Baseball has long been a sport of superstitions, rituals and quirky habits; the things players resort to when they want to ensure that things go their way. It runs so deep many players claim they would rather be lucky than good.
The next time you are watching a Major League Baseball game, watch closely at the rituals that most players display during their at-bat, or while stationed at their position. Did you ever notice how Craig Biggio used to always grab his batting helmet on the forehead with his right hand? There was so much pine tar caked there that over time you could hardly see the Houston Astros emblem. Another former Astro, Steve Finley was also notorious for his quirky ways. One of the most noticeable of these habits was that he would step out of the batter’s box and tug on and re-strap both batting gloves- after every pitch. He did it the same way his entire career.
Many players will cultivate the dirt in the batter’s box after almost every pitch. They do the same thing in the in-field, constantly swiping the dirt back and forth with their cleats. Or have you ever notice how a pitcher or position player will skip over the white chalked foul line as he makes his way back to the dugout after an inning? There is a method to their madness – they don’t want to upset the baseball gods.
It’s actually funny how players will go to great lengths to find any advantage to succeed in a game. A great example of this comes from Fred Caviglia, a Kansas City minor league pitcher, who explained why he ate certain foods before each game: “Everything you do is important to winning. I never forget what I eat the day of a game or what I wear. If I pitch well and win, I’ll do it all exactly the same the next day I pitch. You’d be crazy not to. You just can’t ever tell what’s going to make the difference between winning and losing.” After each pitch, ex-major leaguer Lou Skeins used to reach into his back pocket and touch a crucifix, straighten his cap and then clutch his genitals. Then there was Sam “toothpick” Jones who hit and pitched with a tiny piece of wood in his mouth from 1951 to 1964. In ’59 he won 21 games and led the league with a 2.83 ERA, all while he would chew on the stick and flick it in and out of his mouth with his tongue. Whenever his team needed some hits or outs, he’d change toothpicks for luck.
Why is baseball such a superstitious sport? Why is it taboo to talk about a no-hitter in progress? Maybe there is a ‘’bad luck” fairy that that makes an unwelcomed visit every time someone breaks one of the ‘unwritten’ rules of baseball.
I have witnessed these curses many times and if you’ve been around baseball long enough you will too. I’ve seen a little league coach who put up the equipment with a 10-0 lead with two out in the bottom of the last inning – and lost. The first year I coached All-Stars, we were smoked and out of the double elimination tournament after just two games. I had noticed that the kids seemed in awe of the new uniforms, so to change my mojo, the next year we wore our uniforms to the last practice before our first game so that the moms would have to wash them so that we weren’t wearing ‘new’ uniforms. It worked! We were the first team in Waller County all-star history to ever beat a Washington County team. At the time, I wasn’t thinking of that ‘bad luck’ fairy; I was just trying to find the key to making the kids comfortable enough to compete to the best of their ability. I wasn’t doing anything any different than any other competitive coach would do. Trust me when I say this - coaches will wear pink panties if they think it will give them a competitive edge or help ensure a victory.
Players are so superstitious that many are even reluctant to appear on the cover of Sport Illustrated because athletes that grace that cover tend to either get hurt frequently, or have the worst slump of their career. It’s gotten so bad that teams and players actually dread the honor. This is just another example of players avoiding anything that might disrupt their success.
To go one step further, one widely known taboo is the crossing of bats. This act is sure to bring bad luck; therefore batters are extremely careful not to drop their bats on top of one another. Some players carry this taboo to an even a higher level. On one occasion a player became quite upset when another player tossed a bat from the batting cage and it came to rest on top of his. Later he explained that the top bat would ‘steal’ hits from the lower one. For him, then, bats contain a finite number of hits.
Honus Wagner, a member of baseball’s Hall of Fame, believed that each bat was good for only 100 hits and no more. Regardless of the quality of the bat he would dispose of it after its 100th hit. Former Astro Moises Alou was ridiculed for indulging that he ‘’urinates on his hand to make the skin tough so they don’t blister from swinging the bat day in and day out.’’ He was practicing a tradition that was passed on to him by his father, who used the ritual as a farmer.
Even the fans attempt to get into the superstition act. Not only do they wear lucky ‘charms’ and gear, but they buy ‘rally’ monkeys and if their team is trailing towards the end of a game, you can see many of them wearing their caps backwards. This is called ‘the rally cap’. Even they believe that by doing something quirky, they will upset the balance of the baseball universe and they might actually have some influence on the outcome of the contest.
Do these tricks really help make a player or team better? Does it help them succeed on the field of play? Well, I doubt you could come up with any scientific evidence to the contrary, but that’s ok, because it’s not what you or I think, it’s what makes players comfortable and more importantly – confident! Baseball is such a mental game that any boost in confidence is welcome.
These superstitions, rituals, and quirky habits are what make baseball so unique. Maybe they help, maybe they don’t. I think the late Branch Rickey said it best – “luck is the residue of design.” ….Enough said!
