Always a free spirit, Bill "The Spaceman" Lee's baseball career ended unceremoniously at the beginning of the 1982 season. Fed up with management, Lee walked out on the Montreal Expos and then subsequently suffered through some politics and idiocy by the National League's only Canadian team.
Unconcerned by his dismissal, Lee expected to be picked up quickly by another team. It didn't happen.
"(They) said it had nothing to do with my walkout or anything else, we're releasing you because you are not fulfilling your contract and getting people out and I went, 'Bullshit,'" Lee remembers. "I said, "Lefthander, 2.38 ERA the year before, I throw strikes.' I said, 'There's a team out there that will want me,' and (they) said, 'Don't count on it.' I sent letters to all the National League teams and the only reply I got was from Hank Peters, who said, I quote, 'We already got enough problems without you on my club.' So I was definitely, I was blackballed and they kind of proved it, but I never took them to court. I probably could have made a lot of money in collusion. I don't know what the statute of limitations is on that, but I bet it is getting up there. It's all right. I will make it back in my book sales."
While Bill Lee may have exited quickly, his connection with the game and his ability to continue using his quick wit prevails. For those who have read "The Wrong Stuff," Lee's next book, "Baseball Sans Frontier: Baseball Without Borders," should be a blessing to the baseball reading public. Lee will discuss his outlooks on life and the planet earth in his book, but here he discusses some thoughts on baseball.
Lee enjoyed 10 seasons with the Boston Red Sox and three seasons and part of a fourth with the Expos, finishing with 119 career wins. He also started Game 7 of the 1975 World Series, something he questions to this day.
"They jumped (Luis) Tiant ahead of me, they dropped a lot of guys and they jumped Tiant ahead of me. I should have thrown Game 6. I would have done fine and Tiant would have had an extra days rest and we probably would have won the World Series. They think that you've got to win Game 6 before you win Game 7 and I said, 'What am I, chicken feathers?' Darn, I could pitch."
Indeed he could.
"In Texas I used to throw in the 90's. If it got any warmer than that I didn't throw. I threw hard. I was very smooth, I had a nice smooth delivery and when I wanted to get it up there I could get it up there, but I realized that your arm only has so many pitches and I was a pitcher not a thrower. Kids today they throw way too many hardballs, they don't rely on their changeups. If you look at your great pitchers out there they rely on their off-speed stuff to set up their fastball. You just don't rear back and throw all the time. I don't know. They are on drugs or something to throw hard all the time."
Lee did enjoy some excellent seasons with the Red Sox and he helped the Red Sox in a handful of pennant chases. However, Lee, like millions of others, believes that Boston will never win a pennant until something is done about the horrendous curse that was bestowed upon the Red Sox nation over 80 years ago.
"(Take) Pedro. He said there is no such thing as the curse. He said, 'I'll drill the Babe in the butt if I saw him' and the next day his arm fell off. There is definitely a curse our there and they've got to realize that Boston is controlled by witches, warlocks and those Scottish, whatever they are called, things that hang around castles and stuff. They've got to realize that they are also not malevolent, but benevolent, too, and you've just got to honor them and everything else and get everything on your side and then we can alleviate that curse and come back and beat the Yankees. We've all got to pull together as a psychological and spiritual New England entity. Use the Force."
Hokey Star Wars religions aside, Lee was able to win with the Red Sox frequently in his ten seasons, going back and forth from the starting rotation to the bullpen, wherever he was needed.
"I liked starting because you got three days to drink and one day to recover. Relieving you had to pick your spots. You never knew when you were going to get in. I always liked to play. Give me the ball, let me throw every day."
As a lefty who could throw every day, Lee understood the value of the tricks of the pitching trade. Hardly as notorious as others of his day and never caught, Lee may have occasionally thrown illegal pitches.
"You have to know physics. I really liked the roughed up baseball. You know they check them all the time. The ball hits the dirt, the catcher hands it back to the umpire, the umpire throws you a new one. The catcher, a good catcher, will scrape it along the ground after the umpire gives it to him and then throws it back to him so you know what side was roughed up. Whitey Ford used to do it, Perry used to rough up the ball. Everybody used to rough up the ball. If you couldn't make the ball move and you had a mediocre fastball, you weren't going to be a pitcher very long."
Perhaps the legalization of the spitball, shineball and other illegal pitches could be an item of discussion when Lee is selected as the baseball commissioner, replacing the numerically challenged current commissioner Bud Selig.
"As soon as I'm elected commissioner, the DH is a dead item. The American League will start playing real baseball again. Pitchers will be allowed to hit and they won't start knocking people down and a guy like Clemens will turn into a .500 pitcher in a heartbeat.
It could be a brave new world with Lee at the helm. The possibilities seem endless. For now, though, Lee will remain around his secluded home in Vermont, coming up with more ideas for "Baseball Sans Frontier."
"I'm in the process of developing chapters right now. It just gives my opinion on baseball, the state of baseball and the planet earth and it goes from there. It will be out probably next spring and then I will go on the book tour and get fat. I'm starting to eat a lot better. I will be all right."
Despite what the 26 general managers of baseball thought 20 years ago, Bill Lee always was.
» Tommy Szarka is still waiting for Barry Bonds to be intentionally walked 58 times this year. He is also looking forward to his first published book, due out near the end of 2002.
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» A New 3,000 Strikeout Club?: Could Sosa, Thome, or Glaus break Reggie Jackson's career strikeout record?
» More submissions
Copyright © 2002 by Tommy Szarka. Posted June 19, 2002.
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