Moneyball - Michael Lewis [77]
Two innings later, in the bottom of the sixth, David Justice leads off the inning again, and this time draws a walk from Wells. Minutes later he crosses the plate, the score is 5–4 and the bases are loaded with two outs. The A’s leadoff hitter, Jeremy Giambi, steps into the box. The one talent every fan and manager in the game associated with a leadoff hitter was the talent Jeremy Giambi most obviously lacked. “I’m the only manager in baseball,” A’s manager Art Howe complained, “who has to pinch-run for his leadoff man.” Sticking the ice wagon in the leadoff slot had been another quixotic front office ploy. What Jeremy did have was a truly phenomenal ability to wear pitchers out, and get himself on base. In the first regard he was actually his brother’s superior. He draws a walk from Mike Stanton and ties the game at 5–5.
Inside the video room, for the first time, we can hear the crowd. Fifty-five thousand fans are beside themselves. The pleasure of rooting for Goliath is that you can expect to win. The pleasure of rooting for David is that, while you don’t know what to expect, you stand at least a chance of being inspired.
In the top of the seventh, the A’s reliever Mike Magnante provides no relief. He gives up a double to Bernie Williams. Derek Jeter walks to the plate, Jason Giambi steps into the on-deck circle, and Art Howe brings in Jim Mecir. Mecir doesn’t trot, he hobbles out of the A’s bullpen. He really doesn’t look like a professional ballplayer—which is to say, I am beginning to understand, he looks like he belongs on the Oakland A’s. The Oakland A’s are baseball’s answer to the Island of Misfit Toys.
“What’s wrong with him?” I ask.
“He’s got a clubfoot,” says Paul.
I think he’s joking but he’s not. Mecir was born with two clubfeet. As a child he’d had operations to correct them but he still walked with a limp. Somehow he had turned his deformity into an advantage. His strange delivery—he wasn’t able to push off the mound with his right foot—put an unusually violent spin on his screwball. The pitch had proven to be ruthlessly effective against left-handed hitters.
Mecir walks Jeter. Giambi steps in. Mecir immediately attacks the hole in Giambi’s swing, the waist-high inside pitch. Screwball after screwball dives over the inside part of the plate. The first is a ball but the second is a strike and Giambi doesn’t even think of swinging at either one of them. The count is 1–1. The third pitch, Giambi takes for a ball. The odds shift dangerously toward him. Mecir defies them: another called strike on the inside corner. His fifth pitch should have been his last. It’s a thing of beauty; Giambi flinches as it passes him on the inside corner of the plate. Strike three. A cheer erupts in the video room.
The umpire calls it a ball.
It’s a terrible call, in a critical situation, bad enough to crack even Paul. “I’m sick of the fucking Yankees getting every call!” he shouts, then, looking for something to swat, settles on the wall. He leaves the video room. Even he doesn’t want to watch what happens next: you can’t give Jason Giambi four strikes and expect to live to tell about it. Giambi fouls off the next pitch and then drives the seventh pitch he sees into right field for a double, scoring two runs.
The A’s fail to score again. A few minutes after he’s done his impersonation of his boss, Paul returns to watch his team lose, wearing a mask of reason. After all, it was just one game. Nothing had happened to dissuade him that his original prediction for the A’s season (ninety-five wins and a play-off spot) was wrong. Ninety-five wins meant sixty-seven losses; this was just one of those. Or so he says.
As he does, Scott Hatteberg appears in the video room. He’s the third and final defective part assembled by the A’s front office to replace Jason Giambi. He wants to see his videotape.
Hatteberg had spent the first six years of his career as a catcher with the Boston Red Sox. He’d become a free agent at the end of the 2001 season and the Red Sox had no interest in signing