Sports Radio Interviews

Mark Buehrle: Whatever Castro Called, I Threw It

I’ve gone through this with my slow-pitch softball team lately (no, no one threw a perfect game against us in slow-pitch), but bad hitting is contagious.  Not to say Buehrle was lucky, but once a pitcher gets inside the mind of hitters, look out.  Hitters start reaching for their troll dolls, reaching down for the extra scratch, etcetera.  I love the fact that Buehrle did it with a catcher who has never caught him before in Ramon Castro.  He kept the game plan extremely simple and he got more than extraordinary results.  Just shows you that baseball can be a simple game, unlike slow-pitch which is very complicated.  It would take me about 3000 words to explain how our team gets ready for a game.  Buehrle joined ESPN Radio Chicago to discuss the things he’s done in his career which he never fathomed, what he said to Castro pre-game, and what it was like hearing from the President post-game.

Did you ever think you could do this again?

“I’ve said I’m never going to do a lot of stuff in this game and I’ve done three things: no hitter, prefect game and a home run.  (Host: And the home run’s this year too!)  Exactly, well a lot of people sit there and say ‘What else do you have to do?’  Obviously, I’ve always said I want to get a Gold Glove because I take pride in my defense and everybody’s like, ‘The only thing left out there is the Cy Young.’  And, I keep on wanting to say that I’ll never win the Cy Young but I don’t know that I can say never, so, its unlikely that that will happen because I’m not a strike-out pitcher.  But, obviously today, I don’t even know if it’s sunk in yet. I  mean just wow, I don’t know.”

What were you thinking when Kapler hit that drive to left center?  I mean, it looked like he tagged that thing.

“I was just hoping that it stayed in the park to give Dewayne a chance to catch it.  I mean, I know Dewayne plays pretty shallow usually.  When he hit it, I didn’t know, I didn’t think he got it that good.  Just watching Dewayne and trying to watch the ball, and just told myself he’s going to get a chance to catch it.  Make sure it’s not too many rows deep, ’cause knowing him and the situation he was going to try and climb the fence and catch it, but obviously, I let him hit it in the right spot for him to catch it.”

You did it with Ramon Castro catching you for the first time.  How difficult was that?

“Yeah, I mean obviously I know with there being a double header tomorrow (Friday) and obviously it being a day game, a lefty out there, I don’t know what Ozzie and Coop and all those guys had planned, but they told me yesterday (Wednesday) ‘Hey, Castro’s going to catch.’  Came in today and said, ‘Hey, 1, 2, 3, wiggle’ because obviously this is the first time I have thrown to him.  1, 2, 3, wiggle, whatever you call, I’ll throw it, and hopefully make the best pitches at that time.  Obviously, crazy things happen here, and next thing you know, perfect game.”

What was the conversation like with the President, Barack Obama when he called you after the game?

“It’s just congratulations, and he said he is taking a little bit of credit because he wore the White Sox jacket at the All-Star game, and I told him I was actually surprised that he actually did it.  He told me in the locker room when I actually met him that he was going to do it, I didn’t think that he would actually go through, I thought he would actually wear an All-Star jacket.  But, you know, just congratulations, and you know it had a lot of memories for a lot of people out there, and that was about it.”

Listen to Mark Buehrle on ESPN Radio Chicago

Tags: Barack Obama, Baseball, Chicago White Sox, Mark Buehrle, MLB, Ramon Castro