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From the Archives
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The Were-Pitcherand Other Tales of Mound MadnessAugust 23, 2000 Yesterday was one of those days that makes you run to the almanac and check to see if it's a full moon. For on August 22nd, 2000, (two cubed, two, two, two, zero zero zero, for you numerologists) some weird stuff happened, despite the moon being waning, three-quarters, and not full. Move over Dick Vitale, it's time for Mound Madness!! The first strange mound appearance of the day was in San Diego, where the Mets were en route to a 16-1 pounding from the Padres. Pat Mahomes, the Mets' "long man", was drafted for an emergency start, but only managed to last four innings and ten runs. You'd think a manager would either let his sacrificial lamb finish the game out, or go straight to the most disposable guy on his roster. Nope: the Mets' manager, Bobby Valentine, uses his best three relievers, Turk Wendell, John Franco, and Armando Benitez, for an inning each. Perhaps he thought a nine-run deficit isn't a lot in this day and age, and he wanted to stay in the game. When the eighth came around, though, and the Mets were still down by nine, he opted to find a sacrificial lamb from his bench to pitch the meaningless eighth. So who does Valentine pull off the mound? Why, none other than his most productive outfielder, Derek Bell. Bell, obviously enjoying himself, manages to get through the inning after another five runs have crossed the plate and he's run a pitch count of 36. Gosh, you think Valentine would've learned a lesson from that fiasco a few years back, when Jose Canseco, the most productive outfielder for Texas and at the time yet a major league star, managed to throw is arm out (torn ligament) in indulging his vanity to pitch in a meaningless game. Ooops...Bobby Valentine was Jose Canseco's manager back then. Never let it be said Bobby Valentine learns from his mistakes. So Derek Bell pitching in a blow-out isn't that weird, just criminally stupid. Things got a little more genuinely weird later in the day, at the Capitol City of Weird, San Francisco. The Giants were losing to the Marlins by a margin of 7-3, and things were indeed not going well for the home nine. AJ Burnett, speaking of weirdos, had pitched a marvelous game, holding the Giants to only two runs and four hits while he was in. Antonio Alfonseca, the closer with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot (again speaking of weird), was warming up pro forma during a somewhat lackadaisical Florida ninth, waiting to be called in. At some point, a strange cry started up during Antonio's warm-up tosses. No, it wasn't cries of "An-ton-i-o" or even an odd "you stink, Alfonseca!" It was an unearthly chanting that went something like this: [Antonio throws a ball to the bullpen catcher] Crowd: w o o o o ooooOOOOOPPPPPPPP!!! [Catcher tosses ball back to Alfonseca] Crowd: WOOOOOOOoooooo o o o o o.... After but a minute or two, pretty much all of Pac Bell Park was focussed on the warm-up mound instead of Doug Henry throwing to Luis Castillo in the actual game, and 30,000 plus were going: w o o o o ooooOOOOOPPPPPPPP!!! and WOOOOOOOoooooo o o o o o.... Alfonseca actually stopped his warm-ups to try to throw the crowd off. It didn't work: he'd try to sneak in a pitch after a minute or so, but the crowd did its weird chant regardless. And, when Antonio came into the game in the bottom of the ninth for the save opportunity, of course the crowd did it during his warm-up tosses, and then for real, in the real game. Was Antonio thrown off by this? Well, he gave up a monster lead-off shot to Ellis Burks. You be the judge. The crowd was too enthusiastic about the homer to keep up the weird chant, so the chanting fell off, and Alfonseca got the rest of the batters for the save. One can only hope that, like tossing opponents' homers back at Wrigley, the crowd has collectively fallen upon a new tradition. Imagine the nightmare of opposing relievers coming into San Francisco, to have to face, on a close sideline bullpen, 40,000 or so weirdos chanting nonsense syllables at you in a sing-song. Move over, The Wave: The Woo-Weird is here. As these things happen in threes, the weirdest was left for last. It was the appearance of the Were-Pitcher in Colorado, in the last game of the evening. Were-Pitcher? You know, like a Werewolf. Half beast, half human. An unnatural being who preys upon the innocent in the middle of the night in a quest for revenge. The contest pitted the home Rockies against the visiting Braves, and like many a Coors field contest, featured the home team blowing a 6-1 lead to have the visitors tie it up and send the game to extra innings. The Rockies managed to use nine pitchers in the nine regulation innings, leaving them with just John Wasdin in the pen to finish out the game. (They eventually used 10 in a game, tying an NL record for most pitchers in the game, and 22 of the 25 men on their roster.) Then things started to get weird indeed. Wasdin plunked Andres Galarraga on a 3-2 pitch with two outs in a tie game. This is the same Andres Galarraga who is a perennial leader in being hit by pitches, and who swoons over the plate the way my dog fixes his face to the supper bowl. Contact is almost inevitable when the pitch slips away inside. So, Galarraga gets it into his head somehow that