Rick Ankiel is smoking the ball

[tennOsfan]

Check out these stats at AAA this season for the former hurler:

http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?n=Rick%2520Ankiel&pos=&sid=t235&t=p_pbp&pid=150449

A home run every 11-12 at-bats. Wow.

[Moose Milligan]

I hope he makes it back. He was quite a pitching talent and then all of a sudden his control vanished through no fault of his own...

I don't see why the Cardinals couldn't use him right now.

[geschinger]

I hope he makes it back. He was quite a pitching talent and then all of a sudden his control vanished through no fault of his own...

Whose fault was it?

I don't see why the Cardinals couldn't use him right now.

They should give him a shot. I think he could hold his own right now. Is he capable defensively? That is a question I don't know the answe to although I don't see why it wouldn't be.

[bryanman8]

Walked people like crazy as a pitcher but can't walk as a hitter. That OBP is horrid.

[Leitch]

A .317 OBP in AAA is a really, really bad thing.

[Migrant Redbird]

Whose fault was it?

LaRussa's, but I can't prove it.

They should give him a shot. I think he could hold his own right now. Is he capable defensively? That is a question I don't know the answe to although I don't see why it wouldn't be.

He's quite capable defensively -- used to play outfield on the U.S. national team when he wasn't pitching. He has excellent speed, with 8 doubles and 2 triples to go along with his 19 home runs in just 213 at bats, but his getting caught 3 times in 5 stolen base attempts suggests he has a lot to learn when it comes to reading pitchers. He has played both center and right field for Memphis and played them well, albeit with a few mistakes that can be chalked up to inexperience. Naturally, he has a cannon for an arm.

Rick is a legitimate 5-tool outfielder once he gets enough experience, but he had only a little more than 500 total professional at bats altogether prior to this season and he really needs to season a little more at the AAA level before being brought up to face major league pitching. Last season was pretty well wiped out with injuries, so he really, really needs to get a full season under his belt at Memphis before being called up. Besides, the only way the Cardinals need him right now would be if he could step into the bedraggled rotation.

The problem is, since Rick has long been out of options, he really needs to be ready when he gets promoted to the major leagues. If he gets into a slump, he'll have to sit on the bench or be allowed to play his way out of it because he can't be returned to the minors without passing through waivers. And the way he's hitting, there's no way that the bottom feeders would allow him to go through waivers.

And as Leitch indicated, Rick really needs to learn to take a few more pitches and draw a few more walks. I'm not really too concerned about his .317 OBP by itself because he's a good enough hitter that he'll work his way through that. What I am concerned about is his only having 11 walks against 54 strikeouts -- a hitter with a .606 slugging percentage ought to be drawing more walks than that.

[Migrant Redbird]

It's getting more and more difficult to keep that boy down on the farm!

Randy Keisler tossed seven solid innings and Rick Ankiel and Joe Mather homered as Memphis routed visiting Albuquerque, 8-1, on Thursday.

.... Ankiel ripped his Pacific Coast League-leading 25th homer, a two-run shot in the first inning, and drew a bases-loaded walk in the fourth.

Mather also clubbed a two-run homer in the first and Jarrett Hoffpauir went 3-for-4 with two RBIs and a run scored for Memphis (37-51).

Rick was 1 for 3 with 2 walks, which raises his BA to .267 and, I assume, lifts his .306 OBP to somewhere around .311, still rather feeble. However, his slugging is .587 and his OPS is .898, which is making some Cardinals fans salivate as they ponder an offense that's 23rd in home runs and 27th in runs scored among major league teams.

2 walks in 1 game after only 14 in his first 73 games; I hope that's an indication that he's finally beginning to develop a better eye and more patience at the plate. It could also reflect a growing reluctance of PCL pitchers to pitch to him.

[Hallas]

I wonder if plays at the plate will be a mirror of Vlad playing outfield; 50% chance he gets the guy by 10 feet, 50% chance he airmails it into the backstop.

[Migrant Redbird]

I predict that runners will learn not to challenge Rick's throwing arm.

