Leiter Goes to Videotape for Pitching Tips

Al Leiter has discovered that, when things aren’t going too well, watching a little television can be a real panacea.

But the New York Yankees’ rookie left-hander doesn’t laugh off his woes with a dose of Bill Cosby, get caught up in a high-speed car chase with Don Johnson or make his own problems seem minor by comparing them with those of his favorite soap opera star.

He watches tapes of himself pitching.

Leiter, only the second rookie to make the Yankees’ starting rotation out of spring training in eight years, won his first three starts this season, averaging seven innings per outing. Then he went six innings and got no decision in start No. 4, lost his fifth and sixth starts--lasting just two innings in No. 6--and made it through only 1 innings 11 days ago when the Yankees lost to the Angels, 5-4.

Just when Yankee fans were beginning to wonder if the 22-year-old flamethrower was going to flame out, Leiter and bullpen coach Jeff Torborg sat down for a little fun with video.

First, they watched tape of Leiter’s April 14 victory over Toronto in which he allowed just four hits and struck out 11. Then they watched the debacle against the Angels--this didn’t take long--and realized they had been watching two different pitchers. Both wore a Yankee uniform with No. 28 on it, but these two guys had different deliveries, and the one pitching against the Blue Jays was certainly a lot more effective.

Leiter figured he’d better try to imitate the former and, Tuesday night at Anaheim Stadium, the Angels discovered there is a marked difference between the two. This time around, the Angels managed just one hit against Leiter--a sixth inning single by Wally Joyner--and lost to New York, 5-3.

Leiter left after walking pinch-hitter Chico Walker to open the eighth inning. He had struck out eight and the Angels hadn’t hit the ball hard more than a couple of times. But he walked six and threw 130 pitches and even he had to admit he was tiring.

Some may have wondered if Leiter would be a mere footnote in Yankee folklore, but not Manager Billy Martin.

“Listen,” Martin said, “a kid with an arm like that and that kind of poise comes along once in a very long while. You don’t give up on a kid like that after a couple of bad outings.

“You see that fastball tonight? They were not only swinging under it, but it was rising so much that (catcher Joel) Skinner almost missed a couple.”

Leiter, however, says his overpowering fastball can cause him almost as many problems as opposing batters.

“Like a lot of hard throwers, I sometimes get caught up in that throw-it-through-a-brick-wall attitude,” he said. “I have to concentrate on staying back.”

He was also concentrating on the mechanical problems that had been at the root of his recent ineffectiveness.

“We have a great video room in New York with two monitors,” Torborg said. “We had the two games on at the same time and were advancing each frame by frame. We were comparing arm motions when we noticed that his leg kick was completely different in the two games.