John,
As an old pitcher with too many innings under my belt my experience has
been as follows: The sticky, gooey stuff is called pine-tar. It's the ugly
mess that batters use on their bats, and it sticks to anything it comes in
contact with. It would have been real fun if they'd have let us use it to
pitch.
Whether it's spelled properly or not, pitchers use a rosin bag. It's a
chalky powder, and in fact is rather tacky. It has some "stick" to it,
unlike a pure powder. My preference would have been for a bucket of pine-tar
on the mound. Oh, the nasty curves I could have tossed.....
In search of an ice bucket and whirlpool,
Dan Dannenfelser
Sacramento, CA
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