[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Klrdds

I don't know who would be the best magician but 2 things.
I played baseball in high school at the same time as Wade Boggs did in Tampa, FL and he was already a hitting legend then . The ball came off his bat literally like a rocket with a sound that you had never heard before. If you saw him play or had the unfortunate experience of pitching to him you knew he was special.
Also a friend of mine did spring training with the Padres back in the Gwynn era and he loves to tell stories of Gwynn's hitting practiices after regular BP during spring training. All the hopefuls would watch Gwynn hit baseballs after BP with a live arm full speed pitcher and hit the balls into 3-5 Home Depot buckets placed on their sides around the infield and outfield, and not finish until he had hit a set number of baseballs into these buckets. He always moved the buckets to different spots everyday and set a pre-determined number of balls to hit into them before he started. He did this everyday without fail my friend said and he had a number of people watching , and when he finished he would just smile at them with a confidence that said ...See that's how it's done !
That isn't a stat but shows true magic with the bat .

Another infuriating thing about Boggs -- in BP he would hit pitch after pitch out of the park, starting with left field and moving across to right. He had serious power but except for one weird year where he hit 24, seemed to prefer to hit for the high BA.