He wasn’t always right, but my father was a smart fellow. He used words in conversation with me as a kid that I had to secretly look up later in his dictionary to understand what it was he meant.
That’s probably why I still remember having the answer once, when he wondered aloud on a thing.
I was seven or eight years old and we were watching a televised baseball game. During an intentional walk by the pitcher, Ray J. questioned the need to throw the pitches. Why not just send the batter down to first and forget the four consecutive pitches that no one could possibly touch with the bat?
“Maybe,” I said, “sometimes the throw goes wild.”
It’s a really clear memory for me: my tentative response, worried while he thought over my idea that some things taken for granted don’t always work out as planned.
He considered the possibility for a moment, and gave a young kid a great deal of satisfaction.
“I guess you’re right,” he admitted, and that was enough for me.
It’s taken most of forty years to back me up, but on Wednesday, LA Angels pitcher Kevin Jepsen was trying to deliver a toss for an intentional walk and sent the pitch clear to the back screen.
It was exactly the scenario I had envisioned when my father wondered aloud: there was a man on third base at the time.
Alexei Ramirez was able to score easily, and the White Sox wound up winning the game 6-4, with the Angels choking up a three-run eighth inning lead.
“I threw it about 10 feet too high,” Jepsen said. “Just sailed it. Sometimes on an intentional walk, you can take it too easy.”
In other words – the things we take for granted, don’t always work out like they should – which was exactly what I was trying to tell my dad, oh – so many years ago.
He would have known the answer anyway, had he given it a moment’s thought. Like I said, he was one smart fellow.