Drysdale and Maglie

[Shotgun Shuba]

In the course of my Dodger research, I have come across the special relationship the Drysdale and Maglie had. When Don came up in 1956 he credits Maglie with teaching him many of the pitching traits he so gloriously and tenaciously showed off later in his career. I can see now where Don learned to plunk batters and dust them. What greater teacher than the 'Barber"? They remained close even through the 60's. I think Sal was the pitching coach for the Pilots when Jim Bouton wrote Ball Four and he was not kind to ol' Sal. While Sal was very important to the Flock in '56, I thought it was weird that one of the great anti-Dodgers was pivotal in the development of a Dodger great.

Photo from Dondrysdale.com

[Sliding Billy]

In the course of my Dodger research, I have come across the special relationship the Drysdale and Maglie had. When Don came up in 1956 he credits Maglie with teaching him many of the pitching traits he so gloriously and tenaciously showed off later in his career. I can see now where Don learned to plunk batters and dust them. What greater teacher than the 'Barber"? They remained close even through the 60's. I think Sal was the pitching coach for the Pilots when Jim Bouton wrote Ball Four and he was not kind to ol' Sal. While Sal was very important to the Flock in '56, I thought it was weird that one of the great anti-Dodgers was pivotal in the development of a Dodger great.

Photo from Dondrysdale.com
That's interesting, especially with the picture of cherubic, clean-cut Donnie. I guess Sal was his dark side or Picture of Dorian Gray.

[Paulmcall]

Most good pitchers acknowledge that you can't let hitters have both sides of the plate.
You pitch them inside and it becomes tough for them to have either side.
You can always be nice off the mound.

[KCGHOST]

I read a book by Sal Maglie when I was twelve and learned two things. First, how to throw a curve ball. Second the best place to throw a curve was for the inside corner. To do this you had to throw it at the batter. If it "hung" their was nothing the batter could do with it.

[jaykay]

I read a book by Sal Maglie when I was twelve and learned two things. First, how to throw a curve ball. Second the best place to throw a curve was for the inside corner. To do this you had to throw it at the batter. If it "hung" their was nothing the batter could do with it.


The standard "book" for any pitcher throwing to any batter is fast balls high and tight, curve balls low and away. There aren't many exceptions, and a great deal has to do with setting up a hitter via a pitch sequence. When a batter hits the dirt - hard and fast - as many facing Maglie and Drysdale (and a great many others) did, it was a fast ball up and in that put him there. With or without this kind of setup, a hitter will instinctively react to a close pitch by backing off or leaning away from it, so that the breaking pitch at the knees on the outside corner becomes extremely effective. For a batter to hang in against the possibility of such a breaking pitch will lead to many hit batters (see Maglie, Drysdale), but also to strikeouts on the outside corner (see Maglie, Drysdale). In other words, those two used the brushback as a preliminary to their "out" pitch; they did not attempt to throw curves for strikes on the inside portion of the plate.
Despite every batter anticipating the foregoing setup and sequence, the ball is very hard, and at 80- 90mph encourages the batter to move/lean away. Major league batters hang in far better than the rest of us (that being one of the main reasons they are in the major leagues), but the inclination to bail nevertheless remains - which is why Maglie, not a hard thrower by any means, could use such an approach effectively.

[The Real McCoy]

Ah, good, another adage exploded: the twain did, indeed, meet when Drysdale and "the Barber" conspired. Early indications were always there, most particularly Don's line concerning proper brushback etiquette: "If you're going to throw at a hitter throw at him twice, that way he'll be sure the first one wasn't a mistake."

