Sixty Feet, Six Inches

by Bob Gibson

  You find that when you throw a little harder you tend to throw a little higher, and if you don’t throw with that same intensity in the bullpen, you’ll be out of sync in a game situation. And the fact is, you don’t throw with the same intensity in the bullpen. You just don’t. There are no consequences if you miss in the bullpen—just a gee whiz and a shake of the head. If you miss in a game, the party might be over. There’s a tremendous difference, just like there’s a tremendous difference between shooting a fifteen-foot jump shot alone in the gym and shooting that same shot with Dennis Rodman in your face in a close game with the clock running down and twenty thousand people screaming and waving things.

  You need both. You need the practice to get the repetition, and to get your mechanics mastered to the point that they come naturally; and you need the game experience. There’s no substitute for either.

  Bob Gibson

  I’m still waiting for a manager to put me in at third base. I took a lot of ground balls over there on the days after I pitched.

  But the time wasn’t wasted. Even in the major leagues, I believed that you had to throw a lot to keep your arm strong. The more you run, the longer you can run, and the same goes for throwing. That’s how you develop your durability: throwing.

  Most pitchers schedule a bullpen session midway between their starts, and that’s fine, but my arm—my whole body—was always sore on the second day after a ballgame. For some reason, I was never sore the next day. So I’d go to third base and field at least fifty ground balls, probably more, and get them across to first with something on them. The following day, I’d hurt so bad that I couldn’t do anything but sit around and agitate people. The day or two after that, I’d shag in the outfield and toss balls in from there, or take more grounders at third. When I was young I threw bullpens, but later on I was more concerned with saving my body—more so my knees than my arm—and stopped doing that.

  At one point, fairly early in my career, there was a nun who took films of me when I was having trouble in the late innings. The films showed that my location was wavering because I was tired. So I started running stadium steps. But I didn’t do that any longer than I had to. Later, it got to the point where I didn’t like to run at all. We had artificial grass in St. Louis, with concrete a few inches beneath, and it was hard on the legs—and especially hard on my legs. My problem was a combination of age and injuries. I had three operations on my knee. Toward the end, I had no cartilage left in that knee, so things were just rubbing together in a way that compelled me to cross running off my to-do list.

  That was why I liked third base. I could build up a sweat and get the kinks out of my arm and exercise my legs without putting miles on them. That was what worked for me. Nothing else I tried ever lasted.

  Once, I polished my car in the morning and threw a one-hitter that night, so I thought I was onto something. I thought it loosened up my arm. But I did the same thing the next time and got lit up. So much for rituals.

  Reggie Jackson

  I was more a creature of habit—not just in my workout, but in the whole preparation before a ballgame. It’s different for an everyday player. We’re not on five-day timetables. It’s the same agenda, game after game. There’s a routine that you develop without even realizing it. Something works, or feels right, and you don’t want deviation.

  For example, I liked to wear two pairs of sanitary socks, and I wanted them new. I wanted two towels on my locker when I got in. I’d have a lucky T-shirt that I’d stay with for a long time if my luck held up. And that was about it.

  My superstition, if you want to call it that—actually, I wouldn’t, because I had a reason for it—was wearing a long-sleeved shirt under my uniform. In Oakland, especially, I had trouble with hamstring pulls and muscle tightness, so I learned to wear long underwear in cold weather to stay warm. But I also wore it in hot weather to stay cool. Got that from Dick Allen, who recommended it. Brother, when Dick Allen gave advice, I took it. We’d play back east in the humidity and a hundred degrees, and I’d be sticking to my long underwear.

  Bob Gibson

  I did the same thing. I always wore a long-sleeved wool shirt. Always. The breeze would blow a little bit on there and cool you off. Even now, when I go down to spring training with the Cardinals, I always have a jacket on underneath my uniform. I don’t care how hot it is.

  Reggie Jackson

  There was something reassuring about getting ready a certain way every time. I liked putting my uni on. I liked getting taped up. I liked getting my hat and my glasses and my sweatbands on. I liked my number forty-four. I liked it all.

  Bob Gibson

  Hmm. I never thought much about it. I’d just put the stuff on and go get ’em, then take it off and go home.

  Reggie Jackson

  Pitchers have different considerations than everyday players, and different routines. For that matter, married players have different routines than single players, drinkers have different routines than nondrinkers, old players have different routines than young players.

  Every day, I got up between nine and ten in the morning and made it a point to go to breakfast. I was single and didn’t cook, so I always went out to a local diner. I’d get something else to eat around two o’clock—a lot of greens and rice—so I could head to the ballpark at three; games started at eight or eight-oh-five in my era.

  When I got to the ballpark I’d read the paper, put my underwear on, walk around, put my shirt on, walk around, grab some cookies, have some milk, shoot the bull with the other guys, walk around, maybe talk to somebody from the media, put my pants on … I didn’t get rubdowns or sit in the whirlpool until I was close to forty, but I just needed the time to be in the clubhouse. Some players—Bobby Grich was one—like to pull in at quarter to five if batting practice is at five. I couldn’t do that. I needed to get into my routine and get ready.

