Rage. Peter Golenbock

1

       CHILDHOOD

      I GOT HIGH FOR THE FIRST TIME when I was six years old. I went to the dentist’s office and he gave me nitrous oxide, and I loved it. When I came home and my parents asked me how the visit went, I said, “I have good news and bad news.” I was a pretty precocious six-year-old.

      “What’s the bad news?” my mother asked.

      “I had sixteen cavities.”

      “What’s the good news?”

      “I didn’t feel a thing.”

      The dentist had given me laughing gas, and I spent the whole time floating up near his ceiling and doing loop-de-loops in and around the dentist’s chair, so there was no pain, and I really enjoyed it.

      At age twelve I was an altar boy, and one of the benefits of the job was access to the wine that was supposed to be offered to Jesus. I noticed the friendliness of our three parish priests after they drank all His wine. The monsignor and one of the priests only took sips, but the second priest would drink the wine down to the bottom of the cup. I wanted to feel like the second priest. So, at the end of each mass, instead of pouring the wine out, I would drink it. I would drink all of it.

      At age twenty I was carefree. I had been a high school pitcher and a star athlete with one hell of a fastball. I was six foot three, 200 pounds, and in American Legion ball I had almost thrown two perfect games in a row. It was all so easy. I just had to rear back and throw, and if the ball found the strike zone, the batter usually didn’t stand a chance. I was clocked somewhere in the neighborhood of ninety-five miles an hour, but I had an easy motion, and batters told me it seemed the ball went much faster. When a pitcher throws a ninety-five-mile-an-hour fastball to the hitter, the hitter has to decide in 44/100ths of a second whether it’s a ball or a strike, whether he should swing or “take” the pitch, or whether to hit the dirt.

      At age twenty I drove to spring training in St. Petersburg, Florida, certain that I was going to make the big leagues. I had the same feeling of invincibility that I found from taking the laughing gas at the dentist and drinking the wine in church. As I drove my Oldsmobile Cutlass convertible down I-95 from wintry Connecticut to balmy Florida, I was just north of Jacksonville when the disc jockey on the radio said that he was about to play a song by the Rolling Stones called “Let’s Spend the Night Together.” He said, “It has been banned by the FCC.” The Rolling Stones were in sympathy with the devil; the Vietnam War was raging; it was the winter of ’67.

      In 1967 I had every reason to be optimistic about my future. The year before I had pitched for Double-A Williamsport, and I had a nine-win-and-two-loss record with a 1.97 earned run average. I had been named Pitcher of the Year in the Eastern League. I was promoted to Triple-A Jacksonville, and even though I hadn’t pitched very well there, I was sure I’d make it to the majors.

      I was cocky, though I never saw it as cockiness. I felt I was self-confident. Everyone else said I was cocky. I wondered why the Mets had bothered to send me to the minors at all. I had some trouble getting my breaking ball over, but in my mind I felt I had big-league talent and should have already started my professional career with the big boys.

      I wasn’t the only phenom on the Mets’ roster. The Mets had a number of excellent young pitching prospects in the minor leagues, including Tom Seaver and Jerry Koosman. Scouts swore I was just as talented as they were, if not more so. In fact, in the Mets’ 1967 yearbook, “Billy the Kid” Denehy got more press than the fair-haired Tom Seaver, the all-American college star from California who was certain to make the jump from Triple-A ball to the Mets.

      I arrived at the spring training complex in St. Petersburg, Florida, in the afternoon, bounded into the clubhouse, and said hello to those coaches and players I already knew. The manager of the Mets was stone-faced Wes Westrum, a former New York Giants catcher. Wes had replaced the legendary Casey Stengel after Casey broke his hip falling off a barstool and got too old to manage.

      I found my locker, and I was getting into my uniform when the Mets’ general manager, Johnny Murphy, came by. I was stoked that Mr. Murphy, once a great Yankee pitcher, thought enough of me to pay me a visit. I took it as an omen.

      “You arrived a half hour ago,” he said, “and since you arrived everyone has been talking about you. You probably don’t have a clue as to why.” He was right.

      “It’s those fucking sideburns of yours,” Murphy said. I was sporting mutton-chop sideburns. I had let them grow over the winter, and now they had reached almost to my jaw.

      “If you want to be in uniform tomorrow,” said Murphy, “you need to go directly to the shower room and cut them way back.” I didn’t have a problem with that.

      When spring training began, Westrum let me know that I was only there for a look-see. He had set his rotation, and I wasn’t in it, and so at first it didn’t appear I’d pitch much, but fate has a way of rearranging things. Fat Jack Fisher was supposed to pitch a game against the Cincinnati Reds, but the morning before the game was to start, Jack got a phone call that his young daughter had been injured in a fall. When I arrived at the ballpark that day, Wes informed me I was going to start.

      I didn’t have a lot of time to think about it. I didn’t even know most of the players on the Reds.

      Who are these hitters? I wondered. I warmed up and went out to the mound.

      I certainly knew the first batter, Pete Rose, who ended his career with 4,256 hits to break Ty Cobb’s all-time record. Pete Rose didn’t faze me. I threw Pete three straight fastballs for three straight strikes, and Charlie Hustle, as Rose was called back then, returned to the bench.

      It seemed so easy. I stood on the mound, and would think I was Superman. To this day I can still imagine those fastballs I threw past Pete Rose. Strike one, strike two, strike three. Have a seat.

      Holy shit! I thought to myself. I just threw three fastballs past Pete Rose. Wow! This is easy.

      Before my three innings were over, I had struck out six of the nine Reds batters I faced, and we’re talking about some great hitters: Tony Pérez, Vada Pinson, Lee May, Leo Cárdenas, Tommy Helms, and Pete Rose.

      Westrum, who didn’t talk much to his players, came up to me after the game and said, “That was impressive. Let’s see if you can do it again.” I gave up exactly one run in the twenty innings I pitched during spring training. I led all Mets pitchers in strikeouts and ERA, and that included all of the Mets starters and the rookies Seaver and Koosman.

      There was a game against the Kansas City A’s (before the Athletics moved to Oakland) in which Tom and I split the pitching duties. Tom pitched the first five innings. I pitched the final four.