The Phenomenon

by Rick Ankiel

  “What’d you learn today?” he’d ask.

  “A high fastball sure does carry,” I’d say.

  He’d laugh, and we’d move on to the next scouting report, a list of guys I’d heard of but not pitched against, and then a couple days later I’d go throw a hundred pitches and see how that went.

  Darryl was smart, and he saw things in a baseball game hardly anyone else saw. He worked so hard he made an entire pitching staff stronger and more prepared, because no one wished to be viewed as a slacker in comparison, though some days it was difficult not to be. He possessed a natural curiosity for what worked on a pitcher’s mound and what didn’t, and when he decided he wanted a new pitch to go along with his fastball and curveball, by the next spring he had a forkball that was among the best in the game. Darryl took the ball and made his starts and pitched his innings, because that’s what a pitcher was supposed to do, and he did not gripe about the heat or his shoulder being sore or the offense not getting him enough runs. He was the guy you wanted to sit next to on the bench for three hours during a game, then sit next to at a bar for an hour afterward, so he could tell you what you’d just seen for three hours.

  Darryl and his wife, Flynn, had two young children—a boy and girl, they were twins—and he talked about them often. He was eleven years older than I was, and while he had a family he adored and a job that took up most of his time, he found time for me and my career, and in many ways I wanted to grow up to be just like Darryl Kile. I wanted to be a good man. He wasn’t the next Sandy Koufax, but I’d have taken the life he had if I could.

  Nearing the end of August, Darryl and I were pitching one day apart from each other. First him, then me. I watched him pitch toward twenty wins at the end of a long season. They’re all long. He seemed to get stronger, and he found ways out of difficult spots, and in his final seven starts Darryl was 6–0 with a 2.72 ERA. I’d come in behind him on the next night, and in those seven starts I was 4–0 with a 1.97 ERA. On September 20 I beat the Houston Astros and the Cardinals clinched the division, and a week later I won my eleventh game. I’d finish 11–7 with a 3.50 ERA, my first season behind me, the playoffs six days ahead. That I’d ended so well, that the trials of the season had made me better, that the coaching staff’s confidence in me seemed to match the confidence I had in myself, I thought, meant the best was coming. First the Braves in the division series and then whoever came after them, and then the better part of a lifetime after that. I was ready.

  Scott Boras told me I’d start game one of the playoffs against the Braves. He was guessing, but his logic seemed sound. Because there would be an off day between the first and second games, the pitcher who started game one could pitch game four on regular rest, that being four days. The gap between games two and five was three days. I’d not started on three days’ rest as a professional. Darryl had, plenty. I was twenty-one years old, and even before the notions of hard innings and pitch limits had taken hold in the league, people were smart enough to have figured out the longer the rest, the safer (and stronger) the arm. Then, the Braves had been tough on Darryl in two starts. They’d not seen me since the September before, thirteen months before, and in the meantime I’d put nearly two hundred big-league innings on my arm and into my head and introduced a sinker that darted away from right-handers. No one was more sure of himself than I was.

  The counterargument to me in game one? Because Darryl Kile, that’s why. He was the ace, undisputedly. He was a grown-up with playoff experience. A month before, he’d allowed two runs in a complete-game win against the Braves in Atlanta. Andy Benes had something wrong with his hand, Garrett Stephenson’s elbow was sore, and Pat Hentgen seemed worn out. That left Darryl and me.

  Tony La Russa and Dave Duncan had penciled out a rotation that had me starting game one. They slept on it for a night. Then two. Tony wondered about putting so much on a twenty-one-year-old, a rookie. He believed there was a risk of too much too soon and whatever might come of that. I didn’t believe it, though. I wanted the ball. And by Monday morning—the day after our final regular-season game and the day before we’d open the division series against the Braves—the lure of having Darryl and me cover four of those games was too much to pass up. If the series went five games, I would pitch games one and four. Darryl would pitch games two and, on three days’ rest, five. With everybody else a little banged up or gassed, that would leave only game three to be covered, and that went to Garrett.

