So long, Dock

I just read the news that one of my all-time favorite Pittsburgh Pirates died today. Dock Ellis was a flamboyant pitcher. I can still see his rapid fire jaws chewing gum like a madman, with a huge symetrical afro, bulging from beneath his yellow Pirate hat. His hair was big, I remember. He used to wear curlers in his hair and one time on his way to the ballpark in Cincinnati, Ellis was pepper sprayed by a security guard. The guard said Ellis refused to identify himself and claimed Ellis was waving his fists in a threatening manner. I always considered Ellis to be the National League's better answer to the Red Sox eccentric pot smoking left hander, Bill "Space Man" Lee. A little known fact about Dock is that he holds the Major League record for hitting the most consecutive batters. He set the record of three back in 1974 when he intentionally loaded the bases in the first inning pitching against the Cincinnati Reds. The fourth hitter, Tony Perez avoided being hit and drew a walk. Ellis' first two pitches to fifth hitter, Johnny Bench nearly took Bench's head off, before Manager, Danny Murtaugh finally pulled Ellis out of the game. Ellis's line read as follows: 0 IP 0 H 1 R 1 ER 1 BB 0 K
I suspect this is how he came to be known as the "first militant of Professional baseball".

Ellis was probably best known for pitching a no-hitter under the influence of LSD. I highly recommend you visit Chuck Brodsky's i-tunes site
and download his great folk song Dock Ellis' No No in Dock's honor. There are plenty of other versions of the song out there and most of them are pretty good. But Brodsky wrote it and his version is probably the best.

Here is an excerpt from his autobiography:

We flew into San Diego and I asked the manager could I go home, because we had an off day. And he said, "Yeah."

So I took some LSD at the airport because I knew where it would hit me -- I'd be in my own little area and I'd know where to go. That's how I got to my friend's girlfriend's house.

She said, "What's wrong with you?"

I said, "I'm high as a Georgia pine."

The next day -- or what I thought was the next day -- she told me, "You better get up, you gotta go pitch!"

I said, "Pitch? What are you talking about, I pitch tomorrow." Because I had got up in the middle of the morning and took some more acid.

She grabbed the paper and showed me the sports page. I said, "Oh wow! What happened to yesterday?"

She said, "I don't know but you better get to that airport."

Now this was in the 1970s and "greenies" was Dexamyl. That was the drug of choice back then, a stimulant.

When I got to the game, there was a lady down there in San Diego, used to always have the bennies for me -- Benzedrine -- another stimulant. I went out to the dugout and reached up, because she was standing over the rail -- she always stood over the rail -- and had a pretty little gold pouch.

So I got the bennies, went on back in the clubhouse, took them.

The game started and a mist started, a misty rain. So all during the game was a little mist. The opposing team and my teammates, they knew I was high, but they didn't know what I was high on. They had no idea what LSD was other than what they see on TV with the hippies.

I didn't see the hitters. All I could tell was if they were on the right side or the left side. The catcher put tape on his fingers so I could see the signals.

There were times when the ball was hit back at me, I jumped because I thought it was coming fast, but the ball was coming slow. Third baseman came by and grabbed the ball, threw somebody out.

I never caught a ball from the catcher with two hands, because I thought that was a big ol' ball! And then sometimes it looks small. One time I covered first base, and I caught the ball and I tagged the base, all in one motion and I said, "Oh, I just made a touchdown."

We had a rookie on the team at that particular time named Dave Cash, and he kept saying after the first inning, "you got a no-no going"--a no-hitter.

I said, "Yeah, right," and I'd look.

Then around the forth inning he'd say it again. "You got a no-no going."

I look. "Yep."

But I could also feel the pressure from other players wanting to tell him to shut up. It's a superstition thing where you're not supposed to say nothing if somebody's throwin' a no-hitter. It's bad luck.

I didn't pay no attention to the score, you know. I'm trying to get the batters out. And I'm throwin' a crazy game. I'm hittin' people, walkin' people, throwin' balls in the dirt. They going everywhere!

It was easier to pitch with the LSD because I was so used to medicating myself. That's the way I was dealing with the fear of failure, the fear of losing, the fear of winning. Over 90 percent of the Major League was using Dexamyl when I was playing. It was part of the game, you know.

Announcer: Everybody in our bullpen is standing, walking around nervously. They wanna run and grab Dock. Now two balls and two strikes, and here's the pitch. Strike three! A no hitter! They're goin' after him. He got it! They're mobbing Dock Ellis on a no-hitter. They're from all over the place. They got him on a strikeout!