By: Haolun Zhang

In his early twenties, Pierre LePage stands in a baseball batting cage, fouling out every shot the machine throws at him. Passersby thought he was terrible at the sport, but not in their wildest imaginations did they think what he was practicing was an actual skill.

His skill was unique: he could foul the ball whenever he wanted, whether at bat in a real game, or at practice; he could use this skill to stay alive while at bat. Although this is a skill many would regard as useless to practice, due to this skill, he has gone through seasons without being fouled out. In his junior year, he had 248 times at bat, yet he only struck out 3 times.

Although he never went to the Major League, many players in the Major League still have vivid memories of him. Nick Ahmed, the shortstop of the Arizona Diamondbacks, remembered LePage’s shows in the batting cage: “He could foul the ball straight back during batting practice on command,” Ahmed said. “Just a different level of bat control.”

Eventually, this skill disappeared from modern baseball. Many professional players have decided to change their tactics in hitting in a sport awash with batted-ball data. Ahmed told the NY Times: “The idea is to square the ball up. Going up there with a defensive mentality to try to spoil pitches is not productive.”

Similar to this skill, LePage unfortunately never could find his place in the pro league. Teams have decided to recruit more heavy hitters, and have disregarded high-contact hitters. Slowly, he disappeared from the leagues.

Even though the skill of control has been nearly forgotten, the skill still exists within the major leagues, albeit one that not a lot of players utilize willingly. One of the exceptions is Luis Arreaz of the Miami Marlins. He is reaching nearly .400 despite having one of the league’s softest swings. With the slow elimination of the contact hitter, one of the exciting points of the game has also vanished. Decades ago, “it was once common for batters to intentionally fight off pitches at the edge of the strike zone, sending them into the crowd as foul balls to keep themselves alive and wait for something they could hit more cleanly.”

At the time contact hitters flourished, priorities were different. In the modern era, players prioritize exit velocity and on-base percentage, but Mark Grace, a Chicago Cubs star who retired in 2003 after a 16-year career, comments that baseball stars’ priorities were different in the past. After batters accumulated two strikes, the batters would choke up on the bats and start trying to prevent being struck out. “In my era, we were embarrassed if we struck out. Barry Bonds choked up, Barry Larkin choked up,” he said. Grace admitted to sometimes swinging for foul territory as a player, although he didn’t succeed a lot. “I put more balls in play trying to foul balls off than I actually fouled balls off,” he said.

Since batting data was recorded in 1998, there was an enormous amount of fouls recorded. However, modern-day players believe that it isn’t very possible. “From what I know about hitting,” said Christian Walker, a power-hitting first baseman for the Diamondbacks, “it seems impossible that somebody’s doing that on purpose.” Even if it was true, the old players “weren’t facing guys who were throwing 95 to 100 m.p.h. every night,” said Ahmed.

Although this art is nearly forgotten from the history of baseball, LePage is confused about why modern players have strikeout-happy turns. “If you get a slider low and away,” he said, “instead of swinging through it, wouldn’t you want another pitch?”

As weird as his response may seem to us, it would make perfect sense to him. Because from his perspective, it must’ve been really easy to foul the pitch with the lost skill of his.