  Still, Tony remained bothered. He would, by this plan, get the most from his two healthiest arms. But, he asked himself, what of the larger burden on me, the rookie? So, on Monday, he announced that Darryl Kile would start game one, and Darryl answered the media’s questions that afternoon about facing the Braves knowing he would not be the starter the next afternoon, that I would. This was Tony’s plan to relieve some of the pressure. That night he called Atlanta’s manager, Bobby Cox, and told him they’d made a switch, that Ankiel—not Kile—would start Tuesday.

  “Rick’s got enough on him,” he told Bobby, and Bobby thanked him for the call.

  The Cardinals later sent out a release to reporters, notifying them of the change—which wasn’t a change but part of the plan all along.

  That’s what I walked into Tuesday morning, October 3, 2000. Not that I cared. Tony and Dave knew what they were doing. If Darryl was disappointed, he didn’t say so. And the Braves were not at a disadvantage. The media believed they had been duped, and the fans who had gone to bed thinking they’d see Darryl the next afternoon were confused. None of it registered with me. I knew I’d miss Mike Matheny, my regular catcher, but I’d pitch on five days’ rest, one more than usual, I’d pitch at home, and I was pitching better than I ever had. Give me the ball and get out of the way.

  I had an apartment in Clayton, a suburb west of St. Louis, on the other side of a large green park that had museums and a zoo I never went to. My mom was in town for the first two games of the series. She stayed with me. We drove to the ballpark hours before first pitch. I left her to fill that time on her own and made my way to the clubhouse, little in my head but what a great day this would be, feeling young and invincible. I also was wondering how many hits I might get off Greg Maddux. At my locker I drew out a bat and felt it in my hands, waggled it, took some easy swings. A voice behind me laughed and said, “You’re always worried about hitting.” Not worried, though. Excited. I enjoyed pitching. I was good at it. I loved to hit.

  I’d batted .250 that season, which I thought was pretty decent for a guy who hardly ever hit anymore. I homered twice in the same week in April so pretty much tried to jack everything after that. We won both of those games and I didn’t give up a run in either, so I figured it was good luck for my pitching if I hit a home run. I tried a lot.

  I stood there half dressed and half listening to the chatter of a clubhouse coming alive, a black Rawlings bat cocked behind my left ear and thinking about fastballs—Maddux’s, not mine. Satisfied with that, I leaned the gamer bat against the side of the locker, slid a pair of headphones over my ears, and got to thinking about being a pitcher. Or at least acting like being a pitcher. My routine started with a nap, maybe forty minutes, in the trainer’s room, which never failed to amuse some of the veteran Cardinals. I trusted Dave Duncan’s scouting report, and I trusted myself even if a game started to stagger away from that scouting report, and I trusted that I was a better pitcher than any of those other guys—today the Braves—were hitters. I slept well.

  There’s something ceremonial about sliding the game jersey from its hanger, slipping into it, and then buttoning it. And then it was time. The headphones were gone. The clubbie had gathered up the bat and run it through the tunnel to the rack in the dugout with the rest of the bats. The time had come to pitch, to check in with my body, to stretch and throw long in the outfield, to finish in the bullpen, to feel the ballpark fill up and somewhere in my peripheral vision see the stands turn red and somewhere in the distance hear my name in the mouths of those people, loude
r on that day because they’d expected Darryl Kile. We’d won ninety-five games. We were a good team. Eighteen years had passed since the last Cardinals’ World Series championship, most of a generation had passed, and folks get impatient. The Braves had won ninety-five too. We’d have to play well, and we knew we would, starting that day, starting with that first pitch, starting with me.

  In the bullpen, we’d start with fastballs on my arm side of the plate. That is, away from right-handed hitters. Then to the other side of the plate. Some curveballs. Then we’d pick a couple guys from their lineup—Chipper Jones, the switch-hitter, a righty against me, for one—and simulate an at bat. Strike one. Ball one. Foul ball. Ball two. Finish him with the curveball, always finishing with a strikeout, always with a thwack of the catcher’s mitt and a nod and an “All right, let’s go” and a lot of positive thoughts.

