He’d Like Chance to Be More Than a Spear-Chucker

Attention, Dodgers and Angels:

Can either of you guys use a relief pitcher who is big--6-2, 220--and intimidating, who is certified and tested drug-free, who is in fabulous condition despite his 38-inch waistline, and who can throw a baseball, I don’t know, maybe 105 m.p.h.?

Lack of experience may be a drawback. The guy is 28 and hasn’t really pitched since high school, but he’s been keeping the old wing in shape, by throwing a javelin, of all things.

His name is Tom Petranoff. Maybe you’ve heard of him. He broke the world javelin record by almost 10 feet three years ago and was favored to win the 1984 Olympics but fell on his face in that little meet.

Still, you gotta like the kid’s right arm.

Maybe I shouldn’t even be talking about this. I interviewed Petranoff the other day, and he mentioned this baseball thing in passing and asked me not to make a big deal of it. It’s just that he would be interested in maybe giving baseball a whirl in the near future.

I promised him I wouldn’t play it up big, and I won’t, but the thought is intriguing.

“I was clocked at 97 m.p.h. 2 1/2 years ago,” Petranoff said. “But that was with no warmup. I throw a two-pound javelin 77 miles an hour, so I think I can throw a baseball pretty well. I’ve got three or four pitches.”

Right. Like fastball, extra-fastball and hyperspace.

As Petranoff kicks around the idea of throwing baseballs instead of javelins, he draws inspiration from the fact that Cy Young was once a champion javelin thrower, a gold medalist, in fact. Tom’s wife, Caroline, has even taken to calling him Cy, kidding Tom about getting a real job and making big money.

Tom, if you’re reading, skip the rest of this paragraph, please. Gone? OK. The truth is that Cy Young did win an Olympic gold medal, but it wasn’t the baseball Cy Young. I don’t know if they’re related, but the baseball Cy Young was 85 years young when the 24-year-old javelin Cy Young won the gold medal in Helsinki in ’52. But why ruin a good inspiration?

As I was saying, if Cy Young can switch sports and win 508 big league games, why in the heck couldn’t Tom Petranoff become a big league pitcher?

Not that there’s anything less than noble about a career as a javelin thrower. You can even make a decent living at it, although javelin thrower money is small potatoes compared to baseball thrower money.

But Tom is upset that the ruling bodies of international track are conspiring to take the fun out of the javelin event for the long bombers.

Here’s what happened: Petranoff threw a monster 327-2 in the Pepsi meet at UCLA two years ago. Then, the next summer, East German Ewe Hohn threw an astounding 343-10. This is approaching the limits of most stadium infields.

So the International Amateur Athletic Federation’s technical committee got together and decided that the javelin event was becoming too dangerous. It isn’t meant to be a spectator participation sport.

The committee passed new guidelines for a legal javelin, starting this track season. The new javelin weighs the same, but its center of gravity has been relocated. It won’t travel nearly as far and has to be thrown on a different trajectory for best results.

Now there are about a million different models of javelins, and a million technical loopholes, and nobody is sure which javelins are legal. It has become very confusing and bureaucratic.

“I don’t want to come across as a crybaby,” Petranoff said. “I just want to let people know how political everything is. Instead of an event that shows talent and ability, they’ve turned it into a carnival-type situation. We’re being penalized for excellence.”

Indeed, one of the most compelling aspects of watching a javelin contest is marveling at the beautiful, soaring, rainbow arc of the spear as it soars the length of a football field. Now the rules guys have turned a tape-measure home run into a ground-rule double.

If Petranoff and Hohn ever learn how to launch the new javelin as far as the old one, the next step will be a compromise equipment ruling. Broomsticks will be used. They sail a long distance--up to several miles if they catch a stiff breeze--yet are relatively harmless when they land. Safety is a big factor in the javelin. For instance, the spin approach is outlawed, for obvious reasons.

Petranoff, however, claims that the new javelin is more dangerous than the old home-run spear. Instead of a long, low arc and soft, flat landing, the new javelin takes a higher arc and falls to earth like a bomb.

“I guarantee you you’re going to see more serious injuries,” Petranoff warned. “It’s going to wind up pinning someone to the ground.”

Hey, maybe track and field can start attracting the auto racing fans.

Anyway, Petranoff will be testing one of the thousands of semi-legal versions of the new javelin a week from Saturday in this year’s Invitational at UCLA, where the trouble all started. Tom thinks he is slowly learning how to throw the new one but he’s pretty sure he can still keep it inside Drake Stadium.

If the new javelin does knock him out of the world elite in the event, at least Petranoff has a fall-back sport. Just call him Cy.