Greatest 21 Days Baseball Profiles

One shutout can make a pitcher feel good. Two can make him feel that much better . That was the case for Chris Hammond , pitcher on the 1994 Marlins. The hurler on a team one year removed from expansion shut out the Phillies that May, then came back and pitched eight shutout innings against the Pirates. "This is the best I've ever felt," Hammond told The South Florida Sun-Sentinel . "I've got five pitches I can throw for strikes. Going up there (on the mound) has started to become a lot of fun." Hammond was having fun in his fifth major league season. And he would continue to have fun in the majors through 14 big league seasons . Hammond's career began in 1986, taken by the Reds in the sixth round of the January draft out of the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Hammond played that first year between the rookie Gulf Coast League and single-A Tampa. He made AA Chattanooga in 1988 and AAA Nashville in 1989 . He debuted with Cincinnati in...

The Greatest 21 Days caught up with Carl Nichols in February 2014. Read the interview: Carl Nichols, Different World The pressure was high and Carl Nichols delivered. The pinch hitter smacked a single to right, breaking up a tie game in the seventh inning Aug. 2, 1990, in a game Nichols' Astros went on to win 3-1. "When you hit in key spots it makes you concentrate more," Nichols told The Associated Press after the game. "It's making me a better hitter because I concentrate better when the pressure is on." But those pressure situations in major league games would be few for Nichols. Nichols was in his fifth season with major league playing time that year, he was also in the season where he saw his most time, all of 32 games . Nichols' career began in 1980, taken in the fourth round of the draft, out of Compton, Ca. He played that year at rookie league Bluefield, hitting .212 in 37 games. He made single-A Hagerstown and Miami in 1981, bu...

In the middle of his first major league season, one where pitcher Jose Bautista went 6-15 for the 1988 Orioles, was a veritable gem . On July 5, Bautista took the mound in Chicago against the White Sox and gave up just five hits for a complete-game, 5-1 win . "Location, that's what I was thinking about tonight," Bautista told The Associated Press after the game. "I threw my fork ball for strikes. But, more important, I went nine innings. I felt great, strong." Bautista had just been drafted the previous off-season out of the Mets' organization, after spending seven seasons there without making Queens. But that year in 1988 marked the first of nine seasons in which Bautista would see time in the majors, including a 10-3 season with the Cubs in 1993. And he's continuing in baseball into 2011, as a pitching coach in the system of those same White Sox he beat back in 1988, with the single-A Kannapolis Intimidators . Jose Joaquin Bautista's ...

Al Pacheco 's Opa-Locka Monsignor Pace High School was one win away from the Florida state championship game and, while Pacheco started off slow on the mound that hot day, he got them there, The Orlando Sentinel wrote . Pacheco didn't pick up a strike out until the fourth inning. But that strike out signaled Opa-Locka's birth in the championship, Opa-Locka coach John Messina told The Sentinel . "Once the fourth inning came and Al struck out two batters, I knew we had them,'' Messina told The Sentinel . Pacheco went on to play college ball at the University of Miami and Florida International University and pro ball in the Cardinals organization. But, after being taken by St. Louis in the 27th round of the draft,  Pacheco's professional career turned out to be a brief one. He  played in just two seasons and never got above high-A. Pacheco's career, though, as many do, had roots in high school. By early May 1985, Pacheco was 9-4. He was already...

It was a season in which Geronimo Berroa hit the most home runs of his major league career, 36. It was also a season where Berroa got himself into the record books . Berroa hit six of those home runs in just two separate games, three in each. He was the 10th player to hit three home runs in a game twice in a season, The Associated Press wrote . Berroa's explanation was a simple one : "I just swing hard, that's all." Berroa had hit home runs before. Nearly a decade earlier, at AA Knoxville , he hit another 36. But at the major league level, he didn't see success until he hit 13 in 1994, then upped that to 22 in 1995. By the time his career was over, Berroa had hit a total of 101 in the majors , in a career that spanned parts of 11 seasons. Also, years after his career was over, came accusations that those home runs were not natural . In a 2006 affidavit, unsealed in December 2007, disgraced pitcher Jason Grimsley accused Berroa, among others, of using s...

