“I remember when I first started throwing it, Mark Shapiro told me, ‘You’re the one guy where age is just a number,’ ” Wright said, referring to the Indians’ president at the time. “ ‘It doesn’t matter. To us, you’re 21 again. You just need to grow with it. The more you throw it, the better feel you’ll get for it, the more confidence you’ll get with it, and we just want you to build off of that.’ ”

Confidence is an issue for Gamboa, a factor that has, so far, helped keep him from joining Dickey and Wright on major league mounds. For the Orioles’ Class AAA team last season, Gamboa walked 84 and struck out 79, with a 4.61 E.R.A.

“Depressing, to say the least,” he said. “It was really tough, because I came from a career where walks were never an issue. I always pitched to contact. To put people on base and give a free base, that was tough, physically and mentally.

“But I went to winter ball this off-season, and I mixed it in with all my pitches. I was fortunate things went really well.”

Gamboa estimates that he threw the knuckleball only 40 percent of the time in winter ball. If he could control it better, he said, he would happily throw it more often. Niekro said Gamboa must trust the pitch.

“He’s got to get up to that 80, 85 percent,” Niekro said. “That’s what I keep telling him. Every time he gets into a little trouble or doesn’t quite get the knuckleball over or doesn’t feel good, he goes back to the other stuff, and he kind of gets them out and stays with the other stuff, other than committing — or recommitting — to the knuckleball the whole ballgame. You’ve got to commit to it. That’s what Wakefield finally did.”

Tim Wakefield had pitched parts of two seasons in the majors when Pittsburgh released him in 1995. He signed with the Red Sox, who arranged for him to work with Phil and Joe Niekro, another longtime knuckleballer, who died in 2006. Wakefield pitched 17 seasons for Boston.