After I parked him three straight pitches, the tall kid started to get frustrated. Coach Conde stepped in and reminded both of us that this was batting practice. He changed the focus to situational hitting, which forced me to try to hit the ball to different locations and even to bunt.
When the kid began to tire, the other pitcher was brought in. He was much older; I would guess that he was in his late twenties or early thirties. He had command of all the pitches, a crafty veteran who set you up with his varied pitches and locations. There were times he had me tied up in knots, trying to guess what he would throw next. What he didn’t have was a commanding fastball.
Then he broke out a pitch I had never faced before: the knuckleball. I honestly didn’t think he knew where it was going. I watched a baseball move in ways I didn’t know were possible. You throw the knuckleball with minimal spin. The lack of spin causes the air to push on the seams of the ball, the effect of which is an erratic, unpredictable flight path. It was almost like the ball was dancing as it approached the plate.
The reason most pitchers don’t throw the knuckleball is that you really can’t control the pitch. That became evident when a couple of them hit me. He apologized, but I asked him to keep throwing them. As a hitter, the knuckleball forced me to focus. Eye-hand coordination is what separates the average from the better hitters. In baseball, the difference isn’t that much; just a few extra hits could cause your batting average to jump.
I knew that when I tried out for the Under-18 team, everyone there would be top notch. Someone had told me there were 760 high schools in my state alone. If you figured there was an average of fifteen baseball players for each school, then that was over eleven thousand kids. You had to be in the top four or five in a state our size to be invited. I would have to shine to separate myself from the other 107 participants who were already the best-of-the-best.
What I found was that when I focused hard enough, I began to drop into the zone. That was what I called the state of awareness where everything but hitting faded into the background. I did something similar when I played football. My mind would block out everything off the field, and I became hyperaware of my immediate surroundings. When that happened, my performance became much better. I discovered that I quit thinking about what I should do at the plate.
After all, as Yogi Berra purportedly said, you can’t think and hit at the same time. When I was in LA, I was given the foundation I needed for hitting. Since then, my focus was on the proper technique. That meant good base, hands back, track the ball’s release point, level swing, and the other millions of details you needed to have happen to hit the ball.
Batting against a veteran pitcher throwing knuckleballs helped me fall into the zone. It was just me and the pitcher, and I just hit; I didn’t need to think about how. I’d done this enough that the muscle memory was there. It was like throwing a football; after you did it like a bazillion times, you just did it. It was the moment I became a hitter. With the switch flipped, I saw the ball, and my body reacted.
For the next twenty minutes, it was like I couldn’t miss. The crafty veteran threw everything he had at me, and I hit it with authority.
Once we were finally done, you couldn’t wipe the smile off my face. I paid both pitchers the equivalent of $30 each, which made their day. Coach Conde had told them they’d earn $10. I also gave Coach Conde $40. He was much cheaper than Bo Harrington had been. Of course, they wanted to know when I would do this again. I had less than a month until I would be at the tryouts. Coach Conde assured me he could find more pitchers for me to practice with.
During practice, I played center field and rotated with their regular starter. He didn’t seem happy, but Coach Conde told him to settle down. After we were done, Cassidy ran me through sixty minutes of hell. The Cuban baseball players thought I was nuts.
◊◊◊
After baseball, my security team and I went to the dojo. We were in the middle of working on our forms when one of their instructors came over to introduce himself. His name was Carlos, and he had an interesting offer.
“I’ve watched you practice and have noticed that you use a rather conventional approach. I was wondering if you would like to learn some effective ways to protect yourself?” he asked.
“You teach here?” Fritz asked.
“Yes. I was also in the Cuban army and taught hand-to-hand combat. Over the years, I’ve learned a thing or two and thought you might be interested in some backstreet wisdom.”
We agreed, and Carlos began our lesson.
“What is the most powerful strike you can do?” he asked me.
I thought about it for a minute.
“Probably a side kick. My legs are stronger than my arms and can generate a lot more force.”
“Good answer. Show me,” he said.
They had an oversized heavy bag. It touched the ground, which made it harder to move. I found my range, set my base, and then kicked the bag as hard as I could. I was able to move the bag with a strong kick.
Carlos walked up to the bag and swung his arm as if he were throwing a hook, but hit it with his forearm. I watched in amazement as the bag moved more than my kick had achieved.
“How’d you do that?” Cassidy asked as she suddenly paid close attention.
“You can get more force using your torso and hitting the bag with your bone. I believe you can do more damage with a ‘bone strike’ than you can most other ways. Feel your forearm. In the middle, it’s soft with muscle, but on the outsides, it’s hard. You can feel the bone.
“It’s the same with a ‘palm strike.’ You can knock the air out of someone easily, but if you tilt your hand back and strike with the heel of your palm and wrist, it’s bone. You can do some serious damage,” he explained.
I felt my palm and recognized I’d been using the meaty part of my palm when I hit someone. I moved my fingers down just a little, and he was right, I could feel the bone.
“Here’s a tip,” Carlos said. “If you’re in a fight with just one person, go ahead and use your fists and pound his jaw. The trick is to keep your fist tight at all times. Most people tighten their hand right before they hit someone. See this bump,” Carlos said as he showed a bump on the back of his hand.
“I learned that lesson the hard way. My opponent lunged forward as I threw a punch, and because my fist was loose, I ended up breaking a bone in my hand.”
He was right. I usually had my hands loose before I threw a punch.
“What if you’re in a fight with multiple people?” I asked.
“Then use the palm or bone strike. If there are multiple attackers, odds are that you will need to grapple with them, and you don’t want to take time to clench your fists,” Carlos explained.
“It sounds like you used to mix it up,” Fritz said.
“I’ve been in a bar fight or three in my time,” Carlos admitted.
“How would you go about it?” Fritz asked.
He pulled Paul onto the mat.
“Typically, they will get in your face. You want to be in a defensive stance so you can protect yourself without being obvious,” Carlos explained.
He showed us how he would cross his left arm across his chest. He held his right arm so that his elbow was against his side, and his hand was up around his chin as if he were thinking.
“With my arms like this, I can bring up my left to fend off a punch or use my right to push them back if they get too close.” Then Carlos demonstrated with Paul before he continued. “Because they are going to want to get in your face, you strike first by head-butting their nose with your forehead. It will stun them and give you a chance to jump them and pound them.
“If they try to head-butt you, tuck your chin and let their nose hit your forehead. You end up with the same result,” Carlos taught.