GaryMrMets
06-04-2004, 02:17 AM
http://www.philly.com/mld/dailynews/sports/8824793.htm
Posted on Thu, Jun. 03, 2004
Sam Donnellon | Why pitching is the toughest task in sports
AS KEVIN MILLWOOD coiled to deliver a crucial pitch in a scoreless tie against the Mets the other night, a smiling fan ran across the stands
behind the backstop, herked and jerked his body from side to side, and frantically waved his hands.
What made this even more
absurd is that the fan was in a Phillies shirt, in the Phillies' home park - and, presumably,
a Phillies fan.
As distracted fans followed the flailing of the fan, Millwood -
unaffected and undeterred -
delivered the next pitch over the outside of the plate for a called strike.
You don't get very far as a
baseball pitcher if you can't
handle these things. On even cold nights, the Phillie Phanatic works up a healthy sweat working on the focus of the visiting team's pitcher - pacing up and down the dugout roof, applying hexes with his oversized mitts, rushing to the edge of the dugout roof and sticking his head as far into the corner of the pitcher's eye as gravity will allow.
On most nights, it is questionable that the opposing pitcher is even aware of such efforts.
They would not have reached this point if they had.
That is a big reason why I
consider pitching to be the most difficult endeavor in mainstream sports.
Not the most grueling. Not
the most athletic. But the most mentally challenging.
I have heard every argument for every sport. I have seen most sports at most levels, have coached midget soccer and
football, Little League and Babe Ruth baseball, middle-school basketball, and high-school hockey.
I make this claim with one
caveat. Lance Armstrong is
mentally tougher than anyone in sports today, or in any other day. I will concede that in practically renaming the Tour de France
after himself, he has performed borderline miracles.
So if we're throwing cycling
into the mix of mainstream, OK, you win.
But if you want to stick with sports that you actually would watch, cycling takes a hike.
Those who argue for the game of golf, and particularly for the art of putting, have a hard sell - thanks to their most accomplished players. The annoyed looks of Tiger Woods when someone fidgets along the fringe while he stands over a putt must be downright comical to those who have attended Eagles games on Sunday and have been left too hoarse to speak to co-workers until Wednesday.
Any fan who ever has clapped ThunderStix, or waved those squiggly foam sticks behind the basket at a Sixers game (do those things have a name?), has probably also mused over golf's quiet-please mentality. Why does a golfer need this any more than a hoops player attempting a game-deciding free throw, a pitcher delivering a 3-2 pitch with the bases loaded in the
bottom of the ninth, or a batter trying to hit it?
You think maybe Scott Norwood makes that field goal in
Augusta?
Picture Woods, lining up his putt on the 18th green of one of golf's so-called majors as John Daly fans wave their squiggly sticks on the fringe.
ThunderStix, anyone?
Turn on your television this morning, or any morning this week, and listen to the silence
in the stands that accompanies every serve at the French Open. Then listen to the participants' labored groans at Roland Garos.
You would think serving a tossed fuzzy ball or swatting it
in return is akin to childbirth.
And those are the men.
Honest.
Listen to those tennis players today as I did yesterday and ask yourself: Ever hear Roger Clemens squeeze out a noise like that as he delivers one in the high 90s?
In an interesting juxtaposition, Roger even followed the French Open in an ESPN matinee against the Cubs yesterday.
Even at age 41, no childbirth grunts from the Rocket.
I don't even hear them at the Babe Ruth level.
You do hear them, and noises that would have neighbors dialing 911, in hockey and football. Thanks to the microphones of NFL Films and the technological advances that allow us to hear the impact when hockey players skate into each other at 20 mph, we know this.
And there is no sport tougher than hockey, with its 82-game schedule of midice collisions and bashes along the boards, not even football. I remember standing next to former Eagle Michael Zordich one time as he watched hockey highlights in the Eagles' locker room.
"Man, those guys get hit every night," he said. It's a near-miracle that these players, especially the ones over 30, can even walk when April rolls around.
But those are impulse sports, emotion sports, when - aside from goaltenders and quarterbacks - a lack of composure
sometimes produces advantageous results. What separates a goaltender from a pitcher is that he is the last line of defense, not the first. What separates a quarterback from a pitcher is that his accuracy does not have to be as precise.
If we've learned nothing else in the tenure of Donovan McNabb, it is that.
Miss a little inside in baseball, and the ball is over the fence. A little outside, and you've walked in the run. Like tennis and golf, the margin of error is small.