  Then, when it was over, I’d have a beer. If it was New York, I’d ride downtown, go to McMullen’s for swordfish, relax, maybe drive through Central Park, listen to music. I didn’t drink. I’d spend some time with a special lady and by twelve-thirty or one o’clock I was heading to the hay. I’d wind down by watching television, then be up again the next morning at nine or ten.

  I only stayed out all night one time. That was in New York when I played for Oakland.

  Bob Gibson

  It’s tough to stay out all night if you don’t drink.

  Reggie Jackson

  It’s tough to stay out all night unless you run around with somebody who stays out all night. I didn’t do that.

  Bob Gibson

  I didn’t raise much ruckus on the nights before I pitched. But I didn’t try to get any extra sleep, either. I always got up early, and it wasn’t because I kept myself on a strict schedule. I just didn’t sleep long.

  After I got up and had some breakfast, I might shop a little bit—mainly just look in windows. I’d have lunch about two o’clock, but didn’t pay much attention to what I ate. I didn’t know what a carbohydrate was; didn’t know any of that stuff. I ate everything but fish. I didn’t have fish at all until I was out of baseball. It was just my custom. As a black kid, I grew up eating a lot of pork and beef, a lot of beans and rice. We didn’t have a regimen. I eat more greens now than I did then. But I always drank a lot of milk, and still do.

  On the days I pitched, I didn’t have to be at the ballpark at three—that was the way it was for everybody—so I’d get there about four-thirty or five. After batting practice, I’d wander into the training room, lie on the table, and get a rubdown. They’d massage my arm, try to loosen it up and stretch it, and I’d fall asleep. Sound asleep. The trainer used to put a towel over me because I snored so loud.

  Reggie Jackson

  For me, the off-season was a big part of the routine. I’d take it easy for about a month, a month and a half, then around December I’d get back at it, running and lifting weights. I was younger than the guys I hung out with in spring training—Billy Will
iams, Willie McCovey, Fergie Jenkins, and Ernie Banks—and they always told me that when you get to be thirty, things are going to be different; you need to pay attention to your conditioning. I trusted what those guys said, so I started working out more intensely when I turned thirty. There were winters when I did twelve hundred sit-ups every other day.

  Bob Gibson

  Exercise is a way of life for these guys now. They wouldn’t know what to do if they weren’t exercising.

  Reggie Jackson

  It was a way of life for me, and it still is. I can’t run like I used to, but I lift weights six or seven times a week. Not heavy ones, though. I’ve got a bad back from being rear-ended in 2005 by a Ford Expedition doing a hundred. Flipped my car three times and destroyed it.

  Bob Gibson

  Rather than lift, I played basketball in the off-season until the Cardinals got wind of it and said they didn’t want me to. If I were active today, I still wouldn’t work out with weights—not in view of the fact that I accomplished what I accomplished.

  Reggie Jackson

  It’s amazing to me that so many players are getting injured today in spite of all the conditioning they do.

  Bob Gibson

  I’m not sure that’s a coincidence. I wish I knew whether all the weight training they do today was helpful or harmful. It seems to me that it’s like stretching a rubber band. It’ll hold at a certain point, but pretty soon it’s going to get loose and lax. My instinct tells me that all the muscle building is contributing to players breaking down, because their bodies aren’t getting the rest they need.

  The body needs to recuperate. I don’t think you need to work out year-round to be a good and well-prepared ballplayer. You play ball most of the year and when you’re not playing you’re exercising? I don’t get that. If you listen to the exercise gurus, yeah, they’ll tell you that you need to do this or that, and they’ll keep you on an elaborate conditioning program. Naturally. They make their living by having people do that stuff. Meanwhile, the players today look good in their uniforms, but they’re on the disabled list all the time.

  I believe in downtime, and what I did worked really well for me. Of course, all I have is theories. Judging by the money they’re making, I suppose that what these guys are doing now is working out all right for them.

  Reggie Jackson

  There’s something to be said for taking a break. No doubt about that.

  Over the winter I’d relax by working on my cars. I’d do Christmas shopping for my family. I’d read the Bible. Socialize. Have a nice time.

  But I liked to be ready for spring training. I didn’t go there to get in shape; I wanted to be in shape when I arrived.

  Bob Gibson

  I looked at that a little differently. To me, spring training itself was the time for getting ready. That’s when you need to put your work in.

  I did a lot of running in the spring to get my legs in shape, but mostly I was concerned about finding my rhythm and sharpening my hand-eye coordination. One year, after I was retired and helping out the Cardinals, they brought in this guy named Mack Newton to lead them in exercises. He’s a martial arts expert and a conditioning authority who has done a lot for the Dallas Cowboys and Oakland A’s and I don’t know who-all, and he had the players performing these rigorous calisthenics. A lot of the guys were complaining that they were sore. So one day, when they were talking about this in a meeting, Tony La Russa asked me what I thought of those exercises. I’m sure it wasn’t what he wanted to hear, but I told him that those things were pretty good, I guess, if you were a professional exerciser.