[Hank Scorpio]

I found this to be quite amazing. This dude can rake.

http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?n=Rick%2520Ankiel&pos=76&sid=l112&t=p_pbp&pid=150449

[Migrant Redbird]

It's already been discussed in this thread, which has the benefit of including Rick's name in the subject so that O's fans who could care less don't have to click on the thread to see who you're talking about.

Rick Ankiel is smoking the ball

Believe it or not, there are some O's fans who would rather not hear about Cardinals prospects, unless there's a trade in the works to acquire some of them.

[Migrant Redbird]

Here are Rick's stats through Sunday, with the Memphis Redbirds having already clinched the first half title in their division.

 G  AB  R  H 2B 3B HR RBI  TB BB SO SB CS  AVG  OBP  SLG  OPS76 289 48 78 11  2 26  66 171 16 69  2  3 .270 .312 .592 .904

Here's the blurb from Saturday's game wrap up, when Rick hit his 26th home run. He's still not drawing many walks; he got 2 in 1 game a few days ago, but only has 16 for the season so far.

Rick Ankiel belted his 26th homer leading off the bottom of the seventh for the Redbirds (38-52) [in a 6-5 loss to the Albuquerque Isotopes]. The former pitcher is tied with Toledo's Mike Hessman for second in the Minor Leagues behind Omaha's Craig Brazell, who has 30.

There was a story in the New York Times a few days ago about Ankiel declining an invitation to the PCL All Star game, and refusing to grant interviews to ESPN.

Many minor league baseball players would be thrilled if ESPN sent a camera crew to do a profile on them. But Rick Ankiel did not want that. He has been on national television before and rejected ESPN’s recent repeated requests for an interview.

.... And some minor leaguers might be eager to play in the Class AAA All-Star Game in their first year as an outfielder at that level. Ankiel, of the Memphis Redbirds, said no thanks, electing to rest his surgically repaired left knee. He does not seem to crave attention.

Ankiel, who hits home runs often and impressively, will turn 28 on July 19. That is old for a professional prospect, but his hitting and fielding skills still seem unrefined, with good reason. A few years ago, Ankiel was one of the best young left-handed pitchers in the major leagues.

.... “It’s the past; I don’t really like talking about it,” Ankiel said in the dugout before a game this week. “I just deal with today and the future and go from there. The past is the past. You can’t change it. It is what it is.”

His comeback as an outfielder, which began in 2005, was delayed when he missed the 2006 season because of a knee injury.

.... Babe Ruth made the transition to slugger from pitcher, but few have done it successfully since. Some St. Louis fans are clamoring for Ankiel’s return to the majors, but the Cardinals have not rushed him.

.... Tony La Russa, the manager of the Cardinals, said this week on a visit to Shea Stadium that the plan was to give Ankiel “as much game time as he can get” in the highest level of the minors. As for promoting him, La Russa said it would be better to do it too late than too early.

.... Tagg Bozied, a 27-year-old first baseman and Ankiel’s closest friend on the team, [said] “He’s got a ton of talent and strength. He’s a hard worker. He’s only going to get better. He works out. He eats great. He’s dedicated — 100 percent.” .... He also said that Ankiel was “really raw, mentally” about hitting and that he lacked polish.

The Memphis Commercial Appeal has a new story on Ankiel this morning.

If the pressure is building on Ankiel as he steams toward an increasingly inevitable return to the big leagues, it was difficult to tell on Sunday as the Redbirds hit the All-Star break on a high note with a 5-2 victory over Albuquerque at AutoZone Park.

Ankiel caused a bit of a stir recently by declining multiple interview requests from an ESPN crew that traveled to Memphis to film an "Outside the Lines" segment. The 27-year-old center fielder is apparently no fan of the network, which he feels made a meal of his 2000 meltdown with the Cardinals.

.... "I think it's been better than anybody expected," Redbirds manager Chris Maloney said of Ankiel's first half in Memphis. "He's made faster progress in the outfield than I expected. We thought he had the ability to be a good, solid center fielder, but he's already one now."

