Posted on 12/21/2006 7:05:19 AM PST by rhema
When you greatly admire a famous person, someone once said, avoid meeting him. Otherwise, prepare yourself for disappointment. Whoever said that never met Sandy Koufax, the great former pitcher for the Los Angeles Dodgers. In the seventh grade, at age 12, I entered a poetry contest held at my Los Angeles junior high school. I wrote about my favorite player:
Koufax is on the mound,
The game has just begun.
He gets a sign from the catcher
And, zoom, strike one.
Not exactly Robert Frost, so I'll spare you the rest of the poem. But after winning, I immediately sent the poem to Sandy Koufax. I never expected to hear back, but he sent me a postcard-sized picture of himself, with his elegant signature.
At an American Friends of the Hebrew University black-tie function honoring the current owners of the Dodgers, the McCourts, I sat at a table in a large ballroom at a Beverly Hills hotel. Vin Scully, the brilliant Los Angeles Dodgers broadcaster, emceed the event. He ran down the list of attendees, among them Sandy Koufax. Sandy Koufax?!
When Koufax arrived in the major leagues in 1955, never having spent one day in the minor leagues, he found it difficult to control his pitches. Some days he threw accurately; other days he threw so erratically that the ball could hit the batter in the head or sail over the backstop. But the Dodgers recognized his brilliance and stuck with him.
Then it clicked.
From 1962 to 1966, the southpaw pitched so brilliantly as to kiss the face of God. The left-hander won the Cy Young Award – baseball's highest pitching honor – in 1963, 1965 and 1966. (In those years, one award was given to baseball's best pitcher, unlike now, when baseball awards a Cy Young to the best pitcher in each of the two leagues.) Koufax recorded the lowest earned run average (ERA – the number of earned runs scored against him per game by the opposition) for an astonishing five consecutive seasons, from 1962 to 1966. He threw 11 shutouts in 1963, amassing 40 during his career. Koufax led the major league in strikeouts four times, including a then-record 382 strikeouts in 1965. His career strikeouts totaled 2,396, and three times he fanned 300 or more batters in a season. In his five final seasons, his win-loss record was an astonishing 111-34. During the 1965 World Series, he refused to pitch on Yom Kippur, demonstrating that the High Holy Days meant more to him than a World Series game.
In those days, pitchers pitched. Modern pitchers now pitch "deep into the game," walking off the mound to hand the ball in the sixth or seventh inning to a "middle reliever," who, in turn, hands the ball off to a "closer." When the Dodgers beat the Minnesota Twins in the 1965 World Series, Koufax pitched games two, five and seven, astounding by modern standards.
Koufax pitched with grace, consistency and excellence. And by all accounts, handled himself the same way off the field. Handsome, almost regal, you simply could not take your eyes off of him as he pitched. He was the first major league pitcher to hurl four no-hit games, including, in 1965, a perfect game – no runs, no hits, no walks, no errors. Twenty-seven batters up, and 27 batters down, a feat pulled off only 17 times in the major leagues since 1880.
The Dodgers played the Baltimore Orioles in the 1966 World Series, defying the odds-makers by losing in four straight. Koufax battled arm problems throughout his career, though in 1966 he went 27-9 with a 1.73 ERA. But by the time of the World Series, Koufax simply ran out of gas.
After the Dodgers' 1966 World Series defeat, I picked up the local newspaper and read the shocking headline – Koufax To Retire. At age 31, the prince walked off the mound, never to return. I cried for two days.
Now, 40 years later, Koufax and I actually occupied the same space in the same hotel ballroom! I asked renowned Hollywood publicist Warren Cowan, seated at my table, "Is there anyway you can find Sandy Koufax, and ask him if I can go over to his table and shake his hand?"
