tdtz. When I went to Pierce College, I actually sculpted my first figurative piece and it was Reggie Smith. Im had it done in wax, about 20 inches tall, but never cast it in bronze. It is long gone. I had him in that usual home run stance with the bat way above his head. He was the deadliest hitter I ever saw with a 3 - 1 count.
When I lived in the Valley, I would go to Buddies Bat-A-Way (on Van Nuys, I think) every day.....yes, every day. My friends dad owned the place and we would bat for hours, yes, again for free. My favorite is when we would go in the cage where the machine would throw the ball up to 90 or so miles per hour. If nobody was around, we would gather all the cut balls, damaged balls, etc and put them in the machine. They would fly everywhere when you were at bat! I used to hit really good as I had every machine timed. One day, some guy saw me and asked me to try out for a team at one of the parks. I just whacked the fastballs........then something happened I hadn't expected. The pitcher threw me an offspeed pitch. I swung and the ball was still coming to the plate. Everybody laughed and that was pretty much the end of any of my thoughts to join any team.
BTW; some of the Dodgers would come to the cage. I especially remember Dusty Baker. I thought the ball was going to go through the netting!
"Turtles, Frogs & other Environmental Sculpture"
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