LOOGYian tour of the Cubs, Braves,
Dodgers, Orioles, Marlins and
White Sox. “You do your job, and
other people get the glory. You’re
there for the team win, not your
own gratification.”
“There’s a trade-off,” says
Wunsch, who held lefthanded
batters to a .181 average and
.314 on-base percentage during his
career. “You set aside some of your
ego, and in return you get to put on
a major league jersey with your last
name on it. You get the plane trips
and the clubhouses, you get the
sounds of the crowd. Why would
you turn your back on that?”
“You’re given this gift,” Ohman
says. “For the rest of your life, you
get the honor of saying, ‘I was a
major league ballplayer.’ ”
The LOOGY reminded us of
our fragility, that we’re all just a
few not-so-good moments from
riding the proverbial bus in the
Pacific Coast League. There are
career-ending injuries, breaking
balls that don’t break at the
most inopportune times. No one
plans for it to happen, it just
does. Postcareer, the LOOGY
remains like us. Not blessed with
the generational wealth of an
ace pitcher, there are LinkedIn
accounts (Wunsch and Myers
each have one), bosses and
schedules. The mortgage doesn’t
pay itself, they say.
When Choate has time, he
sometimes thrills teenagers in
Davis, Calif., by throwing to the
local high school team’s seniors
near the end of the season. One day
a couple of years ago, a lefty started
talking trash before Choate stepped
on the mound. Then in his early
40s, Choate struck out the teenager
on three pitches. “The second one
was a slider, and I totally buckled
him,” Choate says. “Bonds and
Jim Thome had trouble with that.The kid didn’t stand a chance. (^) ¼
for in-game injury and the inning’s
final out—is intended to limit
mid-inning pitching changes late
in games, which have been
increasing in frequency for years
due to expanded bullpens and
growing specialization.
Commissioner Rob Manfred
hopes the rule, which was phased
in during spring training, will
speed up games and keep fans’
attention. While the point is
debatable, one thing is not: The
new rule effectively kills the
lefthanded specialist.
Your game might now end a
few minutes earlier, but there’s
something that will be lost with the
elimination of the most relatable
job in professional sports. “It’s the
end of an era,” Choate says. “There
will never be anyone like us again.”
In many ways, the LOOGY’s
spot on a major league roster was
a microcosm of our own lives.
Of all the men who occupied
a baseball field, the LOOGY’s
imperfections were most obvious,
his limitations most glaring. The
LOOGY was never a hard thrower,
at least by big league standards.
He had a funny delivery. Without
knowing his backstory, it could
safely be assumed that this man
had sacrificed part of himself for
this opportunity. After all, what
Little Leaguer dreams of five
pitches and a shower in Milwaukee?
Underappreciated and
overworked, like all of us, the
LOOGY took the blame when
things went wrong. If he did
his job correctly, it was simply
what was expected. His was the
disappointing baseball card in
the pack, the unsought autograph
among kids at the stadium. The
pre-batter warmup sometimes
lasted longer than the outing itself.
The LOOGY was not good enough
to be a starting pitcher, not talented
enough to be a closer or a setup
man, which made it so striking to
see a person of such limited skill in
a major league environment. The
LOOGY’s reward was simply the
gift of existence.
“We were like the field goal
kicker, but only when the kicker was
called in when the game was on
the line,” says Mike Myers, perhaps
the greatest LOOGY of them all. He
made 883 appearances—throwing
just 541.2 innings!—for nine clubs
over 13 major league seasons and
now works as a special assistant for
the MLB Players Association. “It
was their best against you, every
time, and you couldn’t mess it up.”
“I was the last guy on the roster
in every clubhouse I was in,” says
Ohman, who made a typically
APRI L 2020 17
LEFT OUT
A typically
vagabond
LOOGY, Ohman
hurled for the
Cubs, Braves,
Dodgers,
Orioles, Marlins
and White Sox.