Tics and Gods and Rituals

I often thought if a psychologist watched a baseball game with a professional eye, that he or she could make a number of mental health diagnoses. For example, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (for the rituals right before batting), Paranoid Schizophrenia (for the pitcher who throws a little chin music to “discourage” the batter from crowding the plate.) Bipolar Disorder (for the crowd who swings from euphoria in the first inning to bone weary depression in the last inning if they lose.) Tourette’s Syndrome (for the physical tics of the like of Jonathon Papelbom and the explosive swearing to oneself that happens as someone is caught looking on the third strike), Repetitive Self Stimulating Behavior (such as the kind we used to see with Don Zimmer’s rocking back and forth on the bench with Joe Torre and the Yankees) and Oppositional Defiant Disorder (for the manager who gets into the face of the umpire even though it was obvious that his runner was clearly tagged out at second and clearly the ump is not going to change the call.)

But then I thought the doc would probably get caught up in the excitement of the game, start rooting for the home team, start marking a score card instead of a prescription pad, and write off all the quirks, obsessions, ticks, rituals, and superstition as “oh well, that’s just part of the game.”

And you know, it is part of the game. Baseball, with all of its speed guns, computerized statistics, modern stadiums, sophisticated training, and now, instant replay, is home to more superstitions, rituals and prayers to the many different gods who watch over us than any other event, except maybe the upcoming presidential race.

There are some general superstitions that apply to everyone in baseball, such as not stepping on the foul lines when leaving or entering the field. Watch, you’ll see players jumping over the line. Even when the manager heads out to the mound to relieve a pitcher from his duties, he won’t step on the line. There is the widely held superstition that if a pitcher is pitching no-hitter, you don’t mention it for fear of jinxing it. I practiced this one myself when Brandon Morrow of the Mariners pitched 7 1/3 innings of no hits last week against the Yankees. You can bet there were many fans with Bronx accents shouting it from the nosebleed section for exactly the same reason, but for a nefarious purpose.

Most of the really interesting superstitions and rituals though happen on an individual basis. Power hitter David Ortiz of the Boston Red Sox participates in the same ritual of going through a regular routine of prepping himself for the bat which includes a predictable slapping together of this batting gloves twice before getting ready to bat. Ichiro Suzuki of the Mariners has a very distinctive, almost tai chi kind of ritual where he squats down as if loosening his hamstrings before he gets to an at bat. Then at bat he circles his bat over his head a couple times then lines it up somewhere with the back wall and pulls up his sleeve. He holds that position until the pitcher gets into his stance, then positions himself to bat Nomar Garciapparra is the king of ticks and rituals and used to take 20 seconds to do all his touching and pointing of toes and checking of gloves.

Keep in mind, this is not just before an at-bat. This is every time right before ball is pitched. Since there is no time clock in baseball, each player has the time to go through his ritual unless he is unduly delaying the game. Those of you who are MOFFs (More of a Football Fan), when was the last time you saw a football quarterback take off his helmet, turn it around three times and place it back on his head and then slap the butt of the center snapping the ball each time before calling a play?

What does it all mean, doc? Do you think this is healthy? Where did he go? The fan next to the empty seat informs me he went to get a nacho boat and a Miller Genuine Draft from the Full Count Snack Bar. He said to fill in his scorecard as needed so he wouldn’t miss anything.

Baseball is a team sport. Baseball is a modern sport. Baseball depends on percentages, speed, science. But every time a batter presents him or her self at the plate, whether it be Major League, city league softball, or Little League, it is the batter alone that has to make something happen. Every time the pitcher set into pitching positions, it is basically just him or her to deliver that ball the way the catcher called it. And sometimes the magic works, and sometimes it seems to have left the building. So players look for any edge they can get. If you had a really, really good game wearing a certain tee shirt under your baseball jersey, then you try to recreate the luck by wearing it again even if it is ripped, torn or smelly from the last really good game.

Wade Boggs, third baseman for the Boston Red Sox in the Eighties and Nineties, was well known (and teased) about his superstition of eating chicken before every game. His wife had over 200 recipes for the stuff. Movies make fun of the superstitious nature of baseball players all the time. In the movie Major League, one of the players had a full blown voodoo temple in his locker to JABU. In Bull Durham, pitcher Nuke Laroosh wore black garters under his uniform during a winning streak and the first baseman blessed his bat with chicken bones.

Many religious players, especially the Catholic players from Hispanic Countries, make the Sign of the Cross before a bat or a prayer of thanks after a great play or a run or kiss their medal of Our Mother of Guadalupe or St, Rita of Cascia. St. Rita has been fairly recently dubbed the patron saint of baseball players, but she is originally the patron saint of the abused and of hopeless causes. (If that doesn’t describe the Mariners season this year…St Rita pray for us in 2009...)

Don’t scoff at the players though for being silly. You know you the fan are doing it, too. Whether you are watching a league softball game or a Major League Baseball Game. Look around you and you can see dozens or even hundreds of people with their hands clasped, praying that that pitch will scream right down the center of the plate and the batter from the enemy team will swing powerlessly over the top of it. Or during that 4-1 game that your team is losing in the bottom of the ninth, if bases are loaded, and the bottom of the order comes up to bat, you really think that if you pray hard enough and send enough good vibes to the batter, the skinny guy with a .190 batting average is going to hit a grand slam and win the game in rapture filled triumph.

What about John Adams, the Cleveland Indians fan who brings a drum to every home game and beats it continuously throughout the game just like he has done for two decades? I bet he really thinks that if he doesn’t come, the Indians are going to tank. (In deference to The Baseball Buddy, I’ll make no comment on the effectiveness of that tactic.) Or the phenomenon of rally caps, where the crowd puts their hats on backwards in hopes of rallying their team in the last innings of the game.

We all have our own tics and gods and rituals we bring to the ball park. Because miracles do happen. Sometimes, the littlest guy on the team really does hit that homerun and wins the game after we just sent up a heart felt prayer of “Please God, please!”

Our psychologist friend, fresh back from checking out the Ichiro Sushi Plate from the Hit it Here Café, (“Do you want my pickled ginger?” he asks) says we have been “intermittently reinforced” which is the strongest kind of reinforcement there is. In translation it means, “every once in awhile, it works.” So we do it again, and maybe again, and then we can’t stop doing it because every once in awhile, it works.

Yeah, I’ll take your pickled ginger, doc. And St. Rita, pray for us. Sometimes I think we baseball fans are just plain crazy.