Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, August 15, 1993 TAG: 9308150079
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RAY COX
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
"I was worried I was going to get released," he said.
Pisciotta's paranoia came from two factors. One was his employers' dissatisfaction with the shadow he cast on the mound. It was too broad, the product of an overabundance of blubber. Pisciotta's other bane was a sore arm.
"I was never throwing like I thought I should be throwing," said Pisciotta, who missed the first half of the South Atlantic League season at Augusta.
But, being a man of action, Pisciotta, a native of Marietta, Ga., didn't stand pat. First, he concluded that fat would get him fired, so he went to work.
No more hot dogs and French fries at the ballpark. Cheese became a rare luxury. Then, to consolidate his losses, he began vigorous conditioning four times a week - running, racquetball, that sort of thing. He trimmed his 6-foot-5 frame from 240-plus pounds to 220.
The newly slim and trim Pisciotta saw his arm and pitching improve.
Since Pisciotta arrived here from Augusta after Jeff McCurry was called up to Class AA Carolina at midseason, not a lot has been crossing his plate at mealtime. And no opponents have crossed an even more important dish, home plate.
In 9 1/3 innings over nine games heading into Saturday's action, he had not given up an earned run and had been rewarded with five saves. The innings and the saves would have been more numerous if the Bucs, under .500 since his arrival, had given him more save opportunities.
"For all I know, I may still be released," he said. "I go out there with the attitude that every game might be my last. I play a little game with myself: Every situation is a one-run situation with runners on. I say, `These guys aren't scoring. Let's shut this thing down right now.' "
Pisciotta has had to sacrifice for baseball before. One of his losses was a lifelong dream. All through high school, he took advanced drafting and the like to prepare for an architecture curriculum in college. When Georgia Tech recruited him for baseball, he was delighted because he thought he could combine his two passions, architecture and baseball.
He thought he had his classes worked out until the day he got his schedule. To his horror, he found himself enrolled in business management classes. What's going on here, he asked?
"Ask your coaches," he was told. So he did.
"You don't have time for architecture," the coaches said. "You're here to play baseball."
So much for the myth of the student-athlete. Pisciotta doesn't spend much time humming the Tech fight song under his breath these days.
Still, the experience wasn't all bad. He met the love of his life at Tech, Tracy Kinnan of Middletown, Ohio, as well as Buc Ken Bonifay, a Tech teammate. Bonifay will be a groomsman when Pisciotta is married Oct. 16.
"We chose that date because that was my number at Tech and almost all the way through amateur ball," Pisciotta said. "I figured I wouldn't be getting in any trouble for missing an anniversary."
\ WHAT A LONG, STRANGE TRIP IT'S BEEN: Good cheer has been on the ebb in the Salem Buccaneers' clubhouse - perhaps because the Bucs own one of the Carolina League's worst records.
Last week, the discord spread to the relationship between the players and the front office.
The ill humor started with trips to Lynchburg and Prince William during the hottest part of July. On both occasions, the air conditioning either failed or was inadequate - depending on whose account you believe - on the charter provided by Lynchburg Bus Service.Some of the players complained to the bus driver and asked what could be done. The players were informed that a better bus would cost an extra $25. On a subsequent road trip, the players chipped in $1 apiece to that end.
Later, players complained publicly that the Bucs were too stingy to provide them with a coach with functioning air conditioning.
Not so, said Mary McConville, vice president of Lynchburg Bus Service.
"All our buses have air conditioning," she said. "There was a problem on one trip when the air conditioning broke down. That was the only time to my knowledge that happened. But you know the way July was [record heat]. Those buses are like iron lungs. They sit in the sun all day and soak up the heat. It may take a long time for them to get cooled down once they're started."
So what did the extra 25 smackers buy? "A television and VCR," she said.
The players' beef about the bus left Salem general manager Sam Lazzaro in an advanced state of meltdown.
"The whole thing is nonsense," he said. "The players are making the ballclub look bad by making it out to be cheap. That isn't the case. Evans and [pitcher Jason] Christiansen talked to me and asked me why they had to pay extra for a bus with air conditioning. I told them they paid extra for a bus with a VCR, and if they didn't believe me, that they could come with me to the office and we'd call the bus company right then to get it straightened out.
"They said they didn't have time because they had to run."
The players were not exactly jolly themselves. "I can't believe how cheap this team is," Christiansen said.
Lazzaro couldn't believe the players.
"Leave it to the pitching staff to complain about something after last night [when the Bucs were hammered 12-5 by the Lynchburg Red Sox as the staff coughed up 18 hits, seven walks and two wild pitches]," Lazzaro said Wednesday. "We should complain."
\ AND THE MOUNTAIN-TOPS THAT FREEZE: Oft-traveled Roanoker George Canale has ascended to the rarified air of the Rocky Mountains to play (again) for the Class AAA Colorado Springs Sky Sox.
Unlike Canale's last tour there, Colorado Springs is now in the Colorado Rockies' chain. He was aboard last year in the employ of the Cleveland Indians. The Indians' top farm team, the Charlotte Knights, pink-slipped him with a .216 average, six home runs and 27 RBI several weeks ago.
Shortly thereafter, he was picked up by Colorado, his fourth organization in eight years of pro ball. Filling in for injured first baseman Jay Gainer, Canale has batted .246 with two homers and six RBI in 19 games.
by CNB