Sport: The Whole Story of Pitching

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Today the Robin Robertses live on Robin Hood Road in the Philadelphia suburb of Meadowbrook with their two children (Robin Jr., 5, and Danny, 2) and a 3½-year-old Welsh corgi presented to Robin by an upstate New York fan. Mary Ann, who dutifully goes to Connie Mack Stadium when Robin is pitching a home game and turns on radio or TV when he performs on the road, still makes no pretense of being a baseball buff. She admits to knowing precious little about how the other players are doing, is sure only that so far, this season has been all slump for the Phillies. "I don't even bother to check the standings," says Mary Roberts.

A Tremendous Difference. Roberts professes to be unconcerned with the fact that he is using up his career pitching for a losing club. "Getting traded or staying isn't a deep ingrained thing with me," he says. "This club always could potentially win the pennant. Especially when I pitch, it isn't a fourth-place club. Usually they get the runs for me."

Last year, in fact, from the All-Star game to Labor Day, the Phillies were perhaps the best in the National League. Then Third Baseman Willie ("Puddin-head") Jones was hurt, First Baseman Stan Lopata was beaned, and the team faltered. "You look back on a season," says Roberts, "and you see two or three games, here and there, that if you'd won might have made the difference."

Mild-mannered Manager Mayo Smith agrees. "If we had another like Roberts," says Smith, "it would make a tremendous difference. I agree with Connie Mack that pitching is 70% of the game. If you have it, you're always in the game. Even if you haven't the power hitting, as we haven't, you can work things like the sacrifice, the stolen base and the hit-and-run."

Below the Belt. Smith and the Phillies' management are sure that in Roberts they own baseball's biggest bargain. Even in front of a losing team he wins so often that he more than earns his salary (about $60,000, including income from endorsements)—and incidentally disproves Indiana Humorist Kin Hubbard's snide crack: "Knowin' all about baseball is just about as profitable as bein' a good whittler."

To Roberts' slowly growing collection of hot fans, his own success seems adequate denial of his own most cherished belief: that pitching is essentially a simple art. "Anything is simple to an artist," snorts Umpire Larry Goetz. "For the rest of us," echoes Outfielder Ashburn, "there must be more, or everybody would bat .400 and win 20 games a year." But Robin Roberts insists that it is all much simpler than that: "I've been given credit for stuff I don't do. I don't even divide people into the tough and easy. It's never the same. With Willie Mays, for example, I don't put on anything special. I just try to mix up the pitches on him. I can't pinpoint what I pitch. I pitch the same to everybody—low and away, or high and tight.