[ScottinVA]

That knuckler of his confounded batters for a generation. RIP, Phil Niekro.

[Vigilanteman]

Niekro and Hoyt Wilhelm were two of my hero stars when I was a pup. I even learned how to throw sort of a knuckleball when I was a kid.

Back then, they taught kids to throw accurately before they taught them to throw hard. I was quite accurate but gave up a lot of homeruns as a result.

When I tried to throw hard, I lost control. So I learned a sort of knuckleball just to confuse batters once in awhile.

With a lot of practice, I graduated from bad to merely mediocre. But I also got the strikeout rate way up and the homeruns allowed rate way down. Even a juvenile version of a knuckleball isn't easy to learn to throw.