  My game. October. Playoffs. I walked from the bullpen to the dugout, staring at the ground a few yards ahead, aware of the grass under my feet but not really seeing it, aware of a ballpark thumping with music and laughter but not really hearing it. If there’s a baseball equivalent to the boxer’s entrance, this was it, without the guys bouncing around in the background or the glittery shorts. I’d be so deep into my psyche, seeing but not seeing, that sometimes I’d be surprised by the top step of the dugout.

  It was weird, a little, that all this would come against the Braves, my favorite team until about my third day as a Cardinal. Growing up, I could recite their lineup and do a reasonable batting impression of most of them. In game one, their leadoff hitter was Rafael Furcal, who in a few weeks would win the National League Rookie of the Year award. I’d be second. Behind him in the order was Andruw Jones, who four years before had hit two home runs in the first game of the World Series against the Yankees, making me about the happiest kid in Fort Pierce. Then Chipper Jones, Andrés Galarraga, Brian Jordan, Reggie Sanders, Walt Weiss, Paul Bako, and Greg Maddux. I knew of them all. Some were Braves heroes, so formerly my heroes, and for this afternoon the men who would learn my name.

  My command wasn’t great, not like it had been in recent weeks, but my fastball was hard and curveball biting. In the first inning, Furcal singled. I struck out Andruw Jones. While I was in the process of walking Chipper Jones on five pitches, Furcal was thrown out trying to steal second. With Jones on first, I walked Galarraga. Jordan popped out to first baseman Will Clark in foul territory. No damage, but twenty-three pitches, which were too many. I could feel my adrenaline running hot, and I sat on the bench telling myself to settle down, that it was just another ball game.

  As I held this conversation with myself, we scored six runs off Maddux. I even got my at bat in the first inning, thinking home run, of course, and popped to shortstop. Six runs against Maddux didn’t happen often, certainly not all in the same inning, certainly not in the first inning, but the boys were fired up and attacking Maddux early in the count, hunting get-ahead fastballs, and there we were—there I was—ahead 6–0 before the turnstiles at the stadium had stopped spinning.

  Encouraged by that, I bounced off the bench for the second inning, put another zero on the scoreboard with only eleven pitches, and returned to the dugout, thinking, Two down. Seven more to go. Keep ’er goin’.

  We put two more runners on base against Maddux in the bottom of the second inning. Neither scored. Along came the third inning.

  I swept up my glove and headed for the mound. Nothing could beat me now.

  CHAPTER

  ELEVEN

  For something like twenty years, counting every ball I picked up and heaved as a two-year-old, every down-and-out I ran in the street in front of my house, every basketball I tossed toward a playground rim, sports were size, speed, muscle, skill, and, if they had to be, practice. Sports were being a little meaner. Maybe a little taller. Sports were throwing harder, and making contact, and making a play, bleeding a little and hanging tough anyway. Sports were loud and in your face and… out there, where everybody could see.

  Sports were played over huge open spaces—fields, gyms, stadiums. The games of my youth and early adulthood were decided across those spaces, with my arm and my bat, wielded by thick legs and shoulders, and because of that I was better. I could run and jump and I had arm speed and bat speed. I worked. I worked more. I ran. I grew stronger. I grew faster. And I loved it so hard, needed it so badly, that it loved me back, which inspired me to run harder and play better. Sports drew me out of my own head, from my insecurities and fears, my suspicion that I was the person my dad must think I was, because otherwise why would he say that stuff to me? Why would he be so angry?

  In some ways sports raised me, and their advice along the way leaned to the cutthroat. Take care of you. Get away from all that noise. They asked me if I were tough enough. They asked me if I were man enough. Here’s a glove and here’s a ball. Now what kind of a person are you? What is your worth? In all this space, who are you? What are you?

  There would be talk of “game faces.” Of “focus.” Of “the zone.” But, really, in those days when I was clear of mind and ferocious of heart, the entire ballpark would narrow to the width of a baseball. OK, so who’s going to win those final few inches? Who really wants to win? Which one of you loses and trudges back to Fort Pierce, a failure, and into that house where the memories would come back to life, where the nightmares live?

  Those games were won by the hiss of a fastball, the foomp of a catcher’s mitt, the bellow of an umpire. That was what fair-and-square sounded like. I stand here. You stand there. Play ball. That was sports.

