'WAT TOO SOON'
He was a treasured Pirate before he defined knuckle-ballers
Jim Leyland did what a lot of other people did on Sunday afternoon. He watched the Steelers play a lousy game against the Houston Texans. He probably cursed at his television. He couldn’t have liked the 30-6 final score.
But the outcome didn’t upset Leyland nearly as much as the telephone call he took during the game from his close pal, Gene Lamont, his third-base coach with the Pirates and then his successor as Pirates manager.
“Did you hear about Wakefield?”
Tim Wakefield, who pitched briefly for the Pirates and had a career unlike any other in Pittsburgh sports history, died Sunday from brain cancer. He was just 57 and leaves behind his wife, Stacy, who is fighting pancreatic cancer, and two children.
“Way too soon,” Leyland said of Wakefield’s death. “It was a total shock to me. I had no idea. What a tragedy.”
Pittsburgh has had a lot of amazing sports stars. All-time greats such as Roberto Clemente, Joe Greene, Mario Lemieux and Sidney Crosby. Too many Hall of Famers to mention. But Pittsburgh never had a player that did what Wakefield did. His star didn’t shine for long here, but it was absolutely brilliant and blinding.
“An amazing sports story,” Leyland called it.
“A lot of people have taken credit for him, but it was [longtime Pirates scout] Woody Huyke who deserves the credit. We had tried him in the infield and tried him in the outfield. It wasn’t working. We were going to release him, but Woody talked us out of it. He saw him throwing in the outfield. He liked his arm. He told us to put him on the mound and try him as a pitcher. He thought he could be good.
“So [Wakefield] goes from not being able to make it as an infielder or an outfielder to winning 200 games in the big leagues. An unbelievable story.”
I’ve never seen an athlete take over our city the way Wakefield did in 1992. His knuckleball didn’t just baffle opposing hitters, it enthralled Pirates fans everywhere. They couldn’t get enough of Wakefield Mania.
The Pirates promoted Wakefield from Triple-A Buffalo in July to make his first major league start against the St. Louis Cardinals. He pitched a complete game that night in a 2-0 win. He won his next start against the New York Mets. He kept winning, finishing the season with an 8-1 record and 2.15 earned-run average for a Pirates team that won its third consecutive National League East championship.
“We didn’t know what to expect when we brought him up,” Leyland said. “He shocked the world, including us.”
The best was yet to come. Wakefield pitched complete-game wins in Games 3 and 6 of the National League Championship Series against the Atlanta Braves, allowing just six runs and 14 hits in the two games. It’s no wonder plenty of fans wanted Leyland to start him in Game 7 instead of former Cy Young winner Doug
Drabek. Wakefield would have won the series MVP award if the Pirates hadn’t lost that Game 7 on Sid Bream’s slide into home in the bottom of the ninth in -ning.
“Absolutely he would have won it,” Leyland said. “Deservedly so.”
Leyland couldn’t believe what happened next.
“Knuckleballs,” he said, “they come and they go.” Wakefield’s went.
He went 6-11 with a 5.61 ERA in 1993. The Pirates sent him back to the minors before releasing him in April, 1995. The Boston Red Sox signed him six days later.
“I guess he found it again with them,” Leyland said.
Wakefield went on to win 186 games with Boston before retiring after the 2011 season.
Only Cy Young and Roger Clemens won more games in franchise history.
They still talk about Wakefield’s resiliency in Boston. In Game 7 of the 2003 ALCS against the Yankees, he gave up a series-winning home run to Aaron Boone with his first pitch in the 11th inning. The next season in the ALCS against the Yankees, he recorded the final nine outs in Game 5 to get the extra-innings win. The Red Sox came back to make history by taking that series after losing the first three games.
“Seeing him bounce back like that was really something,” Leyland said.
Wakefield endeared himself to Boston fans as much by what he did away from Fenway Park.
He was an eight-time nominee for the Roberto Clemente award, winning it in 2010.
That award is baseball’s greatest honor because it goes to a player who excels on the field and in his community. It goes to a player who makes a difference.
“He wasn’t just a great pitcher,” Leyland said. “He was a great person. That’s how I’ll remember him, as a great ambassador for the Pirates, the Red Sox and our game.”