Player Superstitions/Rituals
1989FleerBillRipkencollector
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Turk Wendell- MLB Relief pitcher. Brush teeth between innings, leapt over foul lines
Wade Boggs- Ended Pre game infield practice by stepping in order to 3rd,2nd,1st base
Luis Gonzalez-Taps plate 3x before every game in honor of his triplets.
Nomar Garciaparra- Unsure if ritual or due to OCD-Steps on each dugout step with both feet and adjusts gloves,hat and other things between pitches.
Wade Boggs- Ended Pre game infield practice by stepping in order to 3rd,2nd,1st base
Luis Gonzalez-Taps plate 3x before every game in honor of his triplets.
Nomar Garciaparra- Unsure if ritual or due to OCD-Steps on each dugout step with both feet and adjusts gloves,hat and other things between pitches.
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ALWAYS Looking for Chris Sabo cards!
edit to add... apparently if an umpire wanted to give him a new ball, Turk would only accept it if it was rolled to him. If the ump threw it to him, he'd ignore it, letting it fly past or hit him, and he'd pick it up off the ground.
WTB: 2001 Leaf Rookies & Stars Longevity: Ryan Jensen #/25
Former Red Sox and Yankees’ player Wade Boggs was often referred to as the “Chicken Man” because he ate chicken habitually before every game and would also start wind sprints exactly 16 minutes before each game.
Frank Viola, a three-time MLB all-star and former Cy Young winner had a secret to his success on the mound. He would clean the mound before every inning, kicking up dirt ex-actly four times. However, if something bad happened, he couldn’t do it in repetition of four’s any more, instead he would try three or five.
+John Smoltz, who once was doing jumping jacks in the clubhouse during an Atlanta Braves rally,was afraid to stop because he didn’t want to be held responsible for the end of the Braves’ scoring. He ended up doing jumping jacks for nearly half an hour.
+Tony La Russa, who received a death threat while managing the Chicago White Sox in 1982 that resulted in him wearing a protective vest. La Russa covered the vest with a warmup jacket — and when the Sox rattled off a winning streak, he kept wearing the jacket, even after discarding the vest.
+Larry Walker is obsessed with the number “3.” He sets his alarm for 33 minutes past the hour, takes practice swings in multiples of three, wears No. 33, was married on Nov. 3 at 3:33 p.m., and bought tickets for 33 disadvantaged kids when he played in Montreal, to be seated in Section 333 at Olympic Stadium. His last contract his current contract included a joint $3,333,333 donation to children’s organizations in British Columbia and Colorado. Finally he has 3 kids.
+Wade Boggs. Where do I begin. He ate chicken before every game, woke up at the same time every day, took exactly 150 ground balls in practice, took batting practice at 5:17 and ran sprints at 7:17. His route to and from his position in the field beat a path to the home dugout, and he drew the Hebrew word “çé-Chai” (meaning “life”) in the batter’s box before each at-bat (Boggs is not Jewish). He always ended his pregame infield practice by stepping, in order, on the third-, second- and first-base bags, stepping on the baseline, taking two steps in the coach’s box and trotting to the dugout in exactly four steps.
+One of the most unusually famous superstitions came from former reliever Turk Wendell . He chewed four pieces of black licorice when he pitched, spit them out after each inning, brushed his teeth in the dugout, and leaped (not stepped) over the baseline (described as a “kangaroo hop”). When he was on the mound, Wendell stood if the catcher was squatting, and squatted if the catcher was standing.
Finally the best one comes from a little known player named Kevin Rhomberg who appeared in a grand total of 41 games for the Cleveland Indians, from 1982-84. His superstition can basically be called a compulsion. There’s no other way to describe it.
His superstition was the need to touch back someone who had just touched him. Like tag during recess in grade school. However doing it when you’re an adult makes you strange. The need to touch someone back was so necessary that if a person somehow eluded his return touch, Rhomberg would send a letter that said, “This constitutes a touch.”
Rick Sutcliffe once reached under a bathroom stall to touch Rhomberg on the toe. Not knowing who did it, Rhomberg went around the clubhouse and touched each player. Brook Jacoby once told of tagging Rhomberg with a ball in the minors, then throwing it out of the stadium. Jacoby said that Rhomberg spent two hours looking for the ball before finding it. An umpire once halted play during a game in New York to tell Yankees players to stop touching Rhomberg.
