Knuckler

by Tim Wakefield

  Naturally, Duquette was not the only baseball executive interested in Wakefield, particularly at a time when the game was in a state of flux and teams were scrambling. The Baltimore Orioles also expressed interest in Wakefield, the knuckleballer remembered, and Duquette recalled that the Florida Marlins had an eye on him. The Marlins' general manager at the time was Dave Dombrowski, who preceded Duquette as general manager of the Montreal Expos and had also seen Wakefield excel against the Expos as a member of the Pirates in 1992. Duquette knew how Dombrowski thought; if Dombrowski valued Wakefield, Duquette knew that the Marlins would make a push. Duquette believed that in order to acquire Wakefield the Red Sox would need to tap every available resource and make Boston the most appealing of any destination. Because all of the teams interested in Wakefield were likely to offer the pitcher similar financial deals—something close to the major league minimum salary—Duquette believed that other factors would determine where Wakefield landed.

  Duquette had several advantages over Dombrowski and the Marlins as well as the Orioles, a division rival of the Red Sox and an organization in a state of flux. For starters, Duquette had a strong relationship with Bill Moore, the Arizona-based agent who operated almost ex clusively with Wakefield's long-term interests, not the bottom line, in mind. Beyond that, Duquette's right-hand man and chief adviser was a man named Eddie Haas, a longtime baseball evaluator who embodied the cliché of the "crusty old baseball man." During many spring trainings, the white-haired Haas rode next to Duquette in a golf cart as the pair made their way from field to field around the Red Sox minor league complex, the older adviser gnawing on a cigar beneath the brim of a large straw hat. That Haas rarely spoke to anyone and hardly even exchanged pleasantries with anyone other than Duquette only added to the mystery of a man who always seemed shrouded in a puff of smoke.

  The fact that Haas's full name was G. Edwin Haas prompted chuckles among the Red Sox beat reporters, who saw him as the "J. Edgar Hoover" of the Red Sox. (For what it's worth, the G stood for George.) The analogy was loose, at best, but Haas was nonetheless seen as Duquette's director of black ops—which was a colorful way to think of a man who had spent a lifetime in baseball and knew, well, just about everyone. A native of Paducah, Kentucky, Haas was then approaching his 60th birthday and had spent more than 40 years in professional baseball as a player, a coach, a manager, and a scout—a range of responsibilities and experiences that made him one of Duquette's most trustworthy evaluators of talent. Haas had spent many of those years in the organization of the Atlanta Braves, a stint during which he had encountered some of the game's most accomplished and unique talents, ranging from A (Aaron, Hank) to Z (Smith, Zane).

  In Atlanta, too, Haas had learned about the value and whims of the knuckleball through the career of Phil Niekro, a career 318-game winner who thrice won 20 games in a season, twice lost 20 games in a season, and was regarded, quite simply, as perhaps the greatest knuckleball pitcher of all time.

  "Eddie Haas was with the Braves when Niekro was with the Braves, and he extolled the virtues of the knuckleball," Duquette said. "He said the project was worth pursuing. He said, 'If we can stabilize the knuckleball, [Wakefield] could pitch for a long time.' I distinctly remember Eddie saying that [Wakefield] could pitch into his 40s."

  Through conversations with Moore, Duquette learned that Wakefield's confidence had been badly shaken during his time with the Pirates, news that came as no surprise to the Red Sox general manager given the "whirlwind" existence that Jim Leyland had once described. During the six-year period from 1988 to 1994, Wakefield had been drafted as a positional player, nearly released, and converted to a knuckleballer, after which he experienced a dazzling and meteoric ascent to national prominence and then nosedived like a heavily weighted lawn dart. More than anything, Moore wanted stability for his client, something Duquette and Haas moved quickly to provide.

  Through Haas, the Red Sox reached out to both Phil and Joe Niekro, who were then coaching the Colorado Silver Bullets, an all-women's baseball team sponsored by the Coors Brewing Company. As luck would have it, the Silver Bullets trained at City of Palms Park, Florida, the spring training home of the Red Sox. The idea of pairing Wakefield with Niekro was far too sensible on many levels for anyone to overlook.

