Posted on 10/02/2023 7:52:53 AM PDT by Red Badger
Tim Wakefield, the knuckleballing workhorse of the Red Sox pitching staff who bounced back after giving up a season-ending home run to the Yankees in the 2003 playoffs to help Boston win its curse-busting World Series title the following year, has died. He was 57.
The Red Sox announced his death in a statement Sunday. Wakefield had brain cancer, according to former teammate Curt Schilling, who disclosed the illness on a podcast last week without Wakefield's consent. The Red Sox confirmed an illness at the time but did not elaborate, saying Wakefield had requested privacy.
"It's one thing to be an outstanding athlete; it's another to be an extraordinary human being. Tim was both," Red Sox chairman Tom Werner said in the team's statement. "I know the world was made better because he was in it."
Said Red Sox manager and ex-teammate Alex Cora on Sunday: "We lost a brother, a teammate, a family member. One of the best teammates I ever had. ... Of all the guys I played with, nobody wore his jersey with more pride than Tim Wakefield."
Our hearts are broken with the loss of Tim Wakefield.
Wake embodied true goodness; a devoted husband, father, and teammate, beloved broadcaster, and the ultimate community leader. He gave so much to the game and all of Red Sox Nation.
Our deepest love and thoughts are with... pic.twitter.com/ah5kV2Yt8j
— Red Sox (@RedSox) October 1, 2023
Great pitcher, very good man.
what is a knuckle-ball, exactly? I never knew
what is the benefit?
Knuckleball is a pitch wothout any spin.
A baseball thrown without spin is very difficult to hit because it will move randomly.
“Wake embodied true goodness; a devoted husband, father, and teammate, beloved broadcaster, and the ultimate community leader.”
He sounds like quite a guy. RIP.
The baseball doesn’t spin and unpredictably moves all over the place. Catchers used to use larger catcher mitts to catch knuckleballers.
Wakefield was about as good as there was when it came to the pitch. He was un-hitable for awhile there.
He was my favorite Red Sox pitcher and , as far as I know, a really nice guy. RIP
Bob Uecker (semi-famous catcher) once said that the easiest way to catch a knuckleball was to wait until it stopped rolling, then go pick it up. 😁
A good knuckleball just kind of flutters up to the plate. No specific movement. Got to be near impossible to hit, I’d think.
All world tight end Russ Francis died in a plane crash. He was 70.
It’s pretty hard to throw a baseball with no spin consistently just playing catch, to do it with major league movement for strikes seems impossible to me. Truly the most ‘feel’ of all pitches. It’s a shame it seems to be nigh extinct, they just don’t have patience in development. There’s a good documentary called ‘knuckleball!” that features Wakefield heavily, I think during the 2012 R.A. Dickey Cy Young season if I recall.
Freegards
Yes, but it is not so much that it is difficult to hit…but it is very difficult to hit squarely. It is a pitch where you get lots of partial contact, which is to say weak contact, because while you can hit it, because of its random movement you jet get a small piece of it, you don’t square it up (unless you just get lucky or the conditions are such that the movement is diminished - then it’s like hitting a slow pitch softball)). And even when you square it up, all the strength and force is provided by you and none by the velocity of the pitch.
When Wakefield had control of his knuckleball it was almost impossible to hit. Then he would mix in his fast ball, which was only in the eighties. I remember watching one of the Yankees/Sox series and no one could hit his throws. If they did make contact it was typically an easy ground out. As a Sox fan it was great watching the Yankees great hitters going down one after the other.
He also seemed like a great guy off the field. He never said anything stupid. He was very well liked in Sox Nation.
One thing you can say about pitchers that throw the knuckleball…they’re not likely to ever need TJ. And that’s something these days.
Yes. Very true.
My high school teammate threw a wicked knuckleball. It was nearly impossible to hit. He said it isn’t a pitch he could throw all the time because of the grip and amount of effort required to throw it correctly and accurately.
Very few pitchers could/can get the hang of it and if they try without perfecting the pitch, its batting practice for hitters.
If a good K’baller has a decent fast ball to put in the mix, it raises hell with the batters.
The ball does things that defy imagination. Even to go up to hit against one will screw up a batters mind.
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