Yeah, No More Throwing
Yeah, No More Throwing
David Williamson
I stared my dad down. A strikeout would win me the game.
I dug my left foot into the dirt, like real pitchers did before taking the mound. I wanted to land in the same spot with each pitch. Consistency was key.
I took a baseball in my right hand and threw as hard as I could. A fastball, right down the middle. A risky, usually fatal location. My dad swung and missed. Just a split second late. Strike one.
Next, I threw a changeup on the inside corner. My dad, with his swing timed to the fastball, swung way too early. He barely nicked the ball, popped it up into the orange tree behind him. Strike two.
Finally, I threw my famous sinker. It starts high and then descends into the dirt milliseconds before it reaches the strike zone. The one pitch I could throw that my dad couldn’t. His right arm, thirty-five years older than mine, could curve left, right, even up, but it couldn’t drop down, hard and fast.
My dad flailed at the ball and missed it by a mile. Strike three, you’re out.
And I could barely feel my right arm.
~
“Yeah, no more throwing,” my physical therapist said, a hint of a smile.
It was the summer after my freshman year. Until then, I had been unequivocally right-handed.
Everything, from my right hand up to my neck, was in constant pain. I was missing a small section of bone in my arm. I had a benign tumor in my wrist. My shoulder blade was twisted forward. My hand was always numb. The right side of my neck was always stiff.
I did whatever I could to limit the pain. I stopped sleeping on my right side. The video games and drum solos that calmed my nerves in middle school became treats on days when the pain briefly subsided. I visited orthopedists, chiropractors, cardiologists, neurologists, and multiple physical therapists.
“Why?” I asked, lifting the dark blue, five-pound weight above my head. I was two years into physical therapy before I finally asked. “Why am I like this?”
“Poor posture,” he said.
He explained that an unconscious process had made me the way I was. The pain (maybe from the tumor, or the missing bone, or my general lack of muscle mass) had been building for years. To compensate, I twisted my wrist, tensed my neck, anything to put strain on different muscles so the tortured ones could take a break. By compensating, though, I just put strain on different muscles, different nerves. I twisted further, tensed harder. More pain. More bad habits.
My body was telling me that I wasn’t meant to be right-handed. So, when I was told yeah, no more throwing, I picked up a baseball with my left hand.
~
We built a field in our backyard. The pitcher stood on a small blue carpet discarded from our bathroom. The hitter twenty feet away in front of a lawn chair. A square plastic box sat on the lawn chair—our strike zone.
When someone hit the ball, the pitcher had to run to catch it. If the ball hit the fence on a fly, it was called a triple. Hitting the fence on a bounce was a double. Anything else was a single, unless the pitcher caught the ball before it stopped rolling. The rules changed in the winter and summer, depending on the thickness of the bushes and vines that hugged the fence.
The balls we used were all plastic, neon green. Picking out the right bat was trickier. Plastic bats were too heavy. They hit the ball over the fence, into the neighbor’s yard. One of the neighbors always threw the balls back for us, before he died. Another neighbor did too, before he moved. The other neighbor’s dog destroyed the balls, spat them out into the mud. A foam bat was light enough. That would work.
But the bats, vines, fences, and roofs didn’t matter much if I couldn’t throw a strike.
I picked up the bright green ball in my left hand. My dad stared back, curious but skeptical. I transferred the ball to my right hand, and threw a fake pitch, in slow motion, so I wouldn’t hurt my arm. I did this a few more times, until my right hand began to tingle. I transferred the ball to my left hand again. Again, in slow motion, I threw a fake pitch. Left and right, they are both really the same, just mirror images, I thought.
“Ready!” I said, and threw.
The ball went two feet, then hit the dirt.
~
Around the time I threw my first left-handed pitch, an ambidextrous pitcher made his way to my Giants’ crosstown rivals, the Oakland A’s. I scoured his Wikipedia article and learned all I could about his days in college and the minors, his callup to the majors, how he managed to turn his left arm into something useful. Maybe I had some hope.
I learned Pat Venditte was born right-handed. His dad, a relatively unsuccessful college baseball player, decided that Pat should learn to throw with both arms to give him an edge in athletic competitions. Pat practiced as much as he could for years, and soon his left arm was almost as good as his right. As Pat progressed through Little League and high school, it quickly became apparent that his father was an intelligent man.
Right-handed pitchers usually dominate right-handed batters. Left-handed pitchers dominate left-handed batters. Pat Venditte, then, always dominated. Even batters that switched from left to right had no good choice. Left-handed scissors, right-handed scissors, it didn’t matter to Pat Venditte. He always chose rock.
Spectators often thought Pat was a set of twins, one left-handed and one right-handed, because he would sometimes use only one arm each day. Pat’s college pitching coach thought he was a circus act and wouldn’t let him pitch with both hands until his sophomore year. MLB teams thought otherwise.