Cowan left for a few minutes, then he came back and tapped my shoulder, "Done." We grabbed a photographer and approached Koufax's table. The Pitcher stood up. I told him the story of my poem, reciting the first stanza. "Mr. Koufax," I said, "you inspired me as a child, through your class, dignity, consistency, excellence and humility. And you inspire me to this day. It is an honor to shake your hand." He smiled and agreed to take a picture with me.
Oh, by the way, former Vice President Al Gore gave the keynote speech. I barely remember a word he said.
Sandy Koufax was the genuine article, a real class act.
I believe it was a severe case of arthritis in his elbow.
Great pics.
July 4th. I have to look at the program to remember the year. It was hot. Albuquerque is always hot in July. The Dodgers had the Albuquerque Dukes as their farm club for years. Lasorda was there...a number of future Dodgers have started there or worked their way through.
Each year there would be fireworks for the 4th of July home game as always. It was the one game we did not miss.
My dad and I walk out on the concourse about 2 hours before the game. The Dukes were taking a little batting practice from none other than....Sandy Koufax.
I had just seen the silver haired gentleman not 3 days earlier in an interview. I told my dad..."There's Koufax pitching." He didn't believe it. I handed my Binocs to him and sure enough, Koufax. One of my idols from Dodgermania.
Batting practice ended and the cage rolled off and Sandy went to stand in the coolness of the dugout on the Home side. No one but my dad and I knew he was there. I took the program I had and went down to that dugout to ask for an autograph. The guard stopped me and asked..."Who's Sandy Koufax?"
After reading off all his stats from memory to the guard, who but the man himself stepped into the sunshine, looked at me and said....."Anyone who knows that much about me, shouldn't need anyones permission to ask me to sign something for him."
He was that kind of kind. I still have that Dukes program, sealed, dated....and I look at it when I want to remember a time when a kindly gentle man showed a young boy what dignity meant.
The most important pitch of the game is the second brushback pitch. That way the batter knows the first one wasn’t a mistake.
Koufax, Yaz, Musial, Kaline, Killebrew, Gibson, Carew.
Those are a few that come to mind from that era, I am sure there are some others and I am sure I missed a few.
Thanks! I have heard that quote as well and I do believe it is very true. Drysdale was one of the most intimidating pitchers, ever.
As did I. Saw Wally Moon hit one out and saw Koufax pulled in the first inning, walked the bases full, two wild pitches. He was not 'on' that day. I was with my Dad, Uncle and cousins. We laughed at how wild he was and my Uncle told us that we would hear of him again and to remember his name.
Not to be too glib about it, but if Mantle can't hit ya, ya can't be hit. If modern medicine, say, arthroscopic surgery, had been available then, who knows what Koufax could have done?
Koufax retired before I was born, so I never got to watch him play. But from his reputation, the closest recent pitcher has to be Greg Maddux. Him, I've seen, and when he's on, he's on. A 63-pitch complete game? That's so good it's rude.
WRONG, WRONG, WRONG. What I love about baseball is that there is no clock. You can be down 22-0 with two out in the ninth, and however unlikely a comeback is, it's never impossible. There is no such thing as "running out the clock" in baseball. If you can't devote 3 hours to a game, skip it and watch the highlights on SportsCenter.
That is what makes baseball a great game, and more importantly, a great American game. As baseball's poet laureate, Yogi Berra, once observed, "it ain't over 'til it's over." Every pitch counts. Every play counts. Every game counts, all 162 of them. It's a never-give-up, never-say-die game, and sticking a clock on it would suck the life out of it. Never, I say.
Yes, I believe the players' association will eventually phase out what's left of pitchers batting (don't forget interleague games).
I never have been a huge baseball fan, but my Father certainly was. I remember he would fall asleep on worknights with the radio on, listening to the ballgame.
I still have my first baseball glove that he gave me in 1962: it's a Phil Rizutto Signature model.
That's a tremendous action photo of the great Koufax at work. I think it's from the first game of the '63 World Series vs. the Yankees (when he struck out 15, a record since broken), but I'm not quite sure.
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