A broken Ankiel for the Cards

[jpalexa]

While Wohlers has been mentioned in this thread, has everyone forgotten that he had an arm (elbow?) injury that went undiagnosed during his "wildies" period? He had the surgery, sat out the year, and came back with his control (mostly) intact -- not that he has been an effective pitcher, but the "wildies" are gone.

Everyone here in Atlanta assumed that Wohler's problem was ALL in his head -- precipitated by the Leyritz dinger in the WS vs. the Yankees. Turns out the problem WAS in his head -- as he subconsciously attempted to compensate for his unknown injury.

Not that I am a professional athlete (ha!), but I do notice that I have altered my throwing mechanics after hurting my shoulder a year or so back. Even though my shoulder doesn't hurt any more, my head still doesn't completely believe in the recovery, so I find myself making more awkward throws than I used to. Plus, I am just old!

Why wouldn't the Cardinals learn from this and give Ankiel's arm a thorough medical inspection? Not saying that there isn't something in the guy's kitchen that needs to be cleaned out...but why disregard a physical injury possibility?

[NetShrine]

It's worth a shot.

[BuzzBuzzard]

Beating a dead horse on this one, but it is not getting any better for Ankiel.

http://espn.go.com/mlb/news/2001/0524/1204365.html

[baseballtodd]

Anybody remember Steve Blass or Kevin Saucier? This is where Ankiel is headed. What I can't understand is how he can look so effective at times. Then, the very next pitch, he launches one 30 feet up the backstop. I wasn't at the game but saw replays when he started for Louisville against Oklahoma at the Bricktown Ballpark in OKC. He broke off a curveball that fell off the table - beautiful. They showed him blowing a couple pitches past some batters that probably hit 90-plus on the radar gun. Then, with a normal windup and everything, the ball looked like it popped out of his hand as it went 30 feet straight above the catcher, umpire and batter to the backstop. I can't remember the movie (it was rather recent and rather stupid), but a kid has a hand with a mind of its own. He can't control it. That's what Ankiel reminds me of. I truly feel sorry for the guy. After breaking Dizzy Dean's Cardinal rookie record last year for strikeouts in a season, I really thought he was going to be something. So did LaRussa and everybody else. I hope he works out of it - but I don't see it happening anytime soon.

[BuzzBuzzard]

Welcome to the 'Shrine, BBTodd, and you are correct, it is a long way back for Ankiel, if ever.

[jpalexa]

Hi, Todd! How's Baseball Ink's Oklahoma Corresponding doing?


Normally, I'd hop right on the "Ankiel is done" bandwagon, but I have to re-iterate that Mark Wohlers looked to be going down this EXACT same road a couple of years ago, was finally diagnosed with the injury that contributed to the demise all along, had surgery, and is now pitching (all be it ineffectively!) again in the Bigs.

Time will tell...!

[NetShrine]

Originally posted by BuzzBuzzard
Welcome to the 'Shrine, BBTodd

Ditto!

[NetShrine]

A savior for Ankiel
by Gene Wojciechowski

Call Steve Stone.

That's what I'd do if I were the St. Louis Cardinals, who are running out of safety nets for the Human Wild Pitch. That's what I'd do if I were agent Scott Boras, who surely has arranged a session or two between a psychologist and his beleaguered client. I'd put Stone on speed dial and Rick Ankiel on speakerphone. I'd do it yesterday.

Stone won a Cy Young. He became one of the best baseball TV analysts in the business. He made a medium-sized fortune in the restaurant game. He knows success.

But Stone also knows what it's like to stand with your toes hanging over the ledge. Call it a phobia, an Ankiel Moment -- call it whatever you want -- but Stone came this close to forgetting how to pitch to right-handed hitters. It happened early in his career, early enough that Stone still had time to overcome his fears.

"I got hit a few times," Stone says. "I began to think about it. It became a cause of concern for me."

It became more than that. Stone would have a small freak-out session whenever a right-handed batter stepped into the box. He quit throwing sliders on the outer half of the plate because he was scared stiff the pitch would get lined back to the middle of his forehead. Bobby Grich got him once with a hard liner to the leg. So did Al Cowens.

"It affected my control," Stone says. "I saw a psychologist and it didn't really help. I saw a hypnotist and it didn't really help. I found that the only person I really trusted was me."

Stone is a smart guy. Analytical. Thorough. He began to develop his own self-help system. He's big on bombarding the subconscious with positive thoughts. He considers the subconscious as some sort of mental blackboard, a place where you can wipe away the past and start fresh each day. That's the nutshell version.

"I came to the realization that I was the only inhibiting factor," he says. "The sky was the limit to what I could accomplish."

It worked. From the middle of 1979 through the end of 1980, Stone lost only seven of 50 starts. "That is a run like Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson or Greg Maddux, not Steve Stone, who was under .500 when I went on that streak," says Stone. "I was able to do it through a series of mental gymnastics."