Pat rose through the minor leagues. When one arm was injured, he pitched with the other. When one arm was “in a funk,” his other arm was able to focus and get the job done. One day in 2014 he struck out five batters in a row – three with his left arm, and two with his right. He was too good, and too weird, to be jailed in the minor leagues.
In 2015, Pat became the first major league pitcher to pitch with both arms in the same game. Major League Baseball had to invent a new rule for him. Pitchers must declare which hand they are going to pitch with before an at-bat starts. Of course, every other pitcher declares which hand they will pitch with years before they take the field. If you’re left-handed, you pitch with your left. Right-handed, right. It’s that simple. Pat was the only one who could surprise you.
When Pat was called up to the Major Leagues by the Oakland Athletics, the media went crazy. Everyone, even the fans on the east coast (where it was past midnight) had their eyes glued to their televisions. My eyes were glued to the TV.
Pat did not disappoint. For four consecutive days, he didn’t give up a single run. From the right side, he threw with a violent downward motion, blowing hitters away with fastballs and curves that seemed to defy gravity and fall two feet at the last second. From the left, he threw sidearm, the ball spun and sailed unpredictably. Hitters from both sides flailed at his pitches and looked completely silly. It seemed that nothing would be able to stop Pat Venditte, the enigma, the man who revolted against nature.
After those four days, Pat strained his right shoulder throwing a pitch. The façade was broken. His left arm, now exposed, crumbled.
Pat Venditte had his flashes, but never found consistent success.
~
My first ever left-handed pitch went two feet.
I threw another ball; my arm was too far behind my left shoulder when I threw. It sailed onto the roof. Another ball, I released too late, the ball hit the dirt. Another, I dropped my shoulder and slung the ball like a frisbee, the ball hit the orange tree. Another, my dad jumped to avoid being hit. Another, the dirt. Another, the tree. Another, my dad’s shoulder. Another, I forgot to let go of the ball.
Frustrated, I grabbed the last ball in my right hand, snapped off what was supposed to be one of my famous sinkers. The ball flew over my dad’s head. It never sank. My right arm screamed, my left arm snored. Neither had any idea how to throw a strike.
I wasn’t right-handed anymore. And I sure wasn’t left-handed. My dad rested the bat on his shoulder in a kind of bored pity.
“Yeah, no more throwing,” was a prophecy, not an order. I would never be able to throw again.
~
Handedness. The whole concept is both uplifting and crushing. I was born with a decision made. Half of my body will never be in tune with my mind.
My right half. I reach out, and this half grabs a pen, writes the stories I want to share with the world. I fall, this half catches the bedpost and pulls me back up. I’m named section leader in the orchestra drum section, this half brings my xylophone arrangement to life, the audience cheers. This is my half.
The left half. When my right hand screams in pain, this half does what it wants. My left hand writes in an alien script on days when my right hand can’t write at all. In sixth grade, I fell, this half broke, shards shattered across the tennis court. This half aims, fires, misses, slams in the sides of the xylophone keys, a pained, hollow sound. I am no longer named section leader.
One of these halves abandoned me. The other was never with me to begin with. And I had to decide which half to trust.
~
I closed my eyes, imagined myself in the bottom of the ninth inning, World Series, Game 7. Winner takes all. The crowd screams my name, left-handed closer for the San Francisco Giants, comes in to shut down the potent Yankees’ offense. Maybe the big stage would help me focus. Maybe the big stage would wake my left half.
No, my left half yawned and went back to sleep. Three pitches in the strike zone the whole inning. The bad guys won. Five walks by the southpaw who looks like a second grader trying to throw a brick.
Maybe I needed a role model. Tim Lincecum. A twenty-seven-year-old San Francisco Giant. With his tiny body and long greasy black hair, he was often mistaken for a teenager. One of the best, and most unorthodox, in the game. His pitching windup has been described as a hard metal coil, jammed end to end, then released. His spine looked like it would snap with each pitch. He was right-handed, but you might think he was a left-handed teenager who trusted his right hand enough to hurl it as hard as he could at his opponent.
My dad stood in the batter’s box, the same look of bored pity on his face. I strode forward as far as I could with my right foot. I bent my left hand back as far as I could, until it almost touched the ground. I twisted my hips, lifted my hand high over my head, dropped my head to my right knee, and thrust my arm forward. It may have looked as if my spine were about to snap. The ball exploded out of my hand, sizzled through the air, and shattered a plastic corner off the edge of the strike zone. My dad flailed at the lightning bolt, wide-eyed. Strike one.
Seconds later I did it again, everything identical. Strike two. All I needed was raw courage and an anger that comes from knowing I was to blame for the state of my body. My right half was gone. In my other half, I found a power that had been hibernating within me my entire life.
Yeah, right. Three walks and a homerun later, I was lying in the dirt, both arms telling me yeah, no more throwing.