Unlike tennis and golf, yahoos and Phanatics are capable of throwing you off your game - and expected to.
Posted on Thu, Jun. 03, 2004
Sam Donnellon | Why pitching is the toughest task in sports
AS KEVIN MILLWOOD coiled to deliver a crucial pitch in a scoreless tie against the Mets the other night, a smiling fan ran across the stands
behind the backstop, herked and jerked his body from side to side, and frantically waved his hands.
What made this even more
absurd is that the fan was in a Phillies shirt, in the Phillies' home park - and, presumably,
a Phillies fan.
As distracted fans followed the flailing of the fan, Millwood -
unaffected and undeterred -
delivered the next pitch over the outside of the plate for a called strike.
You don't get very far as a
baseball pitcher if you can't
handle these things. On even cold nights, the Phillie Phanatic works up a healthy sweat working on the focus of the visiting team's pitcher - pacing up and down the dugout roof, applying hexes with his oversized mitts, rushing to the edge of the dugout roof and sticking his head as far into the corner of the pitcher's eye as gravity will allow.
On most nights, it is questionable that the opposing pitcher is even aware of such efforts.
They would not have reached this point if they had.
That is a big reason why I
consider pitching to be the most difficult endeavor in mainstream sports.
Not the most grueling. Not
the most athletic. But the most mentally challenging.
I have heard every argument for every sport. I have seen most sports at most levels, have coached midget soccer and
football, Little League and Babe Ruth baseball, middle-school basketball, and high-school hockey.
I make this claim with one
caveat. Lance Armstrong is
mentally tougher than anyone in sports today, or in any other day. I will concede that in practically renaming the Tour de France
after himself, he has performed borderline miracles.
So if we're throwing cycling
into the mix of mainstream, OK, you win.
But if you want to stick with sports that you actually would watch, cycling takes a hike.
Those who argue for the game of golf, and particularly for the art of putting, have a hard sell - thanks to their most accomplished players. The annoyed looks of Tiger Woods when someone fidgets along the fringe while he stands over a putt must be downright comical to those who have attended Eagles games on Sunday and have been left too hoarse to speak to co-workers until Wednesday.
Any fan who ever has clapped ThunderStix, or waved those squiggly foam sticks behind the basket at a Sixers game (do those things have a name?), has probably also mused over golf's quiet-please mentality. Why does a golfer need this any more than a hoops player attempting a game-deciding free throw, a pitcher delivering a 3-2 pitch with the bases loaded in the
bottom of the ninth, or a batter trying to hit it?
You think maybe Scott Norwood makes that field goal in
Augusta?
Picture Woods, lining up his putt on the 18th green of one of golf's so-called majors as John Daly fans wave their squiggly sticks on the fringe.
ThunderStix, anyone?
Turn on your television this morning, or any morning this week, and listen to the silence
in the stands that accompanies every serve at the French Open. Then listen to the participants' labored groans at Roland Garos.
You would think serving a tossed fuzzy ball or swatting it
in return is akin to childbirth.
And those are the men.
Honest.
Listen to those tennis players today as I did yesterday and ask yourself: Ever hear Roger Clemens squeeze out a noise like that as he delivers one in the high 90s?
In an interesting juxtaposition, Roger even followed the French Open in an ESPN matinee against the Cubs yesterday.
Even at age 41, no childbirth grunts from the Rocket.
I don't even hear them at the Babe Ruth level.
You do hear them, and noises that would have neighbors dialing 911, in hockey and football. Thanks to the microphones of NFL Films and the technological advances that allow us to hear the impact when hockey players skate into each other at 20 mph, we know this.
And there is no sport tougher than hockey, with its 82-game schedule of midice collisions and bashes along the boards, not even football. I remember standing next to former Eagle Michael Zordich one time as he watched hockey highlights in the Eagles' locker room.
"Man, those guys get hit every night," he said. It's a near-miracle that these players, especially the ones over 30, can even walk when April rolls around.
But those are impulse sports, emotion sports, when - aside from goaltenders and quarterbacks - a lack of composure
sometimes produces advantageous results. What separates a goaltender from a pitcher is that he is the last line of defense, not the first. What separates a quarterback from a pitcher is that his accuracy does not have to be as precise.
If we've learned nothing else in the tenure of Donovan McNabb, it is that.
Miss a little inside in baseball, and the ball is over the fence. A little outside, and you've walked in the run. Like tennis and golf, the margin of error is small.
Unlike tennis and golf, yahoos and Phanatics are capable of throwing you off your game - and expected to.