this is intentional, and he charges the mound. Wasdin does the usual ritual slappy fighting with Andres, the benches clear, sharp words are exchanged along with ineffectual blows. The umps, clearly affected by the same weird-rays that sent Andres out there, throw out Wasdin, who wasn't throwing on purpose, hadn't been warned, and who stood his ground. Go figure. One weird footnote: it sure looked as if none other than John Rocker was trying to play peacemaker in the latter stages of the brawl. The Rockies are out of rested pitchers, so they send out a trouper if ever there was one, Brian Bohannon, to pitch the last out. Bohannon had been rocked in six innings the day before and couldn't have been what you would call fresh. He gamely spent forever warming up, and stood in there. Big Bo pitched to two batters, walking one and then inducing a ground-out, to send the game into sudden death. Now, Buddy Bell has just been tossed out as part of the Wasdin brouhaha. The Rockies, of course, pinch-hit for Bohannon in the bottom of the inning, but without that sharp intellect that's called for in NL managers at the helm, somebody forgets they've got no pitchers left except for tomorrow's starter. [more] |
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[continued] The Rockies fail to score, and who do they send out to pitch the top of the 11th? Why, Brent Mayne, part-time catcher, who'd had the night off. You'd think they'd've used Mayne as the pinch-hitter if they were going to pitch him in the bottom of the inning, but again, it apparently takes a rocket scientist to figure this out. They're down to Andy Melhuse (more later) as their only bench player, and they're pitching Brent Mayne. At this point, it should be noted the Rockies already had an All-American collegian pitcher in the game: none other than Mr. .400, Todd Helton, who was a great closer in college. But they gave the ball to Mayne -- in a tie game! Mayne is no Derek Bell, I can attest. Now, it was the bottom of the order. The first guy Mayne faces is a pinch hitter -- Tom Glavine. Glavine's no slouch with the bat and has been used as a pinch hitter and runner before, of course, but it was a weird sight to see a catcher pitching to a pitcher. All we needed to complete the scene was Neifi Perez going behind the plate to catch, as he did once in 1998 when Jeff Reed got a cut to his head in a collision at home plate requiring thirteen stitches, after Don Baylor had used up his other catcher. Alas, this did not come to pass, as Ben Petrick was still in the game. Mayne throws nothing but fastballs, slow ones, around 80 MPH. But this is enough to get Glavine and Walt Weiss. Rafael Furcal, who's hitless for the night, is up, and you almost think Mayne is out of it. But, Furcal singles, bringing up Andruw Jones. Oh no, I think. This thing is going to bite the Rockies on the heinie. Jones walks, but not before nearly ending the game on a blistering ball down the left field line that just hooks foul. Bad news coming: Chipper Jones, the 1999 MVP, who'd homered in the game off a real pitcher, was at the plate. But Mayne, perhaps surprising Chipper with the batting practice fastball, gets him to check-swing a ball to the infield for the third out. So here come the Rockies, with the chance to get Brent Mayne his first and likely only major league win. Neifi Perez nearly homers, hitting the ball in pretty much the same place as Jones, and then nearly whiffs, but then comes back with a solid single off John Rocker. Todd Helton, with a hitting streak on the line, comes up and hits a single through the right side on a hit and run where the Braves blew the infield coverage, Perez advancing to third. Game practically over, right? No such luck. The outfield comes all the way in, so far in Andruw Jones is about 25 feet behind the second base bag. The next batter, Jeffrey Hammonds, hits a sinking liner that's a hit most days, but Jones is so shallow, it's an easy out. Bobby Cox, not to be outdone by Bell, clearly didn't want to leave anybody on his bench out of the game, actually takes Rocker out of the game at this point and uses his last pitcher. The next batter up, Terry Shumpert, whiffs. Two outs. This is what we lovingly call a "Red Sox Rally" in the making. The Braves walk Jeff Cirillo intentionally, knowing the Rockies have only rookie Andy Melhuse available to hit, a kid activated that day and without a major league hit. Melhuse is notable because he replaced Larry Walker, a genuine Major League Batsman. Walker didn't want to go on the DL, and the Rockies put him there the day before without his permission because they "didn't like the look" of his elbow when he was swinging. More scientific management from Buddy Bell. What's even weirder is, they've already got Mayne in the game, but whoever was taking over for Buddy Bell didn't think his bat was sufficient for the platoon match-up, so they turned to Melhuse to "counter" bringing Stan Belinda into the game. You know, sometimes this platoon thing is taken to ludicrous extremes. So here's the poor kid, bases loaded, two out, the Rockies completely out of pitchers. What does Melhuse do? First pitch he lines the ball to left field, game over, first major league hit. Ladies and Gentleman, Brent Mayne, Winning Pitcher, 1-0, with an ERA of 0.00. Brent Mayne: the Were-Pitcher, who had the last laugh.
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