Who doesn’t love Randy Johnson after Game 6 and Game 7 of the 2001 World Series?
In this Boston Globe story on Pedro and Schilling’s reactions to Randy Johnson’s perfect game, Pedro’s quote is quite interesting:
I was a young buck with good stuff who threw over [the plate]. Mine was thrown. His was pitched.
A clear distinction between ’throwing’ and ‘pitching’ then. Clearly, the pitching mind of Pedro knows at some point in the past he could get by on pure heat. (Of course, Pedro’s being modest. He didn’t know how to pitch back in 1997? As if.) Part of the reason I’m somewhat obsessed about this Pedro-becoming-Maddux idea is that I’m intrigued by the ongoing tale of a man who could once rely purely on fury and now, faced with intimations of mortality (or at least of physical limitations), has to mix in craft… an old tale, old as Prince Hal become King Henry…