While Ankiel has committed six errors, he also has four outfield assists. Just because he isn't pitching anymore doesn't mean he's lost anything in his throwing arm.

.... "His strike zone still needs improving," Maloney said. "That's the biggest thing to me, and it's just a matter of getting repetitions. I think he'll be fine."

Another area in which Ankiel has performed above expectations is against left-handed pitching. With four outfielders commanding regular playing time, Maloney has given Ankiel occasional off days when the opposition is starting a left-hander.

Of Ankiel's 289 at-bats, just over a quarter have come against lefties. Yet Ankiel is hitting .293 (24-for-82) against such pitchers, with seven homers and 21 RBI.

.... "Growing up, I didn't see as many (left-handers) as I did right-handers," Ankiel said. "That's an adjustment I'm trying to make. The ball breaks the other way on you. I'm trying to get better at dealing with that every day."

Ankiel's biggest concern heading into the season was how his surgically repaired left knee would hold up to the strain of playing every day. While he has experienced occasional "tightness" in the knee, his only extensive time on the sideline came as a result of an Achilles tendon strain. The result of a collision with left fielder Nick Stavinoha, it landed him on the disabled list for a week in mid-May.

"Coming into this year, the big question mark was whether my knee was gonna hold up," Ankiel said. "I wasn't sure whether I was gonna have to miss time, if I'd get tendinitis or if it was gonna flare up. Every day I have to answer that question."

While Ankiel cited the desire to rest his knee as the reason he declined his All-Star Game invitation, he thinks he's responded well to the wear and tear.

"I'm happy with how my body's handled it," he said. "It's just about regular maintenance."

.... While his body might be holding up to the strain of playing every day, how Ankiel will respond to the media glare awaiting his return to St. Louis is another matter.

Asked that question point-blank, he said, "I don't know."

"I've been through it before," he said. "I'm just trying to block it out right now and trying to focus on what I've got to do every day despite what whoever is saying."

At the same time, however, he said he is aware that his story is being presented mainly as one of inspiration and redemption.

I anticipate that Rick will probably be called up sometime in early September. If the Cardinals wait a couple days after the 1st, they will have him under their control for an additional year. However, Memphis will be in the PCL playoffs and the Cards are very unlikely to still be in the NL Central race at that time, so they could just let him continue playing with Memphis until their season ends, and then give Rick the remainder of the year off.

If he does get called up in September, it will probably be the biggest regular season media circus in St. Louis since McGwire and Sosa were in their home run race in 1998. I doubt if it will match the Dice-K or Rocket phenomenas. If Rick's return was postponed until next year, he'd have time to get used to it during the lower key atmosphere of spring training.

[tennOsfan]

I'm really pulling for Ankiel. His is a great story of never giving up.

I hope he hits 30 homers for the Cards next year.

[Migrant Redbird]

I'm really pulling for Ankiel. His is a great story of never giving up.

Well, he's had a lot of bad breaks. He grew up in a broken home. His dad is in jail for dealing drugs. There is a thread at the SLSF Cardinals Forum dedicated to articles and discussion of Ankiel's minor league season, and one of the more recent articles posted there contained this.

When Ankiel was a boy in Florida, one of his instructors was his father, who often shouted at him during youth league games and later went to prison on a drug conviction. One of Ankiel’s former coaches told The New York Times Magazine in 2001 that Ankiel’s father argued with umpires and coaches.

“I was terribly shy,” Ankiel said in that article. “Maybe it was because my dad yelled at me so much. I was afraid to mess up.” Ankiel recently married, and his wife, Lory, showed him a phrase in a book that he has repeated frequently this season: “Life is about re-creating yourself.”

Some fans have claimed or implied that Rick was using drugs himself, but I've never seen anything in print that would seem to confirm it. It might be simply a case of fans trying to tar him with the same brush as his father.

I hope he hits 30 homers for the Cards next year.