Superstitious athletes
By Jason Murdoch, CBC Sports Online | May 10, 2005
"Fear is the main source of superstition and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom." - Bertrand Russell (1872-1970).
Most athletes probably haven't even heard of the British philosopher, but they'd be wise to heed his advice.
Sports is where the weirdest superstitions thrive and, if it leads to success of the team, are respected.
Accountants probably don't wear the same underwear during tax season. And when was the last time you saw a police officer perform the sign of the cross before he pulled someone over for speeding?
In sports, this odd behaviour is considered normal. Here's a look at some of the quirkiest of the bunch:
Wade Boggs
Mark Fidrych
Turk Wendell
Pelle Lindbergh
Kevin Rhomberg
Mike Hargrove
Patrick Roy
John McGraw
Goran Ivanisevic
Steve Finley/Darin Erstad
1. Wade Boggs, MLB
Wade Boggs
If you want to know about superstitions in baseball, Boggs is a perfect case study.
Known as the "Chicken Man," Boggs would eat poultry before every game and was obsessively compulsive about his routine.
He took exactly 150 ground balls during infield practice and had a fixation on time. He entered the batting cage at exactly 5:17 p.m. and ran wind sprints at 7:17 p.m.
Before each at-bat, he would write the Hebrew word "Chai" – meaning life – into the dirt of the batter's box.
Between pitches, he had a habit if he was playing defence: he'd swipe the dirt in front of him with his left foot, tap his glove two or three times and adjust his cap.
And those are just a few of dozens of Boggs's superstitions. To list them all would make this a Top 1 list.
2. Mark (The Bird) Fidrych, MLB
Mark (The Bird) Fidrych
Of all the oddballs in baseball, Fidrych was the trailblazer.
Nicknamed "the Bird" for his resemblance to the popular Sesame Street character, Fidrych became a media celebrity for his antics on the mound during his rookie season with the Detroit Tigers in 1976.
Fans turned out in droves at Tiger Stadium to watch Fidrych fidget around on the mound, talk to the ball after each pitch and congratulate teammates after outstanding plays.
It all translated to a magical rookie season – 19 wins and a league-leading 2.34 ERA.
Unfortunately, his luck didn't last. Knee and arm injuries cut Fidrych's career drastically short and he never pitched a full season after his freshman year.
By 1981, after five abbreviated seasons, he was out of the majors.
3. Turk Wendell, MLB
Turk Wendell
"The Turk" would like to be known for his biting slider, but most baseball fans remember him as the pitcher who brushed his teeth between innings.
Paying special attention to his molars was probably Wendell's most famous superstition.
Chewing four sticks of liquorice while he pitched on the mound, Wendell would sprint back to the dugout after the third out of the inning, making sure to leap over the baseline, and then break out the toothbrush.
He would repeat the process in every inning he pitched.
Baseball fans won't get to see Wendell's antics any longer. After spending 11 seasons with various teams in the majors, he announced his retirement in late March.
4. Pelle Lindbergh, NHL
There's an old cliché in hockey that there's no normal goaltenders. It takes a special – some say insane – person to step in front of vulcanized rubber travelling at 90 miles an hour.
So it's no wonder that goalies are the most superstitious in the hockey fraternity.
The late Philadelphia Flyers netminder reinforced this stereotype with his behaviour in the locker room.
Lindbergh would wear the same old orange t-shirt from a Swedish sporting goods company under his equipment. Each time the shirt started to fall apart, he had someone sew it up.
But his quirks didn't end there. Between periods, he wouldn't drink anything but a Swedish beverage called Pripps and would only take a sip if there were exactly two ice cubes in the cup. A particular team trainer, by the way, could only deliver that cup to him.
5. Kevin Rhomberg, MLB
Never heard of him? You're not only one. But he certainly made an impression during his 41-game stint with the Cleveland Indians in the early 1980s.
According to former pitcher Rick Mahler, Rhomberg was the most superstitious player he met in his 12-year stint in the majors.
"If you touched him, he'd have to touch you back," he told the San Antonio Express News
"We told our catcher to reach up and give him a touch when he came up to the plate, but Rhomberg hit him back before the catcher was even done touching him."
