Armed with that memorable Fu Manchu mustache, Luis Tiant pitched only two years for the Yankees, but it seemed like a much longer stretch of seasons, four or five at least. Curiously, he will forever be embedded in my memory as a Yankee, more so than any other team, perhaps because of those horrendously humorous hot dog commercials he used to make. I’ll also remember those newspaper images of a shirtless Tiant smoking a cigar while soaking himself in a hot tub. (According to eyewitnesses, Tiant also used to take cigars into the shower with him. I wonder how he kept those cigars from being doused.) Tiant always seemed to have something in his hand, whether it was a hot dog, a cigar, or a baseball.
When Tiant made his major league debut for the Cleveland Indians in 1964, he fulfilled a dream of playing in the big leagues, a goal that inspired him more than most; he felt particularly motivated after his equally talented father was denied major league entry because of the darkened color of his skin. Luis Tiant, Sr. was a respected left-hander who forged a representative career in the old Negro Leagues during the summers and the Cuban League during the winters. Fiercely competitive and armed with a torturous herky jerky delivery, the elder Tiant deserved a bigger stage, but the shameful wall of segregation kept him from ever achieving his own major league dream.
As a rookie in 1964, the junior Tiant proved that he belonged in the big leagues. Pumping fastballs with his potent right arm, Tiant won 10 of 14 decisions and posted a 2.83 ERA. The following year, he hurled three shutouts and became a fulltime member of the Cleveland rotation. Tiant remained a solid No. 2 starter for the Indians until 1968, when he vaulted himself into the elite class of American League pitchers. Achieving one of his first tastes of national stardom, Tiant was featured on the cover of The Sporting News, the renowned “Bible of Baseball.” Although the summer of ’68 became known as the “Year of the Pitcher,” Tiant’s numbers transcended the context of the era. Tiant spun a league-leading ERA of 1.60 and held opposing hitters to a .168 batting average, while allowing just under 5.3 hits per game. Even in the dead ball era, which was not all that different from the season of 1968, those numbers would have remained impressive.
Not coincidentally, the ‘68 season also marked the unveiling of El Tiante’s unique set of deliveries. Debuting the new motion against the California Angels, he first began to use his trademark pirouette windup, replete with exaggerated hesitations, body spins, and bobblehead movements. Tiant began to incorporate the strange delivery more and more often, making it a regular part of his already diverse pitching repertoire. On days when his fastball and various breaking balls lacked their usual snap, an innovative Tiant found himself turning to an even wider array of his unusual wind-ups and deliveries, fully replete with spinning torso, head-turning bobs, and assorted other machinations.
