Word: dwights
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...Davey walked over to where I was sitting in the dugout and just put out his hand. 'Congratulations,' he said. 'You made the team.' 'I did?' " Then Johnson sent him into the game. "Oh, man. Every pitch I threw felt five miles an hour faster than the last." When Dwight hurried to his father afterward with the news, Dan just said, "Do your best...
Johnson and Cashen handpicked the stage for Gooden's first start, the Houston Astrodome--"before they brought the fences in," Dwight points out gratefully. "I couldn't sleep the night before, and I couldn't stand to wait for 5 o'clock to take the team bus. About 2:30 I left the hotel and walked by myself to the stadium, about a mile and a half. Everything was moving in slow motion; I was sweating pretty good." Despite forgetting all he knew about pitching the instant the game began ("It was like I'd never been on a mound...
...games and the Rookie of the Year award. He also lost Youmans again, shipped with a small gang of minor and major leaguers to Montreal, but at least he was compensated this time with the eminent backstop Gary Carter. "We're all just fortunate to be part of Dwight's world," Carter likes to say. Last year this pleasure included eight shutouts and strings of 14 victories, 31 scoreless innings and 49 innings without a run earned. Gooden and the St. Louis Cardinals' ace John Tudor stared each other into stupors, but even Tudor picked himself second...
Gooden does know. His mildly sprained ankle this winter almost panicked Wall Street. "All pitchers hold their breath about arm injuries," he says. "Mostly, people hold their breath around pitchers, especially young fastball pitchers." And yet, says Mets Trainer Steve Garland, "of all the pitchers we have, Dwight's the one I least expect to get hurt." His motion is flexible and his fundamentals flowing; the really heavy work falls to his legs, which are as thick as the rest of him is lithe. "Some pitchers who are overpowering," Tom Seaver says, "you can see the clock is ticking down...
...surprisingly, Feller's view is that two seasons are insufficient for comparison. "People are always wanting to know too soon what I think about a Willie Mays or a Joe Charboneau or a Mark Fidrych or a Dwight Gooden. Gooden seems like a hard worker, and he's off to a fine start. As far as I can tell, he's keeping his ducks in a row." By that, maybe he means Gooden doesn't brag much. "Only in the middle of 1946," Feller thinks back, "did I ever try to strike everybody out. I had a chance...