Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
March 03, 2008
Facing Creativity

Jason Giambi likes facing creative pitchers and tells a good David Cone story:

Giambi recalled how he socked his first career homer off Cone's fastball in 1995. After that, Cone was stingy with fastballs to Giambi. During one game, Cone threw four straight breaking pitches to walk Giambi and force in a run. "I asked Coney afterwards why he didn't throw me a fastball," Giambi said. "He told me he wasn't giving me a fastball with Tejada on deck."

With the free-swinging Miguel Tejada batting behind Giambi, Cone decided to sacrifice a run and go after Tejada. "Coney threw him three straight high fastballs and struck him out," Giambi said.

At bats like that were probably a reason the Athletics let Tejada walk when he became a free agent. To his credit, Tejada did bring his strikeout rate down after hitting a high of 102 in 2000.

The Baseball Musings pledge drive continues through March. Please consider making a donation.


Posted by David Pinto at 10:48 AM | Players | TrackBack (0)
Comments
Post a comment









Remember personal info?