Free Knuckler by Tim Wakefield Page B

Watertown, Wakefield's first career hit as a professional was a home run in a game during which he went 3-for-4, a performance that might have launched the career of one of the game's great hitters had it not been for the simple fact that, in Wakefield's words, "it was all downhill from there." Wakefield had trouble adjusting to the wooden bats—years later he would playfully explain his difficulties by telling people that he was "allergic to wood"—but the problem caused him quite a bit of consternation at the time. And living in New York felt much different to him than living near the campuses of BCC or Florida Tech. Compared with his transitions in college—to BCC and then to Florida Tech—Wakefield saw the start of his career as something far more real, more permanent, more intimidating.
    This is my job now.
    He remembered feeling alone when his parents drove him to Bradenton for extended spring—"They basically just dropped me off and left—and I don't mean that negatively," he said—and he felt even more isolated after being assigned to Watertown.
    Nobody here knows me.
    He was earning a mere $700 per month. Along with a pair of teammates whom he had just met, Wakefield rented a room in the house of an elderly woman for $50 a week. He rode a bike to and from the stadium. He remembered his parents being "horrified" at these arrangements when they first came to visit him, though Wakefield was too young and too inexperienced to know any better.
    All in all, the start of Wakefield's professional career was hardly what he had envisioned, particularly when reality further intruded.
    Shortly after arriving at Watertown, Wakefield learned of the death of his grandfather, Lester Wakefield, with whom he had shared an extremely close relationship. His grandfather had been battling can
cer, and Wakefield remembered being "devastated" by his death. He always had been able to confide in his grandfather, to speak to him, to share things with him. Hall was among those who described Lester Wakefield as "Tim's best friend," and with his death, Wakefield spent a good deal of his first official camp dwelling on what he had lost instead of the opportunity he had gained. He found it impossible to focus on baseball.
    "It was really the first time I had to deal with something like that," Wakefield said of Lester's death. "He was somebody who came to all my games, and he took me fishing all the time. It was my first time away from home. I don't remember if it was my mom or my dad who called me with the news, but I flew to Virginia and met up with an aunt and uncle, who drove me home. Those two or three days were a complete fog. I was depressed. Having to leave early and go back to work was very difficult."
    Along with baseball and fishing, Lester Wakefield shared something else with his grandson: music. Lester enjoyed playing the guitar, and he had spent some time trying to teach the skill to Tim before he died. The lessons never were completed. When Wakefield inherited the guitars his grandfather left behind, he committed himself to completing the teaching that his grandfather could not. And he did indeed teach himself to play the guitar, a skill he would never lose. Wakefield took a certain amount of gratification in that accomplishment, a sense of fulfillment from having applied some of the lessons his grandfather taught him, and not just with the guitar.
    You have more talent than you think you do. You can adjust. You can still succeed.
    Just the same, Wakefield's return to Watertown was a struggle: it was immediately evident that he would ultimately fail as a hitter, that the level of competition had exceeded his talent. In 54 games at Watertown, Wakefield went 30-for-159—a .189 average—with just nine extra-base hits. Pitchers overpowered him. He could not make good contact consistently. Even in Class A, pitchers threw much harder than they did in college, and the crispness of their breaking pitches did