Very Superstitious
It's 18 minutes before Joey Craska is scheduled to pitch for the Mars baseball team and the right-hander reports to the bullpen.
Not a minute before.
Not a minute after.
“It has to be 3:42 precisely (for a 4 p.m. start),” Craska says, chuckling. “It just has to be 18 minutes before.”
Many players across all sports and across all levels have certain rituals, superstitions and peculiar idiosyncrasies that they adhere to religiously.
Craska subscribes to more than most.
Craska, who was one of the top pitchers for the Planets this season and is also a starter for the Mars basketball team, has a slew of quirks that help him prepare for a game and excel during it.
“Before (a baseball) game I have to have a Starbucks cappuccino,” Craska said.
There have been some close calls. Several times the foamy, caffeine-infused concoction arrived to the dugout mere moments before first pitch.
But it always seems to get there, Craska said.
Basketball season is a different story on the cappuccino front.
Mars boys hoop coach Rob Carmody has put a moratorium on caffeine for Craska.
“I'm not allowed to get one,” Craska said, laughing. “He says it makes me play out of control.”
Craska also wears the same undershirt for every game and while he is batting, he partakes in another off-beat ritual.
Between each pitch, Craska draws a smiley face in the dirt near the batters box.
Every pitch. Without fail.
“When I was probably 8 or 9, there was a lull during a game and I drew a smiley face in the dirt,” Craska said. “I got back into the box and got a hit. I've been doing it ever since.”
Craska gets some odd looks at times.
“From umpires, mostly,” Craska said.
The superstitions don't stop there for Craska.
When he takes to the mound to warm up before the start of a half-inning, he throws the same sequence of warm-up pitches: fastball, curveball, slider, change-up, fastball.
Craska is by no means alone in the Butler County area when it comes to rituals and superstitions.
Tucked away in Slippery Rock High junior Kelly Benson's backpack is a woven purse filled with pennies.They aren't just ordinary coins.“Everyone started collecting them last season,” said Benson, a starting guard for the Rockets' girls basketball team of her teammates. “There's just something cool about finding them.”There are rules, however.The pennies have to be face-up when found — face-down means bad mojo — and they have to be turned in to Benson, the keeper of the coins, for safe-keeping.Benson has 24 in her the change purse given to her by Slippery Rock girls basketball coach Amber Osborn, who bought it on a trip to Mexico. The pennies continue to multiply.“Some of them are beat up,” Benson said. “The oldest is from 1960.”There's even a penny from the United Kingdom in the collection.For Osborn, who admits to being extremely superstitious, it's a team-bonding thing.But, she doesn't dismiss the good juju coins have given her team.Before the District 10 semifinal two years ago, Osborn found a heads-up quarter in the Meadville locker room and gave it to Bryce Bennett, one of the Rockets' biggest fans who has a very rare, genetic brain disorder caused by a mutated gene.Slippery Rock went on to win the district title and Bryce still carries the quarter around with him.He was at the Rockets' big win over rival Grove City recently.“He had that quarter in his pocket,” Osborn said.Sometimes a ritual can take root in a simple song.
Jarrett Heilman wasn't having particular success as a pitcher during his freshman year at Freeport.Then he heard children's song.Baby shark, doo doo doo doo doo doo.“I went out and had a perfect game through four or five innings,” Heilman said.Since then, Heilman has made it a point to listen to the song before each game he pitches.Heilman admits other factors have contributed to his recent success that included a microscopic 0.67 ERA last season for the Yellowjackets — he dropped 50 pounds and refined his mechanics and command — but listening to “Baby Shark” certainly hasn't hindered him.“You know what, you just roll with it,” Heilman said. “It's kind of weird, but people think of me as the 'Baby Shark' guy. There's no such thing as bad press.”The Freeport basketball Twitter account tweets out emojis of a baby and a shark before Heilman pitches.The team has embraced it and so has Heilman, who said, “I have fun with it.”
For Knoch senior Hannah Rowe, her ritual started at the top.Rowe, who has long, flowing hair, crafts it into a different style each season.This year, it was a long ponytail rippled with tiny rubber bands.“My hair was a huge ritual,” said Rowe, who helped the Knoch volleyball team to three consecutive WPIAL championships and a state title in 2017 as a dominant hitter. “Every season I picked a hairstyle and never changed it. This year it was my bubble ponytail.”A lot of work went into her hair.“I have extreme OCD,” Rowe said, laughing, “so it always has to be perfect.”Sometimes getting it perfect took longer than expected.“Depends on if it's a lucky day or not,” Rowe explained. “Sometimes it took not even five minutes, but other times it can be 15.”It's not hair that gets the attention of Mars junior shortstop JJ Wetherholt, but he does pay close attention to his head.While his teammates take batting practice without a helmet, Wetherholt does.It's his ritual.“I feel like it's more realistic for the games,” Wetherholt said. “I'm the only one who does this, but, hey, it works for me.”
Senior Jake Chapla was one of the best place kickers in NCAA Division II on a nationally-ranked football team at Slippery Rock University.This season, he broke The Rock record for career points.And he may owe it all to holder Jackson Gildea.Not because of his expert holds, but because of his expert massages.“Definitely it was Jackson Gildea rubbing my calf before every field goal and PAT,” Chapla said.“Every time,” Gildea added.
Osborn has more quirks than just collecting coins.She'll discard an outfit she's worn during a loss and never put it on again.She has a knack of finding four-leaf clovers.And during her playing days at Grove City High School and Slippery Rock University, she was a slave to her accessories based on wins and losses.“I was superstitious to the point I wore the same socks if we won until we lost again,” Osborn said. “If I wore white spandex under my uniform and we won, I wore white spandex again until we lost.”Osborn also prays to herself during the National Anthem.She also remembers a ritual former player Jenna Whitmer had.“I remember she had the same hair tie all season and it ripped,” Osborn said. “She was devastated.”
Most players have some sort of ritual.It's what calms them. Relaxes them. Gets them focused.Whether it's a certain song playlist, a certain routine, a certain drink or a certain piece of clothing, it's what gets them ready to compete.And excel.For Craska, his myriad of rituals draw strange looks from time to time.But it's who he is.His teammates have just grown to accept Craska's eccentricity.“At first they asked, 'What are you doing?' Craska said. “Now it's just, 'That's just Joey.'”
