Is there a better story right now in the Major Leagues than the St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Rick Ankiel? The former flame-throwing pitcher — he of a 97-mph fastball and knee-buckling curve who amassed 11 wins in his 2000 rookie year, including 194 Ks over 175 innings — saw his entire career collapse, beginning with a fateful playoff game that year when he not only couldn’t get anyone out — he couldn’t even find the plate anymore. Along the way, he even became the first pitcher in MLB history to throw five wild pitches in one inning.  More struggles followed, including surgery, eventually leading to the once-prize prospect to head into Tony LaRussa’s office in March 2005 – and quit. And just like that, another would-be star extinguised nearly as quickly as it began. Or . . . was it?

Determined to make it back to the big leagues as a hitter, Ankiel hit 32 home runs this year for the AAA Memphis Redbirds, earning a rightful promotion to the parent club last week. Great story, right? But it doesn’t even end there. Not only did the Busch crowd give him a standing ovation before his first AB, but it responded with a demand for a curtain call after the seventh when Ankiel blasted a Doug Brocail fastball into the right field seats — bringing his manager to tears in the process (which LaRussa no doubt promptly soothed with a bottle of scotch, according to unconfirmed BaseballBigMouth.com sources - Editor). 

“You almost can’t put it into words,” said Ankiel, added another two taters two days later and is batting .375 with three homers, six RBIs and a 1.000 slugging percentage in four games. “I couldn’t have written that any better. It felt so good I can’t describe it. It’s almost euphoric.”

Determination like that is deserving of applause from fans of all teams, regardless of affiliation. Here, here, Ankiel. Now settle back down in the mediocrity of your surroundings and join your Cardinals’ teammates in missing the playoffs after somehow beating my team in the World Series.

No . . . The Heckler still ain’t over that one, gang . . . sigh . . .

- The Heckler

CLICK HERE to read what Baseball Big Mouth thinks of Tony “The Town Drunk” LaRussa

CLICK HERE to read about former Detroit Tiger/New York Yankee Cecil Fielder’s latest gig

CLICK HERE to read what Baseball Big Mouth’s really thinks about ESPN’s Joe Morgan

clipart courtesy of iband.com Used with permission

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 15th, 2007 at 12:01 am and is filed under Baseball History, Baseball News and Views, Baseball. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.