  Clinically, I believe, what happened is this: I dunno. And neither does anyone else. They can tell you they do. They don’t. They can guess. Doesn’t mean it’s true.

  One moment, I was a pitcher. The next, I was a patient. A project. A cautionary tale. A lab rat. A fairly miserable human being. I was, quite suddenly, my father’s son. A casualty of the game, of a broken family, of a heartless world, of all the stuff that may or may not have been swirling around in my head.

  I drew back my arm, and it was the last time I wouldn’t think about that.

  With a single throw I’d joined the List.

  Steve Blass.

  Chuck Knoblauch.

  Mark Wohlers.

  Steve Sax.

  Mackey Sasser.

  On and on.

  … Rick Ankiel.

  Ready?

  It’s an anxiety disorder. No, it’s “misplaced focus.” Unless it’s plain old “performance anxiety,” which, I suppose, is something very close to “choking,” except nobody likes that word.

  Your brain quit on you. Unless, and this was something to think about, your brain knew best, and it really was protecting you. You don’t want to throw this pitch, it’s not going to end well, so I won’t let you throw it.

  It’s a neurological disorder. Narrower? How about “focal dystonia,” in which one’s muscles contract involuntarily? Broader? The old-time golfers called it “the yips.” Older-time than that? “Whiskey fingers.” Yes, it is neurological. Unless it is psychological. Or physical. Or all of it, all balled up into one large sob.

  Damn, man, just pick up the ball and throw it.

  Johnny Miller, the golfer, once told Golf Digest in a moment of vulnerability, “I have a wire corroded in my head.”

  It’s an organic disease of the brain, except it’s never shown up in an autopsy. It’s learned, unlearned, and learned again. It’s visible in life, invisible in death, and I don’t know after that.

  It’s ballplayers, archers, piano players, darts players, free-throw shooters, cricket bowlers, putters, quarterbacks, even writers.

  It’s not physical, it’s mental. It’s a small seizure. It’s a medium seizure. That sounds physical. It’s not a seizure at all. It’s a spark of fear, of humiliation, of regret before the fact. That sounds mental.

  It’s genetic. They think it could be genetic! You know what it’s not? Genetic, I’m guessing.

  The science is somewhat s
plit on the cause of the yips, which is why everyone calls it “the Thing,” which is what it’ll be called even if someone does come up with a sturdy, accurate, and learned description of the condition that turns ballplayers into plumbers. Besides, “whiskey fingers” is taken.

  It’s the Thing because it is both there and not, real and mystical, and because it sounds like it could’ve dragged itself out of the ooze (in this case, of one’s head) and gotten to feeding on the children of the townsfolk.

  There are victims. Hypotheses have been formed, studies have been undertaken, and conclusions have been drawn.

  There is, however, little agreement. There is only slight overlap between different ideas.

  It began the moment I let go of the last pitch I ever truly trusted, the one that went to the backstop and changed my life, and in the few seconds that followed. What happened to me? What snagged in my brain? Was it an emotional response? A physical one? A chemical one? An electrical one? Was it born of a father-son relationship that spoiled, then curled up in my head waiting for the least opportune (for me) moment to present itself?

  Was I vulnerable? Weren’t we all?

  Four decades ago, Steve Blass told Roger Angell in the New Yorker of the moment he let go of the last pitch he ever believed in: “It was just one of the awfulest games and awfulest nights I’ve ever had in my life.… I knew there was something tragically, tragically wrong here. And I am lost here, and I do not have a clue what I’m doing. I wind up, and there’s kind of this freeze, and there’s no flow and no rhythm. I knew I shouldn’t be out there, but I didn’t want to quit. I wanted to keep going to be totally convinced that it wasn’t there.”

  That was me too. And that was it—the fight against the invisible, the shapeless. The fight had turned inward, against myself.

  Forty years after Steve Blass’s awfulest night, the Thing is just as mysterious. Maybe more. We’ve had forty years to find its soft spot. Instead, it grows harder. Meaner. It doesn’t just beat ballplayers and pianists and free-throw shooters, it beats scientists and psychiatrists and psychologists. It beats everyone. It’s damned near undefeated.