The seldom-used outfielder needed to employ this superstition even when he was on the basepaths. If he was tagged when he was on base , Rhomberg would wait until the end of the inning and then chase down the infielder and touch him before he reached the dugout.
He would never make a right turn on the diamond, because when you run the bases you're always turning left.
6. Mike Hargrove, MLB
Mike Hargrove
When he was a player, the Seattle Mariners manager rivalled Boggs as a slave to his superstitions.
Hargrove would walk up the first-base line and take three practice swings before stepping into the batter's box.
It got worse at the plate, where he would perform a series adjustments – fiddling with his batting gloves, pants, sleeves, wiping perspiration off his lips and pushing down on the top of his batting helmet before he was ready to step in.
After each pitch, he would repeat the routine.
It earned him the nickname, "The Human Rain Delay."
7. Patrick Roy, NHL
Patrick Roy
When he was just a rookie with the Montreal Canadiens, a reporter noticed that Roy seemed to get a lot of favourable bounces and the puck seemed to often hit the goalposts.
That's because, Roy said, he talks to his posts during the game.
"They are my friends," he said.
Roy's superstitions have been well documented because he is arguably the greatest goaltender to play the game.
Roy, who holds the NHL record for career wins by a netminder, had a set routine before every game.
During the pre-game, he would skate out to the blue-line and stare at the net, envisioning it shrinking. He would also consciously never step on the blue-line or red-line.
8. John McGraw, MLB
Players don't have a monopoly on irrational behaviour – just take a look at some of the things John McGraw did in his time as manager of the New York Giants:
The hard-as-nails manager once gave a job to a farmer who couldn't play because he believed the man, named Charlie Faust, was a magnet for good luck. Faust received a tryout when he approached McGraw and told him a fortune teller predicted success for him as a Giants pitcher.
Faust was horrible, but his arrival coincided with a Giants winning streak and he was fitted for a uniform.
McGraw would also pick up hairpins and pennies – face up only – that he stumbled across in his travels. He once employed a brewery to send a horse-drawn beer wagon across the Polo Grounds for 10 straight days because the first day it happened one of his players had a great day at the plate.
9. Goran Ivanisevic, Tennis
Goran Ivanisevic
Many athletes call their daily quirks part of their routine, something that's necessary to prepare them for the game.
Ivanisevic, though, readily admits he was superstitious while he was on the court.
The former tennis star would always try to be the second person to get up from his chair on the change-over and would try to never step on any of the lines.
Off the court, he was even worse. If he won a match at a tournament, he would repeat everything from the previous day – go to the same restaurant, eat the same food and try to talk to the same people.
"Sometimes, it got very boring," he wrote on his website.
10. Steve Finley/Darin Erstad, MLB
Steve Finley
Forget steroids – Finley and Erstad have delved into the world of mysticism to generate performance-enhancing powers.
The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim teammates have both worn a little leather pouch containing various minerals around their necks to ward off injury and slumps.
Finley got the mysterious pouch from Craig Counsell, then a teammate with the Arizona Diamondbacks, in 2002. He gave it to the injury-prone Erstad this season.
Apparently, the necklace has worked for both players.
As soon as Finley received it three years ago he went on a hot streak, hitting over .350 for the next three months.
Right after he received it from Finley, Erstad went on a hitting streak and was injury free through the first month of the season.
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<< <i>OMG that Rohmberg "touching" superstition (or OCD) is freakin' hilarious. I had a great time visualizing some of that. The best is that an ump had to stop a game to tell players to stop touching him. Classic. >>
I completely agree.
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How could he not?
j
RIP GURU
<< <i>moises alou & urine
j >>
yuck. Just learned about that one. Oh man.
http://sportsfansnews.com/author/andy-fischer/
Mike
I wouldn't talk to anyone before a game...
At least until I begged the coach to put me in!
mike
it begs to have some clarity. nevermind...i found it.
"In a recent interview with ESPN's Gary Miller, Chicago Cubs outfielder Moises Alou revealed that during baseball season he urinates on his hands to toughen them up. Alou, one of the few major leaguers who doesn't wear gloves while batting, is backed up by Yankees catcher Jorge Posada, who says, "You don't want to shake my hand during spring training." Even Cubs hurler Kerry Wood mentioned on a local radio show that he's tried the technique to remedy blisters on his pitching hand."