Steve Dalkowski's legacy is not only cemented in Hollywood, but as one of the most unique figures of baseball folklore. SI senior writer Tom Verducci shares Dalkowski's story
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00:00Hi, it's SI Senior Writer Tom Verducci.
00:04More than 56,000 people have died in the U.S. from COVID-19, about 20% of those at assisted
00:10living facilities.
00:12This is the story of one of them.
00:14It's the story of Steve Dalkowski, the greatest baseball legend you've never heard.
00:21Nobody threw a baseball harder than Steve Dalkowski.
00:25He didn't always know where it was going, and that's why he never got out of the minor
00:30leagues in nine seasons.
00:33The stories are Bunyan-esque, with one exception.
00:37They're all true.
00:39He threw a ball through a wooden fence in four different ballparks.
00:45He once tore off part of the ear of a batter with his fastball, broke an umpire's mask
00:51in three different places, sending the umpire to the hospital.
00:56Threw a fastball through the wire fencing behind home plate in Elmira, New York, scattering
01:01the fans.
01:03His minor league catcher was Cal Ripken Sr., who estimated that he threw between 110 and
01:09120 miles an hour.
01:12His minor league manager, Earl Weaver, said he never saw anybody throw harder, including
01:18Nolan Ryan.
01:19Ted Williams once stepped in the batting cage against Dalkowski and walked out after one
01:25pitch.
01:26He said he never saw anybody throw harder.
01:30Shortly after signing out of high school in 1957, Dalkowski struck out 24 batters, walked
01:3818, threw six wild pitches, and hit four batters.
01:43And that was in one game.
01:47Dalkowski's arm finally gave out in 1965.
01:51Two years later, the Orioles signed an infielder who heard plenty of Dalkowski's stories as
01:58he bounced around the same stops in the minor leagues.
02:02His name was Ron Shelton, and the Dalkowski stories became the inspiration for Nuke Lelouch
02:09in his movie, Bull Durham.
02:14When his career ended, Dalkowski fell on difficult times.
02:18He picked vegetables in California, drifted from job to job, and for the last 26 years
02:25at the assisted living facility in Connecticut, was treated for alcohol-induced dementia.
02:32We all love Velocity, Nuke Lelouch, Ricky Vaughn, Sid Finch, and Steve Dalkowski.
02:41Only one of them was real.
02:45Steve Dalkowski was 80 years old.
02:48Rest in peace, Steve, and may your legend never die.