Stephen Louis Dalkowski Jr. (June 3, 1939 – April 19, 2020), nicknamed Dalko, was an American left-handed pitcher. He was sometimes called the fastest pitcher in baseball history and had a fastball that probably exceeded . Some experts believed it went as fast as , others that his pitches traveled at less than that speed. As no radar gun nor similar device was available at games to measure the speed of his pitches precisely, the actual top speed of his pitches remains unknown. Regardless of its actual speed, his fastball earned him the nickname "White Lightning". Such was his reputation that despite his never reaching Major League Baseball (MLB), and finishing his Minor League Baseball career in Class B baseball, a 1966 article in The Sporting News about the end of his career was headlined "Living Legend Released".
Dalkowski was also famous for his unpredictable performance and inability to control his pitches. His alcoholism and violent behavior off the field caused him problems during his career and after his retirement. After he retired from baseball, he spent many years as an alcoholic, making a meager living as a manual laborer. He recovered in the 1990s, but his alcoholism left him with dementia and he had difficulty remembering his life after the mid-1960s.
Screenwriter and film director Ron Shelton played in the Baltimore Orioles minor league organization soon after Dalkowski. His 1988 film Bull Durham features a character named Ebby Calvin "Nuke" LaLoosh (played by Tim Robbins) who is based loosely on the tales Shelton was told about Dalkowski. Brendan Fraser's character in the film The Scout is loosely based on him. In 1970, Sports Illustrated'''s Pat Jordan wrote, "Inevitably, the stories outgrew the man, until it was no longer possible to distinguish fact from fiction. But, no matter how embellished, one fact always remained: Dalkowski struck out more batters and walked more batters per nine-inning game than any professional pitcher in baseball history."
Early life Of Polish descent, Dalkowski was born on June 3, 1939, in New Britain, Connecticut, the son of Adele Zaleski, who worked in a ball bearing factory, and Stephen Dalkowski, a tool and die maker. He began playing baseball in high school. He also played football as a quarterback for New Britain High School. He is reputed to have been able to throw a football 100 yards (91.4 m). During his high school football career New Britain was undefeated, winning the division championship in 1955 and 1956.
Dalkowski excelled the most in baseball during high school. He still holds a Connecticut state record for striking out 24 batters in a single game. Dalkowski started the 1957 high school baseball season with consecutive no hitters. In three high school baseball seasons, he had 313 strikeouts in 154 innings, with 180 walks.
In 2001, he was inducted into the New Britain High School Sports Hall of Fame.
Baseball career
After graduating from high school in 1957, scout Frank “Beauty” McGowan signed Dalkowski with the Baltimore Orioles for a $4,000 signing bonus, and allegedly other payments. He spent his entire career in Minor League Baseball (1957 to 1965), playing in nine different leagues during his nine-year career.
Dalkowski's claim to fame was the high velocity of his fastball. Accurate measurements at the time were difficult to make, but the consensus is that Dalkowski regularly threw well above . Dalkowski's raw speed was aided by his highly flexible left (pitching) arm, and by his unusual "buggy-whip" pitching motion, which ended in a cross-body arm swing. Teammate, and future Hall of Fame executive, Pat Gillick reported Dalkowski had hypermobility in his shoulder and wrists. Dalkowski disagreed with Gillick on that.
Dalkowski had extreme difficulty controlling his pitches. He often walked more batters than he struck out, and threw numerous wild pitches — sometimes so wild that they ended up in the stands. Batters found the combination of extreme velocity and lack of control intimidating. Oriole Paul Blair stated that "He threw the hardest I ever saw. He was the wildest I ever saw". During Dalkowski's 1960 season with the Stockton Ports in the California League, umpire Doug Harvey observed that Dalkowski was the fastest throwing pitcher in the league, even when throwing at only three-quarters speed. But as to Dalkowski's control, Harvey added, "You think he's going to throw the ball right through the catcher. When he finds the catcher".
Dalkowski initially played for the Orioles' Class D minor league affiliate in Kingsport, Tennessee, the Kingsport Orioles of the Appalachian League. In 1957 at Kingsport, Dalkowski pitched a total of 62 innings, giving up only 22 base hits (3.2 hits per nine innings pitched) and striking out 121 batters, averaging an extraordinary 17.6 strikeouts per nine innings pitched. However, he finished the season with a 1–8 won loss record and 8.13 earned run average (ERA) because he walked an equally extraordinary 129 batters (18.7 bases on ball per nine innings pitched) and threw 39 wild pitches. By comparison, in 1957 Bob Turley led all MLB pitchers averaging 6.125 hits per nine innings pitched and 7.758 strikeouts per nine innings pitched; Jack Sanford led all MLB pitchers with 188 strikeouts (in 236.2 innings); and among all Orioles' pitchers throwing more than 50 innings in 1957, Al Ceccarelli had the worst bases on balls per nine innings pitched at 4.8.
Pitching for the Kingsport on August 31, 1957, in Bluefield, West Virginia, Dalkowski struck out 24 Bluefield Dodgers hitters in a single game, while also issuing 18 walks, and throwing six wild pitches.Kingsport Times News, September 1, 1957, page 9 Dalkowski had been unnerved early in the game when one of his pitches hit a batter in the head, sending him to the hospital. Orioles assistant farm director Harry Dalton attended the game, and stated the ball rebounded off the batter’s helmet like a pop up to second base. That player, Bob Beavers, was knocked unconscious and chose never to play baseball again.
