On April 2, 1931, a girl named Jackie Mitchell, 17, struck out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in an exhibition between the Yankees and the minor-league Chattanooga Lookouts. Ruth took a ball, swung and missed two pitches then took a called strike. Gehrig swung and missed three straight pitches. Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis voided her contract a few days later and said women could not play baseball because it was "too strenuous."
I can't let this go without comment.
First of all, I seriously doubt this really happened. I don't remember it at all, and I asked Lou, and he doesn't remember it either. He asked his mom and she also doesn't remember it. I asked Claire and she told me to take out the garbage, and I said fuck you, and she said go to hell, and I said you first, and then we made up and now here I am.
Secondly, if it did happen, I can tell you that there's no way I was really trying all that hard to hit that girl's pitches. I wouldn't have wanted to crush her spirits.
Third, I was probably drunk, or at least hungover. Or trying to get the hell out of there so I could hook up.
Fourth of all, she did NOT look 17 years old. She looked much older. And her father did not have any right to point that shotgun at me just for chatting her up.
Fifthly, look, sometimes when you see a pitcher you've never seen before, even if it's a girl, and the lighting is bad and you just want to get out of there and grab a steak, you may not be able to concentrate as well as you should and you might swing and miss a couple of times before you get the hang of it.
Not that that's what happened here or anything. Because I'm SURE it never happened. But if it did, that's what happened.
Or didn't.
Opening day: just two more days.
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