Look: Baseball player derails rally with slick hidden-ball trick
Of all the ways to get a runner out in baseball, the hidden-ball trick is perhaps the hardest.
Not only does there need to be silent communication between at least two fielders, but an element of luck is also involved.
During a Tuesday night minor-league game between the Rochester Red Wings and the Charlotte Knights (Triple-A affiliates of the Twins and White Sox, respectively), everything came together perfectly.
With two men on base and one out in the bottom of the fourth inning, Knights infielder Patrick Leonard lined a single that should have loaded the bases.
But Rochester third baseman Jermaine Curtis had an idea that might help his pitcher, D.J. Baxendale, get out of the inning a bit quicker. He quickly thought up a way to trick the runner at third, Kevan Smith, into thinking the pitcher had the ball, then wait for Smith to step off the bag and tag him out.
“They had a rally going, and I figured it was the perfect time,” Curtis later told MiLB.com. “I try at least once or twice a year, and it usually works best when there’s a big situation.”
After the base hit, Curtis received the cut-off throw back into the infield. Then, he and Baxendale shared a moment.
“I just hid it in my glove, and then I turned around and looked at D.J. Baxendale,” Curtis said, “and it was like we were on the same page. He knew what I was thinking and I knew what he was thinking.”
Though no words were spoken, Baxendale did indeed understand what Curtis was trying to do, and that’s a big part of why the play worked.
“I was in between home and the pitcher’s mound. Jermaine caught the ball and kind of gave me a look and then gave me, like, the air throw and put the ball in his glove,” Baxendale said. “I noticed that the coach (Knights manager Mark Grudzielanek) and the guy on third base weren’t really paying attention, so I fake caught it and tried to slow walk around the mound, act like I was regathering myself.”
Curtis also had to get the attention of third-base umpire Scott Costello so he could know what was going on and thus make the correct call.
Curtis needed to make sure Costello knew that Baxendale had not gone back to the mound, because, per the Official Baseball Rules, “If there is a runner, or runners, it is a balk when the pitcher, without having the ball, stands on or astride the pitcher’s plate or while off the plate, he feints a pitch.”
Baxendale, whose father has worked as a scout for the Cleveland Indians and as a collegiate coach, was familiar with this rule.
“I come from a baseball family,” he said. “I knew as soon as he kept the ball, I had to stay off the dirt and just kind of sell it, walk around, stretch a little bit, just do anything I can to make that guy take that extra step off, make him think I’m getting ready to pitch.”
Curtis, meanwhile, was just waiting for the runner to step off the bag.
“I literally was standing like six feet away from the bag just waiting to see if he was going to get off the bag,” Curtis said. “Finally he just took one step off the bag as he’s still talking to the coach, and I just ran and tagged him.”
It worked. Smith was called out, and the Charlotte rally, which had produced one run already, ended up stalling. Baxendale struck out the next hitter to retire the side.
Later, the reliever expressed his thanks for Curtis’ heads-up play.
“We always say there’s outs to be made, whether it’s a pickoff, anything like that, making a good pitchout, giving your catcher a chance to throw,” he said. “Jermaine showed me another wrinkle tonight, the hidden-ball trick.”
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