You Really Don’t Have to be a Scientist to Know Good Chemistry

I don’t remember Mr. Iske discussing “good” and “bad” chemistry when he taught my sixth-grade chemistry class. Maybe I was sick that day, but I don’t think so. Of course, I didn’t retain much from the class. Mr. Iske was an egg-shaped man with a large nose who also drove the school bus, and he had a mean son named Duane who was fond of snapping rolled-up towels at you in the locker room after gym. His father was not a compelling academician.

Mr. Iske was happiest driving the bus, I believe. In class, he drew a maze of circles, squares and arrows on the blackboard, used the chalk to scratch the tip of his very large nose and mumbled disjointedly about “molecules in concert,” leaving us all staring blankly. What I remember most from the class is passing notes to friends about football and Mr. Iske’s ponderous snout. Needless to say, my chance of conquering chemistry was doomed.

Years later, much to my surprise, I find that this hole in my educational fabric is troublesome. Somewhere, someone must be laughing. (Perhaps it is Duane Iske, ever menacing, rolling up his towel for yet another snap.)

The problem is that chemistry, good and bad, has become a sports concept, and I can’t begin to define it even though I am a professional sports expert with a set of free dinner chits to prove it.

I know “good” chemistry has something to do with teamwork, talents meshing, bunting, passing on the fastbreak. “That team has good chemistry,” people say, and everyone nods.

Good chemistry. Right.

I have no idea what it means, but fortunately, I have been around long enough to know it when I see it. Much as a well-bred bird dog in the misty morning bog, I can’t explain that the quail is dead, but I sure as hell can point to it.

The Washington Bullets, for example. Now, there is a team with good chemistry. They might be the best example of good chemistry I have seen. Individually, they were a small, paltry lot compared to the rest of the teams in the National Basketball Association, a league where flying and laser guns may soon be legal. You had to figure that they would win maybe 20 games this season.

Instead, they won twice as many and were in the running for a place card at the playoff table right up to the last day of the season. How did they do it? They have a good coach, but that’s another story. The coach didn’t play. The players did. And they became a much more formidable entity than the moderate sum of their individual talents. There was a meshing of skill and will that could never have been foretold.

The Bullets played hard, selflessly and with enthusiasm, and although they didn’t make the playoffs, there wasn’t a better team in the NBA. It was all a matter of chemistry. (It occurs to me that this is the “molecules in concert” of which Mr. Iske spoke. I would ask him, but we lost touch years ago. If you see an egg-shaped man with chalk marks on his nose, drop me a postcard.)

Another example of good chemistry could be percolating here in Baltimore. I am referring to the Orioles, who, as you may know, seem finally to have risen from their inertia of the last few years. (Incidently, to the fan who left that rather jeering message on my answering machine asking if I knew all along that this would happen: Absolutely. Of course. Never had a doubt. Not for a second.)

I could be wrong, but I think some molecules may be acting in concert again. The Orioles’ management hoped that a mixture of defense, speed and starting pitching would add up to limited success this year, and they look pretty smart so far. Their pitching is holding up, their defense is superb and their offense has been a classic example of good chemistry, creating runs with speed, aggressive baserunning, sacrifices, all that chaw-in-the-side stuff.

The Orioles also have a clubhouse of young players, who, almost to a man, are happy just to be in the majors. This should not be underestimated. They are virgins of a sort, hungry baseball babies, not mature enough to have developed the fine arts of jealousy, back-stabbing and greed, nettlesome qualities so prevalent today.

“Everybody is pulling for everybody, and everybody is excited when somebody else does well,” pitcher Jeff Ballard said. “That kind of chemistry on a team can bring nothing but good things. There’s no selfishness.”

I can’t help thinking things would be less unified if Eddie Murray still were with the club. He wasn’t what was wrong with the Orioles on the field, but he had become a cynic, unhappy about being in Baltimore. Judging by what he has said since he was traded, his molecules never would have acted in concert here. He might have been energized by this youthful exuberance and sudden success, but I doubt it. He wanted out.

There is a parallel. The Bullets let Moses Malone go and wound up with enviable chemistry. The Orioles may have done the same by trading Murray. I know many think that the Los Angeles Dodgers fleeced the Orioles in the deal. My position is that, regardless if that is true--and let’s give it time (Juan Bell is only 20)--it doesn’t matter. It was a good trade because, even though his hitting is missed, Eddie had to go if the Orioles were to move forward.

His departure made them a new team, finally, free to develop a new personality. They are all about teamwork and enthusiasm now--the corny, but true. I try to envision Eddie in such a clubhouse, and I can’t. He wouldn’t have ruined anything, but he would have polluted the refreshed air, dampened the esprit de corps with his emotional baggage. It is addition by subtraction. I know that sounds like math, but it’s chemistry. Good chemistry.

As I said, I know it when I see it. Mr. Iske would be proud.