Great Moments in Baseball History by Matt Christopher

Author:Matt Christopher [CHRISTOPHER, MATT]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780316093873
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Published: 2009-12-19T00:00:00+00:00

AUGUST 10, 1989

DAVE DRAVECKY

Back in “the Zone”

Late in the 1987 season, San Francisco Giants pitcher Dave Dravecky was undressing after a game. As he pulled his uniform shirt off, he felt for the small lump on his upper left arm. It was still there.

Dravecky had noticed the lump a few days before. Pitchers always worry about their arms and usually notice the least little difference or twinge of pain. Now Dravecky called out to Mark Letendre, the Giants’ trainer.

“Hey, Mark, take a look at this little lump.”

Letendre dropped the towels he was carrying and walked over to Dravecky. He rolled up the sleeve on Dravecky’s undershirt and felt the small bump with his fingers. He looked up at Dravecky, shrugged, and said, “Don’t worry about it.”

Dravecky decided to take that advice, because in the late summer and fall of 1987, everything was just about perfect. Dave Dravecky was in “the zone.”

When Dravecky was in what he called the zone, he threw every pitch exactly where he wanted it to go. That was important, because he didn’t throw the ball fast enough to get it by a hitter. He was a finesse pitcher. To win, he had to throw the ball exactly where the hitter least expected it to be.

When Dravecky was in the zone, he didn’t notice the fans in the stands or the bright blue sky above Candlestick Park. He didn’t care who was at bat or what the score was. All he saw was the catcher’s mitt. He hardly even paid attention to the signs. The catcher would put out his glove, Dravecky would wind up, and zip! The ball was in the mitt.

The Giants won the National League Western Division, and in the play-offs Dravecky had pitched the best baseball of his career. He pitched twice, beating the St. Louis Cardinals 5–0 while giving up only two hits. Although he lost a heartbreaker, 1–0, when one of his teammates made an error, and the Giants eventually lost to the Cardinals, Dravecky was extremely happy with his performance.

Everything was almost perfect.

But almost perfect wasn’t enough. The lump in Dravecky’s arm didn’t go away.

In the off-season, Dave thought about the lump again and decided to have it looked at. His doctor ordered an MRI, which is like an X ray but shows soft tissue as well and is much more detailed. During the MRI, Dravecky had to lie perfectly still in a long tube for more than an hour while the machine took a “picture” of the inside of his arm.

After looking at the MRI, the doctors told Dravecky not to worry. They thought the lump was just scar tissue from an old injury. But they told him to have it checked again in six months just to make sure.

When spring training began a few months later, Dravecky picked up right where he had left off in the play-offs, pitching well during the exhibition season. A few days before the beginning of the season, Giants manager Roger Craig, a former pitcher himself, walked up to Dravecky.

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