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Meet your neighbor:
John D’ Acquisto, the man who lived his dream.
by J.D. Hawk and Hovie Hawk
Throwing a fastball at an average 100 mph, John D’Acquisto used brute force to strike
out his opponents while playing in Major League baseball from 1973 until 1982. He
estimates that he struck out 2600 batters over his minor/major league career. Now
D’Acquisto resides in Otay Ranch and coaches pitching at EastLake High School and
MVP Baseball Academy in EastLake. “I threw hard, 100 mph early in my career,” D’Acquisto
said. “Back then I was ranked with Nolan Ryan, I was ranked about 5 by Sports Illustrated.”
he said. “Having all these years of experience has given me an open door to these
kids,” referring to his pupils at EastLake High. “They tend to listen very well because
I’m just not saying something--I can back it. A lot of guys can’t back it. Coach
John can back it. That’s real big to these kids.”
D’Acquisto was born in San Diego on Christmas Eve 1951. The son of a Sicilian Tuna
fisherman and WW2 veteran, D’Acquisto grew up with two great desires in life: Preparing
and eating Italian food, which he still enjoys, and watching the San Francisco Giants
play on TV, dreaming that he too would one day get to wear that uniform. “I loved
to watch Willie Mays play, and on CBS it was either the Yankees or the Giants. That’s
all you got to watch anyway--one on the East coast and one on the West coast,” he
said.
He attended St. Augustin High School without getting a single demerit and won the
Good Christian Conduct Award. But at 6’2”, 225 lbs, D’Acquisto was anything but a
“quire boy”. The coaches and scouts already knew that D’Acquisto powerful frame would
ensure that his future was big, not only for baseball, but for football too. “I had
144 offers to go to college because of football,” he said.
D’Acquisto also talked about the coaches at St. Augustine High School hiding him
from some scouts because he was already playing some high school tournaments at age
14, and his young age made it his illegibility questionable.
D’Acquisto chose baseball, however, and trimmed down to 205 lbs, running 8 to ten
miles everyday out of what he called “general principle”. This exercise principle
would remain with him his whole life. “I took hits, knocks, bumps, and grinds. Ran
until I puked basically. Just pushed my body for 32 years of sports,” he said.
At only 19 yrs of age, he was playing with the mighty Willie Mays on the San Francisco
Giants and his childhood heroes surrounded him on the field—a very intimidating experience
that left a lasting impression. “I was so nervous my knees were shaking. If you’d
put cymbals there, I could have played the national anthem. Then a high-pitched voice
called out, ‘Hey, hey, hey, don’t throw the ball yet. Wait until I get set.’ I turned
around and there’s Mays screaming at me. This had to be for every pitch!”
Mays later talked to D’Acquisto in the locker room explaining that he would catch
the ball better for D’Acquisto if D’Acquisto would only wait for Mays to get ready.
“He was about 40 and I was the new guy. I said ‘yes sir!’”
Mays and D’Acquisto formed a brotherly friendship after that, but there was still
the problem of age difference. “They’d go out for a few beers and I’d have to go
to a movie or watch Donald Duck in my room,” he said.
After playing only two seasons, D’Acquisto faced the biggest challenge of his career
as he threw out his arm so hard that the nerves in his arm swelled up three times
their normal size and surgeons told him he only had a 40% chance of ever playing
again. There were bone chips in my elbow...It was like someone took an ice pick and
poked holes in it,” he said.
The tough Italian came back three months later, however, with only minimal loss to
his game. “My average speed was 98 mph after that,” he said.
D’Acquisto went on to play for the San Diego Padres in 1977. He said one of the highlights
of being a Padre was being a part of the 1978 team. “This was because this was the
first time the Padres ever had a winning season,” he said.
D’Acquisto said he like the new PetCo Stadium being built for the Padres but has
his concerns about the amount of home runs that won’t be hit. “The water is right
there so you’re going to get a lot of dampness. The ball will suck up a lot of moisture
and it is going to get a lot heavier, and there’s going to be fewer home runs. You
watch.”
He also expressed his preference for the new Padre uniforms over their older brown
or “Taco” uniforms. He remembered that the Padres were actually blue before
1969. “They started changing ownership and that’s when we went into the canary yellow,
browns and you name it...whatever color of the rainbow you can think of,”
he said. We are there to entertain people, to play a sport as a team member, and
we should look presentable,” he said.
Despite arthritis being the price D’ Acquisto has had to pay for his baseball years,
he claims he regrets nothing of his life. “I wouldn’t do anything different. I was
where I wanted to be . I was with Willie Mays, I was with Gaylord Perry. I had a
sixteen-year career and 11 seasons in the big leagues. To be able to play a game
you loved since you were a kid and enjoy it...No, I wouldn’t do anything different.”
Contact J.D. Hawk |
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