Page 18 - Way Out to the Old Ballgame

El Brujo del Beisbol

a terrible hangover, I reported to the stadium for a day game against
the best team in the league, the Cangrejos. I had a light workout
before batting practice and went back to the clubhouse to put on my
uniform. And there it was in my bag, the little doll. So I put it up on
the top shelf of my locker and went out to warm up with the bullpen
coach. I felt pretty good, and I could tell my fastball had a lot of pop,
but I had no idea I was going to go out there and totally shut down
the Cangrejos, throw a complete game, allow only two baserunners
and strike out the side four times!”
“Well, I didn’t know what to think. Maybe it was all that booze,
and I had finally relaxed and let my training take over. The game got
a lot of attention in the local press, and I’m sure the manager
reported back to the States that his regimen had worked on me.
When it was time to clean out my locker and head for the airport, I
found that little doll again. Most of us ballplayers are superstitious,
you know. If we’re on a streak we won’t change anything we’ve been
doing, figuring it might sour our luck. Some guys wear the same
underwear for weeks—pretty gross, eh? Or won’t shave. Or have to
eat the same thing every day. I decided to keep that bean bag, at least
to remind me of that last great game I’d pitched down in San Trueno.
My sister had enough damned dolls.”
“Well, the Juggernauts invited me to spring training, mainly on the
strength of that last game down south, and the rest, as they say, is
history. I was like Bob Gibson or Sandy Koufax at their peak: totally
dominating. Zeroes went up on the board for the opposition every
time I pitched. And that little doll stayed with me. It was my lucky
charm, I was convinced. The regular season started and it was already
clear that I was the ace on the pitching staff. We went with a four-
man rotation, so I had about forty starts in that spring and summer. I
finished 32-3 with twenty-two shutouts, three hundred and sixteen
strikeouts, and an earned-run average of 0.87. Oddly enough, we
were never rained out when I pitched, even though it sometimes
poured the day before or the day after. And I left the other teams
high and dry. My fastball had more movement on it than most guys’
curves, and I went through three catchers that year—they couldn’t

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