  Not only could Haas and the Red Sox provide Wakefield with access to one of the greatest knuckleballers of all time, but the Red Sox could do it while offering Wakefield (and the Niekros) nothing more than a five-minute commute from their minor league training facility to their spring training stadium.

  For all parties, the deal was too good to pass up.

  "Bill Moore said to me, '[Wakefield] just needs another opportunity. He's just lost his confidence, and he's lost command of his knuckleball,'" Duquette recalled. "So we put together a program for [Wakefield] that included the Niekros. We brought Phil in, and I hired him as a consultant. Joe came to the first session, too. The knuckleballers are a small fraternity in baseball, and the Niekros are the head of the fraternity."

  Indeed, the Red Sox were pressed for time.

  In more ways than one, Tim Wakefield was about to begin rush week.

  For Wakefield, working with the Niekros—particularly Phil—was an invaluable opportunity that, incredibly, no one had yet afforded him. Wakefield had briefly spoken over the phone with knuckleballers Charlie Hough and Tom Candiotti in recent years, but Niekro was different. Just as Wilbur Wood had seen Hoyt Wilhelm as "the king of the knuckleball," so Wakefield regarded Niekro as "the master" of the pitch. While the Red Sox had also offered him the opportunity to pitch at Triple A rather than Double A—the Orioles offered only the lower level, something Wakefield wanted no part of—the idea of working with Niekro was an obvious lure. Wakefield had completely lost his feel for the pitch during most of his final two years with the Pirates, and the worst part was that he often felt as if there was no one capable of helping him. He felt isolated and abandoned. Accomplished and respected pitching coaches like Ray Miller could not help him. Conventional baseball knowledge and wisdom were often useless in understanding the knuckler, and Wakefield sometimes joked that his association with the pitch made him feel like "a freak." At that stage of his career, what Wakefield needed to know more than anything else was that the knuckleball could indeed work again, that there were others who understood it, and that he was anything but alone.

  In Phil Niekro, Wakefield found a knuckleball Yoda who had ridden the pitch to more than 300 career victories and whose accomplishments would land him, two years later, in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York.

  Quite simply, there was no one better for the job.

  Immediately, Wakefield was captivated. He felt as if he were in the presence of royalty. The gray-haired Niekro had the distinguished look of a college professor, minus the tweed jacket, and he spoke clearly, slowly, definitively. He did not raise his voice. Wakefield found Niekro's manner to be "easygoing," and he would later speak of Niekro as having an "aura" and the reassuring presence of a "Zen master." Niekro was, above all else, calm and controlled, qualities that Wakefield was sorely lacking during a period of his career when everything seemed to be coming apart.

  "I don't remember who said it, but someone told me a knuckleballer had to have the fingers of a safecracker and the mind of a Zen Buddhist," Wakefield said. In fact, this remark came from former ma jor league pitcher Jim Bouton, who adopted the knuckleball late in his career.

  That description perfectly fit Niekro.

  Phil Niekro took one look at Tim Wakefield and instantly knew that the knuckleballer's mind needed as much fixing as his arm, his fingers, or his grip. In fact, Wakefield's mind needed the most help. The young pitcher's career of extremes—great success and colossal failure—made it Niekro's challenge to convince him that there was a happy medium, a middle ground, a place that would make the knuckleball pitcher no more or less vulnerable than anyone else to the whims of a game designed to bring all players as many defeats as victories. Baseball
is a game where success is measured first by playing .500. For certain, Niekro believed that the knuckleball had a mystical nature to it, that the pitch could be thrown with the same mechanics, over and over again, and "never do the same thing twice." But in order for it to work at all, Niekro preached, you had to believe in it, to trust it, to accept the bad with the good and live with the consequences, the way any pitcher would.

  And so, during an introductory session in Fort Myers that included Wakefield, both Niekro brothers, and Duquette, Wakefield began rebuilding his psyche, his career, and, quite simply, his faith.

