They were planting a seed. There was little else for the White Sox to accomplish with yet another fake-to-third, throw-to-first pickoff move, the type that creates interminable games and few outs.
There was more important business to conduct Saturday with Sammy Sosa at the plate, a two-strike count, the Cubs within a run in the top of the eighth and two runners on base. Wasn’t there?
“I’ve probably done it a hundred times and gotten a couple of guys,” said Sean Lowe, the Sox reliever who had never used the move effectively at the major-league level.
Lowe, who was brought in to pitch to Sosa, had just tried the move and it hadn’t worked. But when Mark Grace scrambled back to first, bench coach Joe Nossek thought he spotted something from the Sox dugout.
Nossek suspected the Cubs would send Grace on a delayed steal in the belief the Sox would not throw to second and risk allowing Eric Young to score the tying run from third. So Nossek relayed the sign through catcher Brook Fordyce: Try the pickoff play again.
“You want to give them something to think about,” Nossek said. “That we will do it, and if it works, great, and if not, maybe we change their mind about doing anything.”
Fordyce looked into the dugout for Nossek’s hand sign.
“Like cleaning your glasses?” Nossek was asked.
“No,” he said, and smiled. “It’s not that subtle.”
Lowe had given up a home run in each of his previous two appearances, and had an earned-run average of 9.00 since May 1. One strike away from the end of the inning, the pickoff play on once more, he began to wonder what was happening.
“I stepped off, like, `What’s going on?'” Lowe said. “An 0-2 count. I’m ready to make my pitch.”
A year ago, in his first full major-league season, Lowe led the American League with six pickoffs. He said he felt a sense of security, not distraction, from Nossek’s observations and hunches in the dugout. He was willing to become part of a rivalry even older than Sox vs. Cubs–that is Cat vs. Mouse.
“If I can get a guy out without throwing a pitch, I’ll take it,” Lowe said.
He pumped his fist after the shocking sight of Grace trapped off first, flat-footed, ended the last, best Cubs chance in a 4-3 Sox victory.
“It’s luck, man,” Lowe said.
Grace made another suggestion:
“I think he got away with one. I think it was a balk.”
Cubs manager Don Baylor said videotape confirmed the balk.
“It wasn’t like I was trying to make a balk move to pick him off,” Lowe said. “I just wanted to make it look, the first movement, like I was going to the plate, make a quick move and put my foot down. I turned around and he was just standing there.”
The wonder was still in Lowe’s voice.
“I wasn’t even really trying to get him,” Lowe said. “It was just a matter of `maybe you can.’ It happens sometimes. Maybe he should have been paying attention more. . . . I wasn’t trying to trick anybody.”
On the earlier unsuccessful attempt, the Cubs said Lowe stepped toward third as the rulebook requires.
“I didn’t think he stepped toward third on the second one,” Grace said, “but I don’t think you’re going to get the call with the tying run on third in Comiskey Park.”
Suddenly a ballpark considered too big, too steep and too impersonal had developed a home-field advantage.
“I don’t think I balked,” Lowe said. “If I did, I did, but he didn’t call it. So that’s it.”
That was as close to an admission as Lowe was willing to offer. Already the word from the opposing clubhouse had begun to spread.
“Grace says you got away with one,” said a voice near Lowe’s dressing stall.
“You have to sometimes,” Lowe said. “If you don’t then you won’t survive very much.”
