Chapter 4

The doctors at Johns-Hopkins seemed to share Dr. Gould's confidence that my vision was going to return to completely normal, but naturally I worried about it quite a bit. I knew that my unusual hitting style was heavily dependent upon having perfect vision.

Legend has it that The Great Ted Williams' vision had tested out as considerably better than 20-20. With that swing that Ted had, he probably could have been a successful hitter, even if he had worn bifocals. Not me. I didn't have the sweet swing -- just good hand-eye coordination and exceptional vision. I figured I'd need both to succeed.

I also worried about getting hit again. If a ballplayer gets hit in the face, and then tells you he's not gun-shy afterward, he's lying. It's hard to stand in there against major league pitching -- especially when those headhunters are pissed at you most of the time, for threatening their only reliable source of income.

Getting hit had never bothered me all that much -- my batting style invited it, because I tended to hang around too long in the box, waiting for the ball to break back over the plate.

Whoops! That one didn't break!

Getting plunked in the elbow or the butt was one thing, but getting it in the noggin was far more serious. The pain from head shots could be long-term, and the threat of permanent injury was way too great.

Two different specialists at Hopkins warned me that it was imperative that I find a way to keep it from happening again.

"What do you recommend?" I asked them.

"A specially designed helmet," the first doctor said.

"Goggles," the second guy told me.

Well, I wasn't proud. If wearing goggles could help keep me from getting effectively blinded by a pitched ball, I'd damned well wear goggles.

But after trying a wide variety of the things, I found that most of them would fog up, or the lenses were of unreliable quality and would negatively affect my vision.

Finally, I found some thick, ugly black rubber goggles that protruded almost an inch in front of my eyes. The lenses were terrible, but I just removed the damned things entirely and stared out through the open holes. No fog-up problems, no obscured vision. As long as I turned toward the pitcher and didn't get blinded by the goggles' frames, I was good.

Since I'd always had an extremely open stance, more or less facing the pitcher, the protruding frames of my rubber goggles didn't create a problem. I may have looked ridiculous, but I wasn't posing for the cover of Sports Illustrated.

Not yet, anyway.

I met the pitching coach one morning, ten days after the beaning, for batting practice at Camden Yards. I found out that I could see the pitched ball just fine -- at least at BP speeds. The thick rubber frames on the goggles made me feel more protected, more confident. I wasn't feeling gun-shy at the plate.

I told the pitching coach I was ready to rejoin the club.

Despite my being a rookie, most of the Oriole regulars had treated me decently since I'd joined the club. Now, after my serious beaning incident, they were, if anything, warmer toward me than they'd been before. If anybody could say "I know how you feel," it would be these guys.

But when I put on the goggles for the first time, the guys in the dugout did a triple-take.

OK, so maybe I looked pretty weird in them. I didn't give a shit. I felt protected.

"Goddamn!" our reserve catcher, Marty Farino, said. "You look like Captain America!"

Well, as I recalled my comic book days, Captain America had a bright blue mask around his eyes that hugs his face like a kid going out for Halloween. But, never mind. Farino's remark had been overheard, and from that moment on, I was Captain America.

So OK. I'd heard worse nicknames. They could have called me Bug Eyes, for example, or Frog. Captain America at least had a hint of the heroic, to go with its derisive intent.

It didn't take long for the reporters following the club to pick up on it, and pretty soon, I was Captain America to virtually everyone.