Interestingly, jaykay, in his treatise, neglected to mention his own reputation, in elite stickball circles, of never having given up a three sewer shot in his career as a hurler. This was primarily due to most batters' fear of "digging in" against the renowned chucker. It was not fear of being plunked by a Spaldeen that distracted the batters, it was the well known fact that jaykay backed them off the manhole cover with rocks, aimed "high and inside." "Truckstop" (he was strong a truckstop coffee) Tedesco was the only batter I ever heard of who had the courage to crowd the "plate" against jaykay and he only did it once and rocks, this time, were not required for future dissuasion. The event in question happened to occur on a 110 degree day and Tedesco dug in so vigorously, that he became mired in the soft, gooey, freshly tarred street surface. Unfortunately, for "Truckstop", this happened during the mayoralty reign of one Vincent ("I'll get right on it") Impellitteri and Tedesco remained in the middle of the street for two nights. That experience, along with jaykay's penchant for "alley apples", kept even the most fearless stickball batters closer to the curb than to "homeplate" and is the reason jaykay's elucidation on the theory of the brushback should be marked "nota bene" (if only Truckstop had paid attention in first year Latin).

[jaykay]

Wouldn't you know it? For once I try to start the New Year on a serious and analytical note, much against my personal inclinations, and here comes Judge McCoy dredging up his inimitable amalgam of fact and fancy to stir the pot. But who am I to complain? The man was there, in one incarnation or another, a living monument to the legacy of stickball, and one of the toughest two-strike hitters I ever faced. He kept Trucks Tedesco fed and dry for those couple of days until Impelliteri returned from the Bahamas and could be photographed by the Daily News personally turning the crank that lifted Tedesco from the soggy asphalt. (The figure making the impish "V" sign behind the mayor's head in the classic photo is in fact McCoy. The figure doing the same to McCoy is in fact me. You could look it up.)

It was not easy to throw a breaking pitch with a rock instead of a ball, but the basic strategy had been established well before my time; it was, if you'll excuse the expression, carved in granite by then. However, in a tough neighborhood like mine, there was no other way to play the game. Just ask a few of the anything-to-win guys who brought their best players to our block to challenge us: McGraw, Durocher, Stanky (to those of us who knew them well, Silky, Dude and Hank respectively). It was a glorious era - yes, tough on pitchers and even tougher on batters, but it did set the standard for years to come. Ask Maglie. Ask Drysdale. Okay, ask McCoy.

[EbtsFldGuy]

Wouldn't you know it? For once I try to start the New Year on a serious and analytical note, much against my personal inclinations, and here comes Judge McCoy dredging up his inimitable amalgam of fact and fancy to stir the pot. But who am I to complain? The man was there, in one incarnation or another, a living monument to the legacy of stickball, and one of the toughest two-strike hitters I ever faced. He kept Trucks Tedesco fed and dry for those couple of days until Impelliteri returned from the Bahamas and could be photographed by the Daily News personally turning the crank that lifted Tedesco from the soggy asphalt. (The figure making the impish "V" sign behind the mayor's head in the classic photo is in fact McCoy. The figure doing the same to McCoy is in fact me. You could look it up.)

It was not easy to throw a breaking pitch with a rock instead of a ball, but the basic strategy had been established well before my time; it was, if you'll excuse the expression, carved in granite by then. However, in a tough neighborhood like mine, there was no other way to play the game. Just ask a few of the anything-to-win guys who brought their best players to our block to challenge us: McGraw, Durocher, Stanky (to those of us who knew them well, Silky, Dude and Hank respectively). It was a glorious era - yes, tough on pitchers and even tougher on batters, but it did set the standard for years to come. Ask Maglie. Ask Drysdale. Okay, ask McCoy.


The same Trucks Tedesco whose later years graced lane 23 in Freddy Fitzsimmons' bowling emporium?

[The Real McCoy]

I know no "Trucks" Tedesco, I referred to "Truckstop", who, if memory recalls, was barred from Freddy Fitzsimmons' lanes primarily for his unorthodox overhand delivery of the sixteen pound ball.

In the interest of full disclosure, however, I do seem to recall that Truckstop had undergone a name change at the behest of his father, Tugboat. Originally, the lad had been named "Interstate", but around the age of 10 was rechristened "Truckstop." Tugboat went to great lengths to explain the advantages of the change, paramount among them the fact that the new "handle" possessed a great deal of aliteration, to which the newly nomered Truckstop snapped, "Whadda ya talking about, I read OK!".