pitcher, scholar., artist and poet…
Of the thousands of baseball players who have heard the mocking bird sing, only one knew that a bright, joyful, clever mocking bird was singing just to him.
When this began to happen, Dave Baldwin’s baseball career took flight.
I watched Mr. Baldwin work as a major league relief pitcher, know he has a Ph.D in genetics, have read his book “Snake Jazz” and seen his paintings, one of which is titled, “Why the Mocking bird Sings to the Relief Pitcher.”
Mr. Badwin’s life journey has taken him from Yuma, Arizona to Yachats, Oregon. At 77, he’s one sharp dude. He is the only person to publish in the proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington and to pitch for the town’s baseball team.
We used to talk about fruit flies and fly outs when Dave Baldwin was with the Senators. Not once did I see him reading the Sporting News. Dave favored anthropology over analytic baseball studies.
Ted Williams, who managed the 1969 Senators, asked Baldwin to describe what makes a curve ball curve, Baldwin focused on what is called the Magnus force on the spinning baseball – a force that nudges the ball in the same direction as the spin on the pitch’s face.
Williams was speechless.
Pompano Beach, Floirda was still.
Twas’ then everyone knew the Mocking Bird had sung to the relief pitcher.