Stone is now working as a "competition consultant" with several tennis and baseball players, as well as several golfers. He has seen the SportsCenter highlights of Ankiel doing the Nuke LaLoosh thing, throwing the ball nearly into the mezzanine level. He has seen the Cardinals protect Ankiel during spring training, then again during the regular season, then again at Triple-A, and now at extended spring training. Nothing changes. Ankiel usually looks great warming up in the bullpen. Then he steps on the mound and his mind goes on the 15-day DL.

"His problem is not his arm," says Stone. "They've got to rework his head."

Here's what Stone would do -- if the Cardinals ever called: He'd get Ankiel the hell away from the field, from the clubhouse, from anything baseball. Go find a beach, a nice restaurant ... any place where the guy could actually relax. Then he'd ask him about last season's playoff appearance, ask him to search his memory for something, anything that could have triggered his inability to throw strikes. He'd ask him what he thought about when he walked to the mound that series. When in doubt, chip away at the subconscious.

There are no guarantees. In fact, Stone says Ankiel might never recover from whatever ails him. Karma.

"I'm not saying there's any one thing, any one person who is going to help Rick Ankiel," he says. "It's a very sad thing. Nobody wants to see a multi-, multi-million dollar talent self-destruct. I would want to exhaust every possibility."

Stone likes Ankiel's chances. He's young, only 21. He's shown resolve, nerve, little ego. He goes where the Cardinals tell him, pitches when they ask him, answers the postgame questions when asked.

"I think he knows in his own mind he can be the pitcher he was last year," Stone says. "He can get any hitter out any level. He knows that."

Now he just needs to believe it. Every day. Stone is ready, willing and, who knows, maybe able to help. Couldn't hurt to try.

[ChrisCary]

He should call David COne and learn how to pretend nothings wrong.

He could go throw eight to the backstop and come back, "Everything felt good, I think I can help this team, overal I'm satisfied"

[willyg]

Call David Cone and learn how to pretend nothing is wrong!!!

That is some funny shit!

[NetShrine]

The latest is that the Cards will send Ankiel to extended spring training, and that he will play some as an OF. Mostly to clear his mind - not that they think he'll never pitch again - supposedly.

[willyg]

Yesterday when I was watching the Yankee game on Fox those were the words echoed from the mouth of Joe Buck.

I was shocked. It happened on a fly ball to Chuck Knoblauch, when Buck says that Knoblauch might not be the only infielder making a move to the outfield this season. I understand that the St. Louis Cardinals are toying with the possibility of making Rick Ankiel an outfielder for at least the rest of the season.

Last year in 68 Ab's, Ankiel hit .250 (17-68), 1 Double, 1 Triple, and 2 HR's to go along with 9 RBI's. He also had 4 BB's, and 20 K's. During the entire season he only had 1 sac bunt, a stat that is very telling for a starting pitcher.

Like I said I was shocked, but if you think about it what are the Cardinals to do. Obviously this guy is young enough, 21 or so, it wasn't too long ago he was an everyday player coming up to the plate 4 , 5 times a game (yes I understand it was high school). He is probably a great athlete, would have an absolute cannon of an arm, and has proven he can hit big league pitching.

Having him spend the rest of the season in A or AA playing outfield everyday and not thinking about pitching is not the worst thing in the world.

Look at Knoblauch, 7 assists this season, has been an above average outfielder, and Ankiel is much younger.

I think this can be done.

**********

As an aside I would like to give some credit to Tim McCarver yesterday. Before I got a chance to listen to him everyday I was never a big fan of his. I still believe he is too forceful in his opinions some time, but yesterday he nailed one right on the head.

He was commenting on how Bartolo Colon was tipping off his pitches by nodding his head two times.

Nod, shake off, nod. The first nod would mean "yes" on the pitch, while after that it was the location, and the only pitch you locate was the fastball. All other locations were implied.

McCarver said that (epically with a catcher at the plate in Posada that is just something you cannot do).

So what happens, nod, shake off, nod. Jorge hits one 400+ feet into monument park on THE NEXT PITCH!!!!!!!

I thought that was impressive.

[NetShrine]

Not the first time I heard McCarver make that observation.

Colon also said after the game that his elbow is bad - and, as such, he can't throw anything that requires torque (sic?) - - so, he was mostly going with fastballs (which is why he's gotten rocked in his last four starts).

Could be another reason why the Yanks were sitting dead red?

BTW, Willy, since the RA to the OF has already been mentioned here, I'm merging the threads.

[NetShrine]

pushing up the thread

[BuzzBuzzard]

A nice piece from today's NY Times:

June 12, 2001


Ankiel Tries to Re-enter the Zone

By IRA BERKOW

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



JUPITER, Fla. — In the early morning sunlight, the baseball tossed into the cloudless blue sky looked like a mini-moon that had lost its way. It went up and up, sailing well over the head of the intended receiver, a middle-aged coach with a catcher's mitt. The strong, loose-limbed young pitcher who had thrown the ball watched the flight with some dismay. It was not the first time he had seen a ball take off as though it contained a maddening inner spring.

