這是一篇ESPN insider的文章 不過有討論版把他偷渡出來 時間大約是上次對小熊系列賽的時候 裡面有些關於Pence的小故事 有興趣的可以看看 The ground ball to shortstop that Hunter Pence hit against the Cubs the other day was routine in every way, except that it was Pence who was speeding to first base, moving, as always, like he was running from a swarm of killer bees. As he fielded the ball, Cubs shortstop Ryan Theriot gathered himself for just a moment, a slight hesitation, and by the time his throw reached first base, Pence's foot had hit the bag. Safe. Earlier this season, Cubs first baseman Derrek Lee had said to Pence, "You get there faster than the fast guys." This time, Lee had a question for Pence: "How the heck do you do it?" "I believe," Pence responded. In a season in which managers have benched stars for not hustling out of the box, Pence runs hard on every ground ball, on every fly ball, as he has since he was a kid. His dad espoused the hustle of Pete Rose and George Brett and Craig Biggio, and then, when Pence was at Texarkana Junior College, his head coach said something that snagged deep inside Pence. Matt Deggs, now an assistant coach at Texas A&M, told Pence and his teammates, "The one thing you can control in baseball is that you can outhustle the other team." This is what Pence believes: He will always outhustle the other team. Plus, he's pretty fast, with his unorthodox, frantic stride that's like something you see in a Roadrunner cartoon: His legs churn like pistons on an old-fashioned steam train, but his head doesn't seem to move at all. When Pence was in high school, he worked out with the track team, without actually competing in meets; he was intrigued by the idea of speed, of trying to run as fast as he possibly could. "He'll get down to first 4.0 or 4.1, every time," a scout said the other day, "depending on how hard he swings." When Pence reaches a two-strike count, he has a habit of drifting into the ball as he pulls his bat through the zone, which makes it look as if he's running into his swing, like another well-known right fielder. "Holy Ichiro!" teammate Geoff Blum shouted at him after he did this once, but of course, there's a distinct difference between Pence and Ichiro: Suzuki is a left-handed hitter, Pence a right-handed hitter. When Pence was playing in Double-A, he once caught himself drifting a bit mentally; he hit a pop-up and charged around first base. "Hard enough," he recalls. But he wasn't moving with full intensity or purpose, and he knew it. When the ball was caught, he realized that if the ball had fallen, he probably wouldn't have been able to make it to second base. So the next time he hit a pop-up -- "the very next time," he said -- Pence busted it out of the batter's box and barreled around first base, legs pumping. The ball fell, Pence wound up on second base, and his accountability to himself was rewarded, and reinforced. Pence will realize after an ugly at-bat that he was not as mentally focused as he might have been. He might not have followed a plan, or he might have swung at a bad pitch. But he will not let himself have any regrets about how hard he runs to first base. "There will be some times when you run to first base where your muscles will be tight, and you won't run as fast," he said. "You can't play every single play full-out in the season. But I still know that I can run hard. I know I can outhustle the other team." Pence slammed a home run Saturday, the Astros won again, and Roy Oswalt is finishing his season on a major roll. Pence "Biggio" to first base 這應該就是他在休士頓為什麼這麼受歡迎的原因吧! --

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