Dennis Rasmussen met Jose Mota on a rehabilitation assignment to AAA Las Vegas. They met again in the majors, Jose Mota called up in May 1991 as the Padres' newest second baseman, The Los Angeles Times wrote . Mota's new friend took him under his wing, Mota told The Times . "When I came here, he said, 'Jose, I saw you play in Las Vegas. Don't change,' " Mota told The Times . " 'I was there with you for four weeks. Don't think this game has to change when you come up here.' " While Mota took Rasmussen's advice, his stay in the majors was a brief one. He played 17 games for the Padres that year, then two more five seasons later with the Royals, marking the extent of his major league career. Mota's career in baseball, though, has continued, in the announcing booth of the Angels as both a Spanish language and English language broadcaster. Mota's career began in 1985, taken in the second round of the draft by th...

Steve Adkins thought he did well the previous year . He'd picked up 15 wins at AAA Columbus, then picked up another win and a six-inning bid for a no-hitter with the big club in the Bronx. So, in spring 1991, when he was quickly sent to minor league camp, Adkins believed the Yankees hadn't given him a fair shot . He didn't think they would ever give him a shot. "The best way to make the rotation here is to be traded, make the rotation somewhere else and come back here as a free agent," Adkins told The South Florida Sun-Sentinel after the demotion. "If you have a bad game and aren't making $2 million a year, you can't pitch in the big leagues." Adkins did eventually get traded , that June to the Cubs. But Adkins never got back to the Yankees, or made the majors, again. Adkins' career began in 1986, taken by the Yankees in the 15th round of the draft, out of the University of Pennsylvania . He played that first year at short-season O...

The Oakland Athletics added some veterans to its pitching staff for 1992, Oakland general manager Sandy Alderson told The Fort Worth Star-Telegram that March. The aim, Alderson told The Star-Telegram , was to protect younger pitchers in the Oakland system from being rushed. "We don't want to be in position where we have to rush anybody," Alderson told The Star-Telegram . We saw enough of that last year (when youngsters Bruce Walton, Johnny Guzman and John Briscoe were force-fed because of injuries) that we don't want to see it again." One of those pitchers, Johnny Guzman , saw his major league debut the previous June at the young age of 20. But, in five relief outings, totaling five innings of work, Guzman gave up five earned runs and 11 hits. Guzman got just two more major league outings in 1992, marking the end of his brief big league career . Guzman's professional career began in 1988, signed by the Athletics as a free agent out of the Dominican...

Lubbock Christian University won the NAIA national championship in 2009, marking the first time the school had won the NAIA World Series since 1983 . Phil Bryant was a member of that 1983 team. He quickly congratulated members of the 2009 squad . "I'm even more excited for these guys than I anticipated," Bryant told The Lubbock Avalanche-Journal after the win. Bryant's hand in the Lubbock Christian 1983 title became part of a successful college career, one successful enough for the Rangers to sign him as an undrafted free agent . His professional career began in 1987, but lasted just four seasons. He made it to AAA, but never made it to the majors . At Lubbock Christian University , Bryant went 7-4 in that championship year as a freshman. He went 10-0 his second. He also lettered all four years, according to The Avalanche-Journal . As a pro, Bryant played his first season at single-A Gastonia. There, Bryant went 9-11, with a 5.31 ERA. He got one of his ...

Todd Hall had his own basic way of breaking in his gloves . The gloves he got as part of a small minor league endorsement deal with Rawlings, two came each year, Hall recalled to The Lima News in 2009. "I heard of guys soaking them in shaving cream or hanging them in the shower," Hall told The News . "I put oil on it, put a ball in there, wrapped it up and casually broke it in. I wasn’t going to put a $200 glove soaking in the shower." While Hall got his endorsement deal gloves in the minors - and got an endorsed glove prominently onto at least one baseball card - he never got an endorsement deal in the majors, or any above AA. His career lasted just five seasons , ending without him making the majors. Hall's career began in 1986, taken by the White Sox in the 14th round of the draft, out of Bowling Green State University. He played his first season in the rookie Gulf Coast League. The pitcher went 6-2 there , with a 2.22 ERA. He also struck out ...

Expos manager Buck Rodgers was looking for a walk or a single from Jerry Goff , The Associated Press wrote . He instead got a home run, a game-winning home run in that June 1990 contest. It was also Goff's first home run in the majors . "I wasn't thinking anything," Goff told The AP wrote. "It's not that I haven't dreamt it a million times, hitting a home run in the ninth inning to win a game. It just so happens that this was the day." The catcher would go on to hit three home runs in 52 games with Montreal that year, the first of six seasons in which he would see time in the majors. In terms of games played, though, Goff's major league career was already more than half over with the close of his rookie season. Goff's big league career ended in 1996, with a total of 90 games played. Goff's career has continued in semi-pro ball and youth coaching in his home state of California, all while starting a post-playing career as a f...