A Nice Tuesday: A Memoir by Pat Jordan

Author:Pat Jordan [Jordan, Pat]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781504033657
Google: jPeyCwAAQBAJ
Published: 2016-04-19T06:19:18.937000+00:00

ELEVEN

A few days after I talked to Miles Wolfe I got a call from Bob Wirsz, the Waterbury Spirit owner. He was circumspect over the phone. “I’ll pitch you,” he said. “But I don’t want this to be a joke.”

“It’s no joke, Bob. I’ve been throwing five months now. I’m throwing good. I get the ball over, I won’t embarrass you.”

He agreed to let me start a game on July 29. I told him I’d be in New Rochelle, New York, covering a golf tournament in early July.

“I’ll drive up to Waterbury,” I said, “and throw on the side for you and your manager. If I don’t look good, don’t pitch me.”

A few days after Wirsz called, a friend from my college days, John Hennessey, called me. We’d kept in touch only intermittently since I’d moved to Fort Lauderdale in 1983. He told me he was friends with Wirsz. When Wirsz found out that John knew me, he told him, “I hope this Jordan doesn’t make a joke of this.”

“What’d you tell him, John?” I said over the phone.

“What’d I tell him? What do ya think, P.J.? I told him, ‘Bob, trust me. Pat Jordan will never make a fool of himself on the mound.’”

I continued throwing with Brian into June. I was throwing the ball better than ever. I’d cut my fliers down to one in ten fastballs. My fastball was consistently around the plate but still not consistently a strike. But my slider was sharp. I could throw it for a strike almost at will. But now I feared I was deceiving myself. Maybe Mark was right. I needed to pitch to batters to see if I really was a pitcher again. I had recaptured a semblance of my talent, but had I regained that killer instinct I had as a young pitcher who thought he was unhittable? The thought of pitching again in Connecticut had brought back all my old fears. Would I be found lacking? Would I make a fool of myself? I hadn’t worried about these things when I thought I was going to pitch in St. Paul.

I came to the park to throw with Brian one afternoon. He snapped at me, “Take that fucking cigar outta your mouth.” I threw it on the ground. “Now let’s work. You only got a coupla weeks.”

It was an unbearably hot, sunny day. I started to sweat as soon as I began to throw. Within minutes, I was throwing full speed.

“Let’s do a coupla innings,” Brian said.

I worked the first batter to a 3–2 count, then walked him on a slider just low and away. “That was a fucking strike, Brian,” I said.

“Not today it isn’t.”

I was already breathing heavily. I got 2–2 on the next batter and then reared back and threw a fastball. Brian caught it, inside and at the knees to a righthanded batter.

“Fucking ay!” He smiled. “Strike three.”

I smiled. “A good one, Bri?”

“That was the best fastball you’ve ever thrown.”

“Ever?”

“To me, anyway. I’ll bet it was ninety.

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