  For Wakefield, Niekro's logic required an enormous shift in thought, if only because nobody had ever presented the knuckler to him in quite the same light; on the contrary, he had been all but taught that the pitch was unreliable. In that regard, especially, Niekro was different. Wakefield saw a man who had thrown the knuckler for 24 years and pitched in 864 career games, who had amassed 318 victories to go along with 274 losses. He saw a man whose mere ability to take the ball and pitch brought enormous benefits to his team. He saw a man who understood that winning comes from being in the game at all, from having worked for the chance to win or to lose. He saw a man whose career proved that the final outcome is often beyond one's control and who emphasized the simple things over the complex.

  He saw a man, too, who recognized things in the knuckleball that others did not.

  Indeed, where conventional baseball thinkers saw the knuckler as frighteningly unreliable, Niekro saw it as wonderfully unpredictable. Use the uncertainty to your advantage. Where conventional baseball thinkers saw walks and passed balls, Niekro saw abandoned base runners and wild swings. It's the only pitch in baseball where, every time you throw it, it can be an out pitch. Where conventional baseball thinkers saw an unclear role for the knuckleballer, Niekro saw a versatile pitcher who could start games or finish them, an adaptability that would lend itself to a long and fruitful career. If you learn to command this pitch, you can pitch until you're 45.

  From the outset, Niekro could see that Wakefield's mechanics were good and that his knuckler was, in a word, special. Wakefield's implementation of it was something altogether different. During the week they worked together, Wakefield and Niekro traveled to the Red Sox minor league complex, where he pitched simulated games against an assortment of minor league players and hopefuls, participants in the same kind of extended spring program in which Wakefield had been participating when Woody Huyke first saw him throw the knuckler. These kids are just like me. During the sessions, Niekro would stand behind Wakefield, on the field, delivering instructions to a student who was all too eager to follow them. Take a little off this pitch. Wakefield would take a little off the next pitch. Good, now throw this one as hard as you can. Wakefield would throw with everything he had.

  Wakefield learned to pitch with the knuckler the way a conventional pitcher would learn to manage an array of pitches, with one obvious exception: where a conventional pitcher could change from a fastball to a curveball to a changeup, Wakefield had to mix it up by changing speeds and elevations with the knuckleball.

  If Wakefield could do that while keeping his delivery sound and consistent—and the events of 1992 had proven to Niekro, among others, that Wakefield could do that—he could be every bit as effective as a conventional pitcher, Niekro stressed, and no more vulnerable to slumps. After all, short of velocity, wasn't movement something that all baseball evaluators coveted? Wasn't that the objective? Niekro believed that conventional baseball thinkers contradicted themselves in this regard: on the one hand, they wanted movement, but on the other hand, they claimed that the knuckleball moved so much that it created problems. Well, which one was it? What Niekro told Wakefield, in the end, was that he was a pitcher like any other pitcher, and that the knuckleball actually gave him more weaponry than was available to the conventional right-hander or left-hander who took the mound every five days.

  The message was striking.

  They don't understand you.

  But I do.

  Trust me.

  "Before we started working, I told Tim, 'If you have confidence in it, you won't care who's hitting. There are going to be days when it's going to be there for you and days when it's not, but no matter what, the next day, you take your glove and your spikes with you because you can pitch,'" Niekro recalled. "That's the advantage a knuckleball pitcher has. It's in our heads and in our arms. If we pitched nine innings, we were as tired mentally and physically as other pitchers, but we didn't get sore arms. If you can get the pitch over the plate, it'll keep you in the big leagues for a long time—that's for sure.

  "Managers and pitching coaches, they can't help you much with the knuckleball," Niekro said. "You're basically your own coach."

  In Fort Myers, then, the ultimate goal for Phil and Joe Niekro was obvious. In connecting with Wakefield, the knuckleballing brothers sought to repair the pitcher's confidence and rebuild his self-esteem, to rehabilitate him. To convince him that he was not alone. To assure him that being a little different was a strength. To remind him that he belonged in the major leagues, that he had the mind and arm to succeed, that he could handle failure just as well as he could embrace success.

  What they sought, in short, was to make Tim Wakefield his own coach.