  Obviously a ballplayer has to be in shape, but for my money, that’s a matter of playing ball. It would drive me crazy when the regulars didn’t want to be in the lineup for the exhibition games. I understand that everyday players are out there a lot more than pitchers, but they’re probably only seeing ten or twelve pitches a ballgame. You need more than three or four days a week of that. I wanted them ready when the season started.

  That said, there are things that spring training just can’t prepare you for. A pitcher can go seven innings in the spring and feel no effects, and then after your first start in the regular season you hurt from your toes to your teeth. I might pitch a whole exhibition game without a breaking ball. I’m just trying to get control of my fastball, throw it over for a strike even if I have to let up a little bit. In spring training, you hold back. If the batter whacks one, you go, oh well, that’s something to work on.

  In the regular season I never, ever thought like that.

  CHAPTER THREE

  STUFF

  Reggie Jackson

  They say velocity doesn’t matter that much. That’s bull.

  They say that no amount of velocity is enough if you can’t put the ball where you want it. Maybe so. But at the same time, there’s no safe place to put a pitch that doesn’t have anything on it.

  Bob Gibson

  There are very few guys who can consistently hit that ninety-five-mile-an-hour fastball that’s up above the belt. Hank Aaron could. Aaron was a little different. A guy like McCovey swung with a big, long, sweeping arc, and maybe a little uppercut. Aaron swung down on the ball. He’d get backspin on it and hit line drives that would start off close to the ground and just keep going unless the fence got in the way.

  But for the most part, when you throw that hard you’re not afraid to throw it high. I actually preferred it.

  Reggie Jackson

  That’s why velocity matters. A high fastball at ninety-five miles an hour is really more than you care to deal with. It takes everything you’ve got to hit it; and sometimes that’s not enough. But if the ball’s coming in at eighty-six miles an hour, even ninety, that’s not a pitch that the hitter has to commit himself to in advance. At least I didn’t.

  Here’s the thing. When a guy throws the ball ninety-five and above, you’ve got to be looking fastball and timing the fastball. If you don’t look fastball, the ball is in on you right now. Or if it’s up high in the zone, it’s by you. Out of 120 pitches, eighty of them are going to be fastballs, so you’d better get on the fastball. At ninety-five miles an hour, sometimes the fastball is by you even if you are looking for it. You just can’t get there. You’re thinking, “Damn, how am I going to hit that?” And then Gibson or Randy Johnson goes to the other side of the plate and you’ve got a very long day.

  Speed on the ball—if there’s enough of it—can reduce your hitting options to one, basically. When a pitcher has a lot of velocity going for him, you can’t try to time the slider. You’ve got to look for number one. You’ve got to set yourself for “dead-red,” buddy, and hit it to the opposite field. With Gibson or Seaver, you just have to fight the slider.

  Now, say a guy throws the ball ninety or ninety-one. If that’s the case, I can look slider speed and I’ve got everything covered. I’m not saying that a guy like that can never get a fastball by you. That’s not true. Even an ancient finesse pitcher like Jamie Moyer can sneak a fastball past you if he’s got you off balance and thinking too much. But he won’t throw it up in the strike zone unless he has you looking for a bunch of slop. He’s going to be very judicious with his fastball.

  The point is, if a pitcher doesn’t have overpowering hard stuff you don’t have to build your whole at-bat around that. Against that guy, if I’m geared for slider speed, to hit it to dead center field, I’m still good for the fastball and off-speed pitches. I want to be behind the fastball, but even at ninety-one I can keep it in left center (which to me, as a left-handed hitter, is the opposite field). I can keep the curveball and changeup fair even though I’m a little out in front of them. You can do that if you’re looking slider speed.

  Bob Gibson

  And if we screw up on that slider, he can hit it out of the park to right field. But we’re talking about the slider that accompanies a ninety-or ninety-one-mile-an-hour fastball. If the fastball’s ninety-five, he’s got to be looking for that.

  A hitter can�
�t set himself for two things at once if one of them comes in at ninety-five. Anything other than the fastball, he just has to react to it. A big-time power pitcher knows he has that advantage, and another one to boot: He knows he can get a good fastball past a good hitter who’s looking for it. Just don’t try to do it too often.

  Reggie Jackson

  If a guy’s coming with the same thing all the time, no matter how hard he throws, I like those odds. If I’m looking for something and I get it, chances are I’m going to touch it.

  Now, sure, you can look for it and foul it off or maybe swing and miss if a pitcher’s throwing ninety-six and he hits a good spot. When a guy like Goose Gossage comes on in the ninth inning with a one-run lead and he’s throwing to somebody like me or McCovey, somebody who can hurt him, we’re going to get all of him, right now. He’s going to empty the tank, and we know it. We’re ready for it, and we might not square it anyway. We might just foul it off, and then foul another one off. Remember, he’s got a hundred miles an hour in that gun of his. And then he breaks one on the outside corner. Forget it.

  But it’s probably good, for his sake, that he went with something different at that point.