Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, May 17, 1990 TAG: 9005170016
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOHN SMALLWOOD
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Wakefield, a converted infielder from Melbourne, Fla., basically has one pitch - the knuckleball. It's his in pitch, his out pitch and virtually every pitch in between.
"That's the way I pitch," Wakefield said. "I let the knuckleball do the work for itself. I throw it 90 percent of the time. I don't care if they [hitters] know the knuckleball is coming. The main thing I have to do is establish I can throw it for strikes. When that happens I'm going to be effective."
Even though he lost 3-0 to the Durham Bulls on Monday, Wakefield has been the Bucs' most reliable starter this season.
He is 2-2 in seven starts with a team-low 2.70 ERA. Wakefield has pitched a team-high 46 innings, and the 35 hits he has given up are the fewest by a Salem starter, as are his 18 runs.
"A year ago at this time, I'd never have thought I'd be pitching a knuckleball," said Wakefield, who started his professional career as a first baseman. "It's weird, but now if I can learn to consistently throw the knuckleball that's going to be my ticket to the major leagues."
Control and consistency, Wakefield knows, are the keys to his future.
"It's the same as any other pitcher," he said. "I have to stay away from the big inning. If I can't throw it [the knuckleball] across for strikes, I'm going to have trouble. Walks will kill you. Walks lead to runs."
Wakefield learned that immediately.
He pitched a two-hitter with no walks in 6 innings against Prince William to win his first Carolina League start.
In his next start, Wakefield didn't give up a hit in 4 innings against Kinston. But he walked eight in a 7-3 loss.
"Some nights it's up and down," Wakefield said of his money pitch. "Sometimes, I don't know where it's going. But I've got pretty good command of it."
His stats bear that out.
Even with his wild game in Kinston, Wakefield has walked only 18 and struck out a team-leading 26. He has hit four batters but hasn't thrown a wild pitch.
"This is my first full season as a pitcher," said Wakefield, who was 1-1 last year with Welland, Ontario, of the short-season Class A New York-Penn League. "I'm still learning. It's only going to get better. Sometimes it breaks differently than I thought it would. I want to be able to get it to rise and dip. I working on throwing it at different speeds and trying other grips. This is all an experimental stage.
"I've been trying to get in touch with other knuckleball pitchers, like [Texas'] Charlie Hough and [300-game winner] Phil Neikro, to get more information about this pitch."
Wakefield said he isn't sure how far he is from the big leagues, but the recent success of another converted position player in the Pittsburgh Pirates' organization hasn't escaped him.
"Look at what happened with [Pirates reliever] Scott Ruskin," Wakefield said. "He was [in Salem] last year. You never know how close you really are."
After going 0-for-22 from the left side of the plate, Bucs second baseman Rob Bailey stopped switch-hitting May 2. Since then, Bailey has gotten 13 hits and raised his batting average from .065 to .222. . . . Salem right fielder Chris Estep leads the Carolina League with eight home runs. Estep is followed by Bucs catcher Mandy Romero, with five. . . . At their current pace of 278 strikeouts in 34 games (8.2 per game), Bucs hitters will whiff 1,145 times in the course of the 140-game Carolina League season.
Colorado Springs (Cleveland) outfielder Alan Cockrell hit three home runs and had nine RBI in a 12-2 Pacific Coast League victory over Phoenix on May 14. Cockrell, a former University of Tennessee quarterback who was acquired from PCL rival Portland (Minnesota) in late April, is hitting .451 in 18 games with the Sky Sox. But the homers were his first of the season, and his RBI total jumped from three to 12 against Phoenix. . . . The Albuquerque Dukes (Los Angeles) of the PCL have a team batting average of .316 after 924 at-bats. . . . Bernard Gilkey of Louisville (St. Louis) had three hits in the third inning of the Redbirds' 18-4 American Association victory over Nashville on May 7. Team officials said Gilkey's feat apparently was a minor-league record, but there was no way of verifying it. Four major-league players have had three hits in an inning, the last being Gene Stephens of the Boston Red Sox, who had two singles and a double in the seventh inning of an American League game June 18, 1953.
What would Bull Durham heroes "Crash" Davis and "Nuke" Laloosh think of Capitol Broadcasting President Jim Goodman's plans to move the Durham Bulls out of the city and into a 10,000-seat stadium near Raleigh-Durham International Airport? At a news conference last week, Goodman said he had acquired an option to buy the Bulls and would like to have the Carolina League team playing in a new stadium by 1992. The stadium is to be part of a $25 million sports complex, which would include a soccer stadium and an ice skating rink, to be built on 120 acres near the airport and inside the Durham County line. Last month, Durham residents voted down a proposal that would have funded the building of a new stadium for the Bulls within the city limits.
by CNB