The Day I Threw a Knuckleball
The Day I Threw a Knuckleball
How good is your baseball vocabulary?
Hello kiddo,
After a blip that kept me from sending an email last Wednesday, I am back and ready to overshare my life with strangers on the internet.
This will be a long letter, so before reading any further, go get a snack and make sure you are comfortable.
Really, go get something, maybe popcorn. I can wait.
[upbeat whistling sounds]
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Are you sorted? No?
Well, suit yourself. Let’s get into it.
This week is the anniversary of my Grandma’s birthday - she would have been 83 this year. My dear Ines passed away in 2020 after spending her last years battling Alzheimer’s and something that looked like mixed dementia.
It was her experience with Alzheimer’s that made me realise how much we are shaped by our memories: the good ones, the bad ones, and the ones that get lost in the way.
So, in the spirit of preserving our memories, especially those that have the potential to define our personality, let me tell you the story of the day I threw a knuckleball and my mum wet her pants.
When I was 10, I was part of an astonishingly inept baseball team. The name of the team eludes me (talk about bad memory, eh?) so for the sake of the story, let’s say the team’s name was “Panic Attack”.
I think is a fitting name as we seemed to panic and crumble at every possible opportunity.
Our league record was embarrassing. We could not score a run to save our lives, let alone win a baseball game. We trained as often as any other team in our league, we played in decent facilities, and had enough equipment to run a good practice.
Yet, when it mattered, we looked terrible.
Collectively, we were beyond salvation, but there were a couple of good players in our team. I distinctly remember this boy, the son of one of our coaches, who had a rocket in his left arm. He could throw fastballs for 30 minutes straight without breaking a sweat.
I cannot remember his name either so I will call him Eric going forward.
Unfortunately, due to pitch count regulations in youth baseball, Eric could only complete 50 pitches per game. That meant he could only carry us so far into the game and then someone else had to take over.
Poor kid, we let him down so many times. He would put on an immaculate performance for 5 innings only for someone else to ruin it immediately after.
It was heartbreaking.
The script repeated itself over and over again. Mentally, the whole team was resigned to losing our games the moment Eric left the mound.
Weekend after weekend, for months and months, the same thing will happen, as predictable as the sunrise.
Until one day…
It didn’t.
We were playing an away game on a Sunday afternoon. Shockingly, we had managed to score a few runs after a series of errors from our opponents. Defensively, Eric had it all under control. The opponents had not had a sniff of the first base.
After a year or so of disappointments, the goddess of victory was finally smiling upon us (or so it looked). The finishing line was in sight!
Could we defy the cruel fate that always damned us to misery and defeat?
Perhaps, but we still had one big mount to climb. Eric had reached his pitching count limit and someone needed to take his place.
Our coach walked from the dugout to the centre of the diamond where he met Eric. He shook his hand, took the ball off his glove and then turned to face the rest of the players on the field.
He was examining us.
It was only a few seconds, but the intensity and scrutiny of his eyes carried immense weight. It was like Medusa glaring at her terrified victims; we were paralysed.
No one dared to take a step forward. Who could bear the guilt of fucking up this time, when we were so close to finally winning?
It was so quiet I could swear we all stopped breathing.
Our coach finally made a decision: he pointed at the player next to me.
(Phew - that was close!)
I was beyond relieved. Those ten seconds of anxiety, nerves and self-doubt were excruciating. Yeah, there was a big chance of losing yet another game, but at least it was not going to be my fault.
My teammate slowly walked to the mound, dragging his feet and keeping his head down the whole way. He looked pale and ready to vomit at any time.
He received the ball from our coach while mumbling something inaudible. The game resumed shortly after.
And then… the inevitable happened.
I can still hear the metallic “clank!” of the bats hitting the baseballs and sending them flying over our heads. Hit after hit, our slim lead vanished instantly.
The boy on the mound was devastated.
Once more, our coach walked from the dugout towards the centre of the diamond. He gave the kid a hug and gently took the ball of his hand, freeing him from his misery.
Again, his inquisitive eyes turned to us.
Like before, it was as if something had sucked all the air from the atmosphere. We were not breathing.
And then he said:
“Cesar, come here” while pointing at me.
H o l y s h i t.
