Leary Probably Had to Pinch Himself to See If He Was Awake

One of the funniest, funkiest baseball games of this or any season was played Saturday night at Dodger Stadium, and when it was over, won 2-1 by the Dodgers over the Giants on a pinch-hit single by a pitcher, Manager Tom Lasorda asked the strangest question.

“What if (Tim) Leary’d been pitching tomorrow?” Lasorda asked.

So? What if he had?

“He wouldn’t have even been in the ballpark tonight!” Lasorda explained.

What a final, fitting twist that would have been, to an evening that was full of them. Leary, pitcher by trade, hitter by necessity, might have missed out on the most joyous moment of his major league career, just because in his vocation as a pitcher, he is neither considered nor expected to be an actual ballplayer.

A pitcher is not even obligated to be in uniform on the night before he works an afternoon game. He can go home and watch his teammates on television, if he so chooses, leaving the manager with only 23 able bodies for that evening’s contest, some of the bodies more able than others.

Since Leary’s next turn was another couple of days away, he took his place in the dugout with the rest of the Dodgers during Saturday night’s game against San Francisco. He is a player, not just a pitcher. He has his own model bats--34 inches, 32 ounces. He takes batting practice whenever possible. He prepares himself to pitch in, even if he doesn’t have to pitch.

Still, who could have anticipated the situation-comedy of Saturday night’s 11th inning? The seventh game of this October’s World Series should only end the way this game did. People would be talking about it for years.

The proportions were certainly classic:

A game between division contenders and arch-rivals, a 1-1 score in extra innings, bases loaded, two out and a full count on the batter.

It gets better:

The batter was Leary, a pitcher, pinch-hitting for another pitcher. He was batting because the Dodgers had no other “real” baseball players available.

Three Dodger principals had just been bounced out of the game by the umpires. One was the lead baserunner, Pedro Guerrero. Why? Because he called one of the umpires a vulgar name, supposedly in jest, after advancing to second base on a passed ball. Lasorda claimed Guerrero and the umpire had been joking with one another all night.

Ejected next was Lasorda. Why? Because he thought up some new vulgar names to call the same umpire.

Third and last to go was Mike Davis, standing by himself in a warmup jacket in the Dodger dugout. Why? Because Davis supposedly was making faces at the umpire from the bench.

“He never said a word!” Kirk Gibson shouted later.

Joe Amalfitano, coaching third base and running the club with Lasorda gone, said the umpire spotted Davis gesturing and warned Amalfitano: “Tell him to stop waving his arms!” Amalfitano in turn asked the umpire not to do anything drastic, because Davis was the Dodgers’ last available non-pitcher. “Don’t take away our last guy!” Amalfitano pleaded.

Too late. Davis got thumbed.

San Francisco Manager Roger Craig can count. He knew the Dodgers were out of “players.” He ordered an intentional walk to Alfredo Griffin, loading the bases. Alejandro Pena, the third Dodger relief pitcher of the night, was due up next.

Leary can count, too.

“I could see what was happening before it happened,” he said later. “So, I went over and grabbed a bat. I already had my spikes on.”

So did Franklin Stubbs, rushed into the game to pinch-run for Guerrero. He had plastic spikes on, good for traction on dry fields, but not when it’s wet. This night, it was dry.

If he had it to do over again, Lasorda might have used a pitcher to pinch-run, and saved Stubbs. In any case, Stubbs led off third base with the potential winning run, and Leary came to bat.

Now, Tim Leary can hit. He knew how to hit when he played at Santa Monica High and UCLA, and he is one of the only veteran pitchers alive who has a lifetime average better than .300.

When Lasorda relieved Leary in a recent game at Houston, he said: “I’m tellin’ myself, ‘I gotta take this guy out, and he’s got two of our four hits!’ ”

Leary has been the happiest find of the baseball season for the Dodgers, the guy who in one year has gone from a 3-11 record to prominence as staff ace behind Orel Hershiser. His hitting, well, what a bonus that has been.

“When I was a kid,” Leary said, “I dreamed of hitting more than pitching.”

Against left-hander Joe Price, whom he had never faced before, Leary was not sure what to expect. “He couldn’t afford to walk me,” Leary said. “But he didn’t want to groove one right across the middle.”

Leary took a called strike, then a ball high, then fouled one back. He was in the hole, 1 and 2. Price came in high and Leary started to swing, but he held up. The next pitch also was high. Full count.

“He had to keep it up high,” Leary said. “He couldn’t afford to throw curves in the dirt.”

Now, with the count full, Price could afford to throw nothing but fastballs. That was good news not only to Leary, but to everybody on the club who already knew he can hit.

Mickey Hatcher, in the clubhouse later, called over to Stubbs: “When he got to 3 and 2, I knew it was over.”

Stubbs: “I did, too. I knew he could hit a fastball.”

Price threw one down the middle, and Leary again fouled it straight back. Price threw the same pitch, and Leary hit it straight up the middle to win the game.

Stubbs was so excited, he crossed home plate and stumbled to the ground, nearly doing a somersault. “It was those plastic spikes,” Gibson said. “There was some dew on home plate, or something, and it was wet. He really went flying!”

The Dodgers jumped all over Leary as if he had just won them the pennant.

“What a reception!” Leary said. “That had to be the most exciting thing that’s ever happened to me. And especially doing it against the Giants in front of our own fans. When we’re up there playing them, their fans crucify you. Being at home makes it even sweeter.”

If the Dodgers win the division by one game, this is the game they should remember.

It’s not only the night they won a big game, but the night they invented a new position.

Pitch-hitter.