~
Many cultures believe that left-handedness is a sign of the devil. Friends have told me that they are naturally left-handed, but their family or teachers forced them to write with their right hand. One of my closest friends has a thick red callous on her right ring finger, a sign of her body fighting back. My teachers always told me I had the oddest pencil grip –I placed all the strain on my right middle finger instead of the index finger. Maybe one of them should have ripped the pencil out my right hand and then slipped it into my left, when the other kids weren’t looking. You’ll thank me one day, my teacher would say with a knowing smile.
I have always wanted to be left-handed. I’ve looked upon left-handers with admiration, even jealousy. How exciting it would be to have the whole world a mirror. How exciting it would be at war with the devil. How exciting it would be to pick up a little green baseball, throw as hard as I could, and watch the lowly right-hander suffer.
But the two halves weren’t the same. The personalities, the philosophies, the ailments were all different. My right half wanted more speed, more power, more glory. My left half couldn’t care less. Sure, do whatever you want with me, it said. Throw as many baseballs as you want. Do some one-armed pushups if you want, I don’t care. Wake me up when you’re done. I needed to meet my left half halfway.
I reared back, gently, barely even putting my weight on my left foot. I wasn’t going to let myself get off balance. I threw slowly, methodically, forcing myself to relax whenever I felt tension in my left arm. Sleep, I said, go ahead and sleep. Lull the batter to sleep. Fight fire with fire, fight fog with fog. My left hand was always the steady one, the gentler touch. Sleep.
Poof. The ball poofed out of my hand, flew up into the sky, and tapped the back window of my house with a light kiss. Poof. Another found a little nest in our orange tree. Poof. Another rolled towards the strike zone, only to be stopped by a patch of grass.
Poof. Right down the middle, and my dad hit it a mile.
~
Ambidexterity. A word that means being able to use the left and right hands equally well. Of course, there’s more subtlety to it. Everyone is a little ambidextrous. I hold the bowl with my left hand, stir with my right. My grandma writes her signature with her left hand, but her right hand took the lead in softball. Sure, one half will always dominate. But the other will have its days.
But there is a sense of mastery that comes from being truly ambidextrous. The choice at the beginning of our lives is mandatory and outside ourselves. Most choose right, the easy choice, the safe choice. Some choose left, the creative, risky choice. Some say, well screw this. I choose both.
~
I placed a camcorder in the backyard, against our back window. I recorded myself pitching, right-handed and left-handed. Right-handed, I looked fine. Nothing too odd, if you ignore the fact I was a lanky teenager with greasy hair down to his shoulders.
Left-handed, I looked like some sort of baby bird learning how to fly. I planted my front leg way too early, as if trying to get some extra lift to leap from the nest. My right arm flailed, feathers flying as this wing tried to take control. I twisted my upper body way too much, flapping side to side instead of up and down. My head dropped down, and luckily, I didn’t find myself in the dirt again, frail wings cracked.
The errors I made were not predictable. Sometimes I released too early or late, too high or low, stride too long or short. I tried fixing the mistakes one at a time, but it just made the other mistakes more prominent. My left half now yelled at me to shut up, to stop the racket, so it could sleep in peace.
The only way I was going to pitch well was to simplify everything. I needed as little movement as possible. Pick up the ball and throw. Nothing fancy, nothing exciting. Don’t maximize strength or speed, minimize chance for error.
I faced the plate, so I wouldn’t need to rotate my body. I strode directly forward. I never looked away from the strike zone—my eyes, body, everything needed to go forward. My arm started high, then went straight forward. No left, no right, no up, no down. Just forward.
Strike.
Again, strike. Again, ball, just a little bit too low. Again, strike. Again, just a little bit high. I could work with this.
Later, with my dad in the box, I alternated between left and right-handed pitching. I actually performed better left-handed than right-handed. The next day, the opposite. A week later, I lost it all again. A week later, I dominated from both sides. When my right arm flared up, I pitched only with my left to give the right side a break. When my left arm went to sleep, my right arm was well rested enough to complete the game.
My right half realized its counterpart was young, observant, filled with a sleepy cockiness. My left half realized its counterpart was strong, energetic, and driven by flamboyant intensity.
Bottom of the ninth. Tie game. Next person to score wins. My dad stared back with intense eyes.
A lazy left-handed curve, an aggressive and early swing. A right-handed fireball, so close to his head that he swung out of self-preservation. One strike away from victory.
A left-handed fastball, right down the middle, smacked into the neighbor’s yard. Home run.
But hope was not lost.
My dad hit the ball into the yard with the dog. We’d never see the ball again. We had a special rule to prevent us from losing balls to the yard with the hungry dog.
Hitting the ball into the dog yard is as good as a swing and a miss.
Strike three, you’re out.
David Williamson is a mathematician by day, writer by night. His short stories have been featured in The First Line, Bellingham Review, and 50-Word Stories. He grew up in the SF bay area during the Giants championship years of 2010-2014, and has kept his scorebook and journal close at hand ever since.
Jason David Córdova lives in Puerto Rico as an illustrator and painter. Some of his art can be seen on Instagram at @jasoni72. You can visit his shop on Red Bubble.
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