The young man and the coach were engaged in a casual long toss, separated by about 150 feet, in which a pitcher stretches his arm. They were alone last week on the outfield grass in a practice field of the St. Louis Cardinals' spring-training complex. As the ball landed near the center-field fence, the young pitcher, Rick Ankiel, shrugged and called, slightly sheepishly, to the retrieving coach, "Too strong today."

Too strong, it turned out, for too many days. No one is quite sure what went wrong, but something went dreadfully wrong with Ankiel's pitching motion, as well as the circuitry in which the brain informs the arm of what it wishes it to do, consciously or subconsciously.

Ankiel's problems began in the playoffs last year and continued into this season. He would throw a ball over the catcher's head; pitches in games and even in warm-ups would slam with a terrible thud against the backstop, when they were not darting in the dirt 5 feet in front of the plate.

The habits and instincts of a lifetime abruptly vanished.

Later that day, Ankiel's Cardinal teammates of just a month ago battled the Cincinnati Reds at home in Busch Stadium. It would normally have been Ankiel's turn in the starting rotation. Just three years ago, he signed a bonus contract out of high school for $2.5 million. He won the Carolina League Pitcher of the Year award in his first professional season, the Minor League Player of the Year award in his second, and, then last year, in his third season, he won the National League Rookie Pitcher of the Year award.

Ankiel, a 21-year-old left-hander from nearby Port St. Lucie, Fla., who can throw a 95-mile-an-hour fastball, had made the journey from here to St. Louis brilliantly, but he would not make it on this day. And as a ballplayer, there is the possibility that he may never make it again.

The muscle memory, or simply the requisite concentration, of other ballplayers has similarly come unraveled. Most famously and astonishingly, Steve Blass, a veteran All-Star pitcher, woke up one morning in the early 1970's and could not find the plate. He never did. Von McDaniel was a rookie pitching sensation with the Cardinals in 1957, but the control he had confidently shown disappeared forever overnight the next season.

In recent times, second basemen Steve Sax and Chuck Knoblauch each discovered one day that he could no longer throw accurately to first base. And Mark Wohlers, an ace reliever with the Braves, began out of the blue to throw wildly; he went to the minor leagues and has made a comeback with the Reds, where this season he is 2-1 with a shaky 4.50 earned run average in relief.

'Just Trying to Get It Right'

Ankiel began this season with the Cardinals, but picking up disastrously from last year's playoffs, he was wild in the first month of the season. The Cardinals sent him to their Class AAA farm club in Memphis to try to regain his confidence and his control, but he continued throwing baseballs as if he had never held one before.

After three terrible starts with the Memphis Redbirds — in the last two, he could not complete the first inning — he was sent to the Cardinals' extended spring-training camp, where low-level minor leaguers work on their fundamentals before starting an abbreviated season. He will be here indefinitely, according to Walt Jocketty, the Cardinals' general manager.

Ankiel was put under the special supervision of Mark Riggins, the Cardinals' minor league pitching coordinator.

"I'm just trying to get it right," Ankiel said, in a kind of mantra, to reporters here. He displays a polite and pleasant disposition. His sandy hair is dyed with blond streaks, there is a small shrub of whisker on his chin, and his eyes are both playful and wary.

How does the arm feel? "Outstanding," he said, with a jaunty air that he often maintains.

How does he deal with this turn of events? "Day by day," he said.

Does he ever feel lonely on the mound, as some pitchers have testified? "Lonely?" he repeated. "No. The pitcher controls the game."

For good or bad?

He did not reply, but gave a look out of the corner of his eye that said, suspiciously, What are you getting at?

Was he frightened about his future? Was he embarrassed at having to be sent here? These were matters, it was obvious, he would not talk about. But someone in the Cardinals organization who is close to Ankiel said, "If you built a building, and the building collapsed, how would you feel?"

Onset Was Sudden

The slide began for Ankiel when he opened the National League East playoff series against Atlanta last Oct. 3. He had finished the season with an 11-7 record and led the team with a 3.70 E.R.A. Down the stretch drive in September, he responded beautifully to pressure, posting a 4-0 record and a 1.97 E.R.A.

Against the Braves in the first round of the playoffs, and against the Mets in the League Championship Series, in which he started one game and relieved in another, he walked 11 batters in four innings. He threw nine wild pitches, the majority of them flung 10 feet over the batters' heads. In just one inning against the Braves, he threw five wild pitches, breaking a record for ineptitude that had stood since 1890.

When he was taken out in the first inning of his start against the Mets, Ankiel told Cardinals Manager Tony La Russa, "I can't feel the ball."

Ankiel won his first regular-season game against Arizona this spring, pitching well and in control. The next game, against Houston, he walked five, including three straight in the second inning, and struck out six in five innings.