My mouth dried and I felt lightheaded, like you do when you stand up too quickly after laying down for a while. I did my best to walk towards the mound in a straight line, but even that felt like an impossible task.
I was shaking.
What happened next is something I could only describe as a “power-up”.
You know in superhero movies, when the villain pushes the main guy into a corner with no way out while a school bus is hanging off a cliff and the girl that the superhero loves is about to get married to a douchebag?
Then suddenly, searching deep within his soul, the superhero unlocks a secret ability that turns the odds in his favour, crushing the villains, saving the kids and winning the girl?
Welp, something like that happened; at least that’s how I remember it.
I accidentally started pitching knuckleballs.
A knuckleball is a very rare pitch, and the pitchers who throw it during games tend to use it almost exclusively. The goal of a knuckleball is to eliminate almost all of the spin on the baseball, causing it to flutter unpredictably on its way to the plate.
Although knuckleballs come to the plate at a much lower velocity than the average pitch, they can be among the hardest pitches to hit because they move so erratically.
I cannot explain why it happened.
In my head, I wanted to throw fastball rockets, like Eric. I was putting all my heart, soul and energy behind every pitch.
Have you had those dreams where you are fighting someone, but your punches feel soft and slow? Like you couldn’t kill a ladybug even if you crushed it between your hands.
This was just like that - but it was happening in real life.
The baseball would randomly swirl in the air, almost in slow motion, doing exactly the opposite of what I wanted it to do. To our luck, batters couldn’t deal with it. One after the other, they struck out without being able to make contact with the ball.
I was perplexed.
What the hell was happening? Why couldn’t I throw fastballs? And why couldn’t they hit those silly floating pitches?
I must have beaten five or six players consecutively before they adapted to my erratic throws. However, even without the “surprise element”, my pitches were hard to hit; we had a chance to keep this game within reach.
Maybe, maybe, we could win this one.
In the last inning of the game, with 1 out on the board and one player in first base, I did something that made my mum wet her pants.
The batter I was facing hit the ball towards my left and I caught it in the air to get him immediately out. If I was quick enough, we could get a double-play and kill their chances of scoring more runs.
In a split second after catching the ball, I threw it to our first baseman so he could get that runner out too, but he couldn’t catch the ball.
Their runner started sprinting towards second base as I started sprinting towards the ball that landed somewhere near our own dugout. I felt possessed by some supernatural speed; I managed to beat my teammate to the ball, even though he was only a few yards away from it.
I grabbed the baseball and, almost without looking, threw a proper rocket in the direction of the second base. This time, my teammate did catch it, comfortably getting the runner out to finish the inning. Game over.
It was mental.
I am sure there were not more than 30 people in the stands, but I felt as if an incredibly loud roar invaded the pitch. My heart was racing, everyone was screaming, holding their heads in disbelief, and congratulating me for an unimaginable moment of inspiration.
I eventually found my mum on the stands. She was ecstatic and barely capable of stringing two words together. Her eyes were filled with tears while she jumped and cheered uncontrollably. Later, she confessed that she had peed her pants a little during her celebrations.
It was a great afternoon.
-Hey, but did you win the game?
I think so?
I believe part of the hysterical celebrations had to do with us winning a game, plus the manner in which we did. But honestly, I cannot remember - not that it matters, though.
That’s the thing with our memories; we cannot decide what will stay with us forever and what will be forgotten. I don’t remember the name of my teammates, the name of the team, or any other baseball anecdotes from that time. Maybe I used to know all those details, but time has been relentless in its job of sending my memories into oblivion, one by one.
As I wrote this, I asked my mum if she had taken any pictures from my baseball days, hoping that it could spark another exciting memory.
Sadly, there aren’t any.
If Alzheimer’s claims my memories one day, as it did with my grandma’s, I hope it lets me keep this one. And if that’s not the case, perhaps you, who somehow read through this seemingly unimportant baseball anecdote, will be kind enough to use this letter to help me remember.
That’s it for today folks.
I apologise for the excessive use of baseball vocabulary - I know that is not everyone’s forte but hopefully, you have been able to follow along.
I will slide into your inbox again on Sunday with another issue of Stuff Around the Internet. If you haven’t already, you can check the last one where I talked about practising maximum enthusiasm and ranted about the rotten politics in the United Kingdom (again?).
Sayonara, Sammy.
C.