Fade in.

George Edward "Rube" Waddell, a mountain of a man, peers over his glove at the hitter. His eyes light up and a small, twisted smile crosses his face.

Gripping the baseball in his left hand tightly, he winds up and delivers the pitch.

With scorching speed it zings into the mitt of Philadelphia Athletics catch Ossee Schreckengost.

Strike three.

Waddell cartwheels off the field to the delight of the fans.

It's just one short scene in a life rich with plot twists and zany antics.

Waddell, who grew up in Prospect, was anything but boring, and for six seasons in the early 1900s, he was more dominating than Cy Young, Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson.

He had a rock star-like existence. He quit baseball for part of a season to join a traveling show called the Stain of Guilt. He chased fire engines and fought fires on days when he was supposed to pitch. He played marbles with kids outside the ballpark when he was supposed to be inside pitching. He saved people from drowning in bodies of water - even if they weren't really drowning.

Waddell was the first, true cult hero in sports, long before Babe Ruth swatted his first home run.

But like a rock star, his career and life ended way too soon.

Fade out.

Waddell hated to be called "Rube," a nickname he picked up early on because of his antics on and off the field.He felt it was an insult and would try to pummel anyone who called him that.He preferred "Ed," or "Eddy." Most just called him great."He actually knocked a guy down the stairs once for calling him 'Rube,'" said Slippery Rock University history professor Alan Levy, who wrote a book about Waddell. "He didn't like it."But it was part of his persona.Waddell wasn't an instant hit in the majors, though. It took time for him to harness his incredible fastball in an era when hitters were concerned only with making contact and not driving the ball.But when he did harness it, no one was greater.Waddell broke into the majors in 1897 after playing some semi-pro baseball in the Evans City area. He pitched for the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1900, leading the league in ERA, but was only 8-13.It wasn't until he joined Connie Mack in Philadelphia in 1902 that his career took off.He is credited with saving the American League from bankruptcy and still holds the league record for strikeouts in a season by a left-hander with 349 in 1904."In terms of putting people in the seats," said Indianapolis-based writer Dan O'Brien, who is an expert on Waddell and he wrote a screenplay about his life, "he was bigger than Cobb, bigger than Mathewson, bigger than Johnson. No one had the drawing power of Rube."Until 1965, Waddell was the only pitcher to strike out 300 batters in consecutive seasons. He is also the first AL pitcher to strike out the side on nine pitches.He accomplished that feat in 1902, a year in which the American League didn't count foul balls as strikes."That was nine pitches, nine whiffs," O'Brien said. "That's an amazing accomplishment."Waddell was full of them. In his first year with the Athletics, he led the league in strikeouts with 210, despite joining the team in mid-season.He had 50 more strikeouts than Cy Young in 109 fewer innings.O'Brien sees that season as Waddell at his most dominant."In many ways, that was his most impressive strikeout season," O'Brien said. "He averaged 6.84 strikeouts per nine innings. Cy Young averaged 3.74."In 1902, eight percent of all the strikeouts in the league came from Rube," he added. "If a pitcher had that kind of percentage now, he'd have to strike out 1,100 or 1,200 hitters in a season."But as great as he was on the field, off the field, he was a ticking time bomb.

Rube Waddell wasn't normal, but he certainly wasn't dumb, either."Rube was a child," Levy said. "He was a kid who never grew up."Some considered him retarded, but many who researched his life discount that.There have even been attempts to formulate a psychological profile on Waddell to see what made him tick.The bottom line? No one knows what made Waddell tick."Why was he like that is the No. 1 question asked about Rube," O'Brien said. "Was he dropped on his head as a baby? We'll never know."Nor should we, O'Brien said.Waddell was what he was: eccentric, sometimes to a fault.He fought fires, sometimes leaving the mound in the middle of a game to do it. He tried to save people from drowning and sometimes people would fake like they were just to see Waddell jump in the water."People did that to him a lot," Levy said.Members of the opposing team tried everything they could to distract him.They would bring clowns and toys to the dugout to try to distract him - anything to get him off his game."If he was focused, you could throw an egg and hit him in the head, and it wasn't going to matter," Levy said. "Sam Crawford, a Hall-of-Famer, said the key was you had to keep him laughing, because if you didn't, and he was able to bear down, you didn't have a chance. Not a chance."The problem with Waddell was that he was easily distracted.In 1903, he left the Athletics to join a traveling melodrama group called the Stain of Guilt. He played himself, the famous baseball pitcher.He received mixed reviews. Most reviews were kinder than usual because it was Waddell.But he took his acting seriously - too seriously."He was supposed to rescue the damsel in distress," O'Brien said. "And that included physically accosting the character who held the damsel. Rube would beat the crap out of the guy."Waddell loved to act. He played Santa Claus in a church in Butler in 1895."Rube was so distracted mentally," O'Brien said. "Eventually Connie Mack finally had enough of him."Waddell's eccentricities also cost him a trip to the World Series.Waddell hurt his pitching shoulder in 1905 after a scuffle with teammate Andy Coakley.Back then it was an unwritten rule that men were not to wear straw hats after Labor Day. If a man did wear one, anyone had permission to take it off his head and punch a hole through it.Waddell was very aware of that rule and when Coakley showed up to the train platform with a straw hat nestled on his head after Labor Day, Waddell took action.He stormed off the train and ran full speed toward Coakley."Coakley is seeing this 6-foot-4, 225-pound idiot running at him and turned his shoulder bag that had his baseball spikes in them and swung around and smacked Rube right in the face with it," Levy said. "Rube was dazed and thought Coakley had punched him, so he jumped after him. The team saw what was going on and tried to break it up and they all piled on them. Everyone landed on Rube's shoulder."

Fade in.Connie Mack consoles Rube Waddell, a hollowed-out figure of the mighty man he once was, who was drawing his last breaths in a sanitarium in San Antonio, Texas.It's April 1, 1914 and Waddell's life, which began on a Friday the 13th in 1876 is drawing to an end on April Fools Day.Waddell died of tuberculosis, which he contracted while helping the citizens of a small town in Kentucky try to thwart a flood with sandbags. He was 37.His life story has made excellent fodder for a screenplay called simply "Rube" that O'Brien has been pitching for five years.In the wake of movies about Honus Wagner, it's starting to get some attention."His story is a classic Greek tragedy," O'Brien said. "He is the classical flawed mythological figure. Only he had an 'Achilles' brain.'"Fade out.