Wild Pitches
by Ben Platt
last revised: August 12, 2006
mlb.com Welcome to Wild Pitches, where your favorite players take time to chat about something other than baseball. The questions will, hopefully, provide you with a glimpse of the person behind the ballplayer, and maybe a few laughs, too.
Six years from the day he retires, Greg Maddux will look at his plaque in Cooperstown and reflect on a remarkable baseball career that included more than 300 career victories, four Cy Young Awards, a world championship ring with the Braves in 1995 and the respect of just about everyone in baseball.
Maddux had two stints with the Chicago Cubs, won three of his Cy Young Awards with the Braves and recently joined the Los Angeles Dodgers, helping to fortify their pitching staff for a possible postseason run. Maddux chatted with Wild Pitches about his life off the diamond.
Growing up as an Air Force brat was …
A lot of moving. My father actually retired when I was about 11 or 12, so I really didn’t get a lot of it. I just remember living on the base and doing everything on the base, you know, bowling, baseball, school; everything was on the base. That included when he was based in Spain. We lived on the base, everybody was an American, we had Little League, school and everything else except when you were outside the base.
Moving to Las Vegas was great …
That’s where we grew up. We stayed on the base and then pops retired [and] started dealing poker. We moved off the base in Vegas and just grew up in Las Vegas like everyone else — parks, churches, movie theatres and the strip — so we kind of got a little bit of everything.
I love golf …
John Smoltz is not only a great pitcher, but he’s also the world’s greatest golf coordinator. We played some nice courses all around the country: New York, Philly, Colorado, here in Los Angeles. We always seemed to play on one of the nicest courses around. My favorite course is Pine Valley. I think it’s phenomenal. I loved it, and I hope to play it again soon. I usually play on the road, because you have a little bit more time; you don’t have to show up at the ballpark as early.
When the TV’s on I like to watch …
“House.” I like the “Law & Orders” and all the “CSI’s” are good, I especially like the one in Vegas. Those are the shows I watch when I can. We have two kids, and they keep us pretty busy.
My kids are great …
My son Chase is nine and my daughter Amanda is 12. My son is now old enough that I bring him to the park and go golfing with him. One of the nice things about playing in Los Angeles is that I can spend more time with them, especially when school starts again. They can come down and spend time together on the weekends.
The movies I like include …
“Silence of the Lambs” is one of my all-time favorites. My wife and I also saw “Red Dragon” a while back, you can’t beat “Hannibal Lecter.”I always wanted to be a baseball player …
I never thought about another career. I signed out of high school, and I was going to give baseball my best shot. If it didn’t work out, I would have gone back to college. Fortunately, it worked out, and I never had to worry about it.
When I’m finished with baseball …
I’m going to take a year off and take my wife to places we never had a chance to go to before. Maybe I’ll play some golf in Scotland and Ireland. After that, who knows? I may come back into the game, maybe coach for a little bit or just be involved with it in some way.
Ben Platt is a national correspondent for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.