In 1958, Dalkowski played for the Class A Knoxville Smokies, the Class B Wilson Tobs, and the Class C Aberdeen Pheasants of the Northern League. In 1959, he played for the Pheasants and the Class D Pensacola Dons. In 1957 and 1958, Dalkowski either struck out or walked almost three out of every four batters he faced. Overall in 1958, he gave up 81 earned runs on only 46 hits, but walked 207 batters in only 104 innings. He also had 203 strikeouts. While with Aberdeen he threw a one-hitter but lost, 9–8, on the strength of 17 walks. On May 17, 1959, he struck out 21 and walked eight for the Pheasants, in pitching his only no-hitter.
His only appearance for the MLB Baltimore Orioles came during the 1959 preseason in Memorial Stadium, during an exhibition game against the Cincinnati Reds. He pitched one inning and struck out the opposing side. After seeing Dalkowski come out to pitch, Reds' manager Birdie Tebbetts demanded that Orioles' manager Paul Richards not use Dalkowski or Tebbetts would not send his batters out to hit. Richards was amused and kept Dalkowski in the game. Tebbetts sent out his three batters, but told them they would be fined $100 if anyone stood close enough to the plate to be able to swing at Dalkowski's pitches.
In 1960, while pitching for the Stockton Ports in the Class C California League, Dalkowski struck out 262 batters and walked 262, averaging 13.81 strikeouts and walks per nine innings pitched. He had the lowest ERA of his career to date (5.14), a career-high 170 innings pitched and a career-low 11 wild pitches; but his record was 7–15. In separate games, Dalkowski struck out 21 batters, and walked 21 batters. In 1961, with the Class B Tri-City Atoms, Dalkowski was 3–12, with 150 strikeouts and 196 walks in 103 innings.
Because a pitcher is generally considered wild if he averages four walks per nine innings (a rate considered awful by Sabermetrics) a pitcher of average repertoire who consistently walked as many as nine men per nine innings would not normally be considered a prospect. But such was the allure of Dalkowski's explosive arm that the Orioles gave him chance after chance to harness his "stuff", knowing that if he ever managed to control it, he would be a great weapon. Playing under Earl Weaver (1959, 1962 to 1964)
In 1959, Dalkowski played under future Hall of Fame manager Earl Weaver in Aberdeen. He played for Weaver again in the 1960s for the Orioles' Single-A (1962) and then Double-A (1963 to 1964) affiliate, the Elmira Pioneers, in Elmira, New York.
It has been reported that Dalkowski's pitching significantly improved under Weaver's guidance in 1962. The Orioles, under Paul Richards, had given all of the players in their organization IQ tests. It was discovered that Dalkowski had a lower than normal IQ. In another telling, it was Weaver who had Dalkowski take an intelligence test along with the team's most intelligent player (Mickey McGuire), for comparison. Weaver later said that Dalkowski scored in the lowest percentile of all the people who had taken that intelligence test. There is speculation that Dalkowski had a learning disability or behavioral disorder, but it is unquestioned that by this point in his life Dalkowski suffered from alcoholism. (Weaver himself had difficulties during his lifetime because of his own abuse of alcohol.)
Weaver reportedly believed that Dalkowski had experienced so much difficulty keeping his pitches under control because he did not have the mental capacity to weigh too many factors while pitching. Weaver made things simpler for Dalkowski by telling him to only throw the fastball and a slider, and to just aim the fastball down the middle of the plate. This allowed Dalkowski to concentrate on just throwing the ball for strikes. Weaver knew that Dalkowski's fastball was practically unhittable no matter where it was in the strike zone, and if Dalkowski missed his target, he might end up throwing it on the corners for a strike anyway.
Under Weaver's stewardship, Dalkowski had his best season in 1962, posting personal bests in complete games and earned run average (ERA), and walking less than a batter an inning for the first time in his career. Weaver got him down to 6.4 walks per nine innings, after never having been lower than 13.9, and after having been at 17.1 just a year earlier. His 3.04 ERA was over two runs lower than his previous best. In an extra-inning game that year, Dalkowski recorded 27 strikeouts (while walking 16 and throwing 283 pitches).
Dalkowski himself said that Baltimore Orioles' pitching coach Harry Brecheen made adjustments to Dalkowski's pitching motion in 1962, by teaching Dalkowski not to throw across his body, and this improved his control. Dalkowski said of his pitching motion before this alteration, “I hit my left elbow on my right knee so often, they finally made me a pad to wear". Brecheen later said of Dalkowski, "In 33 years in baseball I never saw anyone throw faster than he did".
York White Roses' player Dalton Jones hit well against Dalkowski. Weaver instructed Dalkowski to intentionally hit Jones with a pitch in a 1962 game between Elmira and York. Dalkowski did not want to do that, but Weaver persuaded him. Dalkowski's pitch hit Jones in the shin, with Jones falling to the ground; but Jones was not harmed because he was wearing a shin guard. The incident still lead to a brawl, where the White Rose players pummeled Weaver instead of Dalkowski, knowing it was Weaver's doing.
Final playing years