgers on this long, long evening in St. Louis. It was pitching, namely for ‘Dizzy’ and ‘Daffy’s’ and ‘Bullet Bob’s’ legacies that brought victory to the team that plays under the Arch. And that was Friday. Same goes for Saturday’s games in both St. Louis and Boston.

Play Ball.

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Whirling Darvish

He’s bigger than you would expect. Yu Darvish, with his reddish hair and quick genuine smile, is disarming. He appears to talk to his infielders after some batters are retired. But to my knowledge, he doesn’t speak any English. (He is learning both English and Spanish to be able to converse with his new teammates.) He looks totally comfortable on the mound in this arid land so far away from his home in Osaka.

The array of pitches in his 25-year-old command is way above the norm. Not a four pitch hurler, Darvish is in command of eight, four of them fastballs. He even claims to have a famed ‘gyro’ ball. There is a little Bob Gibson in him. His fastball is heavy, very heavy.

In his four outings during Spring Training, I have seen him pitch in two games. The first was against the Brewers where he was nearly unhitable. Nearly. Norichiki Aoki, a fellow Japanese transplant this season, slapped a hit off of Darvish in the bottom of the third. This was a couple of weeks ago. What was impressive was the pop in his fastball.

Last night against the Colorado Rockies at Salt River Flats in Scottsdale, Darvish faced the Colorado Rockies. He was flat-out electric. His fast ball boomed. And it was heavy. Case in point: In the 6th, after giving up a hit to Dexter Fowler, Carlos Gonzalez had his bat sawed off by a tight, inside heavy pitch, leaving him with only the handle in his hands as the barrel of his bat was stuck in the net behind home plate. He struck out for the third time. The following batter, All-Star Troy Tulowitzki did the same, again for the third time in the game. This time it was on a slurve that took the wind out of the swing of the gold glove/silver slugger winning hitter.  For the night, 6 innings. 98 pitches. 3 runs; 6 hits; 1 walk; and 11 strike outs.

For Spring Training, 15 1/3rd innings, 21 strike outs. You do the math.

The quickness of his pitch. The lively arm. He is the real deal.

For those who have an opportunity to see this amazing, young pitcher this season, you will see unmistakable signs of greatness. For those who have tickets to the Texas Rangers home opener in Arlington on April 9th, in the top of the first, there will be a matchup of the ages. When Ichiro walks up to the plate, rubs the inside of his left shoulder pulling slightly at the jersey with his batting instrument raising skyward in his left hand, slowly drops his left arm and transfers his bat to his right hand, and points it straight at Yu to begin his process of preparation in the box, the beginning of THE moment will be upon us. That time…that place will be an historic event our game rarely sees. The entire at-bat will be worth the price of admission.

It’s time for the real games to begin. The anticipation of moments like this is what dreams are made of. Field of Dreams? No. It is a ‘World full of Dreams’. It is what makes baseball, baseball.