  The return to glory came far sooner than anyone expected or could have reasonably imagined. Tim Wakefield spent roughly 10 days in Fort Myers before the Red Sox assigned him to their Triple A affiliate in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, as promised. Wakefield made four starts with the Pawtucket Red Sox, for whom he went 2–1 with a 2.52 ERA in a stretch far more reminiscent of the fall of 1992 than the summer of 1994. Wakefield had pitched a mere 25 innings for the PawSox when the Red Sox quickly summoned him to the major leagues in the midst of what was a deteriorating crisis.

  Following an abbreviated spring training as a result of the work stoppage, the early stages of the 1995 baseball season had the feel of a fire drill. The Red Sox took advantage. The Red Sox rumbled to a 14–5 start over their first 19 games, a stretch that was seen by most critics as the baseball equivalent to Andy Warhol's prescribed 15 minutes of fame. In baseball, almost anyone—or any team—could have a good day, week, or month. Many could have even one good year. But only the good players and teams could repeat the performance time after time, year after year, a reality that tended to weed out the weak and reaffirmed one of Phil Niekro's fundamental beliefs.

  The hard part is to always be in the game.

  By late May, the 1995 Red Sox certainly seemed like a team destined for some counterbalancing. After its eye-opening start, the team lost five of six to the Cleveland Indians and Seattle Mariners, two of the more highly regarded teams in the American League. With Clemens already sidelined, the Sox subsequently lost slugger Jose Canseco as well as pitchers Aaron Sele and Vaughn Eshelman to injury. Because Boston's start had been seen as an aberration—remember that, before the work stoppage that wiped out parts of the 1994 and 1995 seasons, the Red Sox had posted three straight losing seasons—the general feeling throughout New England (and all of baseball) was that the Red Sox were plummeting back to reality. The Red Sox had remaining road series in Anaheim (against the then-California Angels) and Oakland (against the A's) before heading home, and there was some concern that the club would be back playing at C level by the time they returned to Boston.

  Tim Wakefield flew to Seattle to join his new teammates just as Canseco, Sele, and Eshelman were all flying back to Boston to be ex amined by team medical personnel. Their fortunes having passed in the airspace above the continental United States, the Red Sox were in the late stages of a 4–3 loss to the Mariners on May 25 when Tim Wakefield arrived in the visiting clubhouse at the cavernous Kingdome in Seattle. He was not sure what he should say, where he should sit, who he should speak with. The entire situation was foreign and awkward. To that point, Wakefield had spent his entire career in baseball in the Pirates organization, and so there was always that link, that connection,
whenever he arrived at a new level of the minor leagues, even when he arrived in the majors. We're on the same side. But the feeling in Seattle—he felt like a midwesterner who had just stepped off a train in Grand Central Station—was entirely different, and the reality of a new beginning now started to dawn on him.

  Now what?

  In the wake of the loss, the Red Sox clubhouse was relatively quiet. Equipment bags were scattered about the room and stationed before the players' lockers as they prepared for a flight to Anaheim later that day. The routine of such afternoons, which the players referred to as getaway days, was a succession of annoying tasks. In this case, following a night game on Wednesday, the Red Sox had had a Thursday day game that, with a starting time of 12:26 PM, had required an unusually early wake-up call. They had already packed up and checked out of their hotel. After going to the ballpark, they had unpacked, played the game, then returned to the clubhouse to pack up again, all in anticipation of a flight later that night. Then they would arrive at a new hotel in the Anaheim area and unpack again, relieved at the prospect of being able to stay in one place, without packing or unpacking, for at least two days.

  Wakefield, whose day began with an early wake-up call on the East Coast, had spent enough time in the major leagues to know this routine by the time he arrived out west at the Kingdome. He wondered why he had not simply flown to Anaheim and met the team there. He learned the answer when the coaches told him to put on workout clothes and head out to the bullpen, where he would have his inaugural throwing session with his new catcher, Mike Macfarlane. Wakefield felt bad about this. Macfarlane had come into the clubhouse after being behind the plate for the entire loss, and now he was being asked to put his equipment on again to catch Wakefield in the bullpen. Wakefield felt this was a terrible way to meet his new batterymate and, for that matter, his new team.