Or 40. I'm really pulling for him to succeed. I kept him on my team in a dynasty league for a year and a half after his melt down in the 2000 playoffs. I talked to him for a while in 2001 back when he was pitching for Johnson City in the Applachian rookie league, trying to regain his control. Rick was pretty nice, but seemed a little quiet and reserved. He signed a couple of baseballs for me, one of which was for a friend of mine who was dying of lung cancer.

[Migrant Redbird]

Updated with a personal report on Ankiel by one of our Cardinals fans.

I attended the Memphis/Nashville games on Friday & Saturday in Nashville. Ankiel had a very nice game Friday. 3 hits (all solid line drives) and 2 walks. Saturday was a bit of a struggle for Rick and the entire team, but Ankiel did make an impressive throw to nail a runner trying to tag from 1st to second on a deep fly to center. I thought he looked very smooth in the outfield. He is just an athlete, plain & simple. Mather played right both nights, and he also showed off an impressive throwing arm on a couple of throws. Mather does not get cheated at the plate. He looks to be a work in progress to me. Memphis seems to have the same problem as the Cards....weak starting pitching. Neither Parisi (Friday) nor Mike Smith were impressive in the least. Edgar Gonzalez looks like a pretty polished hitter, and Hoffpaur looked good on Friday night. Stavinhoa hit a monstrous HR Saturday. The Nashville LFer never even moved on it. It was my first time at the Nashville ballpark. I think it is safe to say it is not one of the nicer AAA venues. At any rate, my main purose for going to the games was to see Mr. Ankiel, and I came away with a favorable impression of his play. BTW, both Nashville starters were southpaws. I must admit that I am really pulling for Rick. As I have said before, I can hardly imagine what the ovation is going to be like when he steps into the batter's box at Busch for the first time.

I told my buddy that with our luck, he would get called up during the day Friday. One other thing that struck me was that Ankiel really seemed to be enjoying himself out there. He signed lots of autographs before each game, and seemed really relaxed doing so.

It looks like Rick has been drawing walks a little better now, although it's still subject to the "small sample" caveat. He's got his OBP up to .319 now, still not too impressive for a guy who's slugging almost .600!

Here's Rick's current numbers, sandwiched in among some other representative Memphis players. Hoffpauir and Mather are recent promotions from the AA club in Springfield.

   Player        POS  G  AB  R  H  2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB CS  AVG  OBP  SLG  OPSJarrett Hoffpauir 2B  8  25  7  10  3  0  1   7  4  1  0  0 .400 .483 .640 1.123* Ryan Ludwick    OF 29 106 27  36  8  0  8  36 10 20  1  1 .340 .380 .642 1.022Rico Washington   1B 54 168 24  53 12  2  7  23 17 24  2  0 .315 .374 .536  .909* Skip Schumaker  OF 30 118 16  37  7  0  5  14 12 22  1  2 .314 .379 .500  .879Edgar Gonzalez    2B 90 332 52 101 20  3  7  37 33 50  8  1 .304 .368 .446  .814Nick Stavinoha    OF 91 320 33  92 12  0 10  38 18 51  3  1 .288 .327 .419  .746Mike McCoy        2B 50 136 21  39  7  0  3  14 27 19  6  2 .287 .405 .404  .809Rick Ankiel       OF 79 301 49  82 13  2 26  69 19 71  2  3 .272 .319 .588  .907* Brendan Ryan    SS 66 265 42  70  8  5  1  15 19 35 13  5 .264 .317 .343  .660John Rodriguez    OF 54 159 35  42 12  1  8  27 23 35  1  0 .264 .377 .503  .880Tagg Bozied       1B 81 275 44  72 19  2 14  46 33 58  3  0 .262 .350 .498  .849Joe Mather        1B 21  74 10  15  3  1  5   8  5 15  1  0 .203 .289 .473  .762

* currently on major league 25 player roster

Since Memphis is in the PCL playoffs, I wouldn't be surprised if Rick spends the rest of the season with them and didn't get called up to the Cardinals in September.