Word: pitchs
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Actually, there is one pitch that Marichal prefers not to throw: his best one, the fastball. For one thing, it is too much like work. ("Has major-league fastball," read a plaintive note in the first scouting report the Giants received on Juan's pitching, "but wants to throw curves all the time.") For another, the fastball is essentially a strikeout pitch. Sandy Koufax may get his kicks out of setting strikeout records, but Marichal would rather save his arm. "It takes at least three pitches to strike a man out," he says matter-of-factly. "It only takes...
...Every pitch Marichal throws today was already in his bag of tricks when he reported to San Francisco in July 1960. All but one (his screwball) were part of his repertory before he left the Dominican Republic in March 1958. In short, the Giants have not taught Juan a thing-except how to hide the ball in his glove during his windup. "I first saw Juan at the age of 19. And he looked like a ten-year pro even then," says Carl Hubbell, San Francisco's head scout and once a pretty fair pitcher himself. Giants Owner Horace...
...where baseball really is the national pastime. For as long as he can remember, Marichal has been enthralled by the game, and it still sticks out all over him-in the gleeful way he hogs the batting cage in practice ("Bases loaded, two outs," he chirps, waiting for the pitch. "Base hit! Base hit!" he screams, whenever he connects), in the solicitous way he treats the hordes of youngsters who hound him for his autograph ("I remember how I felt about ballplayers when I was a kid"). Juan's father died when he was three ("Too much rum," explains...
...months later, almost to the day, Juan Marichal stood on the mound in San Francisco's windswept Candlestick Park, took his eight regulation warmup tosses, and prepared to pitch his first game for the "parent club"-against the Philadelphia Phillies. Maybe Juan was prepared; but nobody else was-not for what followed. For the first 61 innings, not a single Phillie reached first base. After 7 innings, Marichal still had not given up a hit. At that point, Philadelphia Catcher Clay Dalrymple singled sharply to leftfield, and the spell was broken-barely. Juan shrugged, retired the next four Phillies...
...fluke, either-as Marichal proved by winning his next two starts, beating the Pittsburgh Pirates 3-1 and the Milwaukee Braves 3-2. By the end of that first, abbreviated big-league season, his record was 6-2. The boy from Laguna Verde obviously knew how to pitch in the big time: now all he had to do was learn how to live there...