Rick Ankiel admits to drinking before starts to deal with the yips
Ankiel melted down in the 2000 NLDS, then started drinking vodka before starts to calm his nerves in 2001
By
Mike Axisa
•
3 min read
Given everything that happened in his career, it’s easy to forget just how great Rick Ankiel was at pitching. Baseball America ranked him as the best prospect in all of baseball prior to the 2000 season, and that year the then 20-year-old southpaw went out and finished second to Rafael Furcal in the NL Rookie of the Year voting.
Here is what Ankiel did in 1999 to earn top prospect billing, as well as his big league performance in 2000:
Age | Level | IP | ERA | WHIP | BB/9 | K/9 | WAR | |
1999 | 19 | AA, AAA | 137 2/3 | 2.35 | 1.16 | 4.1 | 12.7 | -- |
2000 | 20 | MLB | 175 | 3.50 | 1.30 | 4.5 | 10.0 | 3.3 |
Remember, the 2000 season was one of the most offense-friendly seasons in baseball history. That 3.50 ERA was 34 percent better than league average. Ankiel’s rookie season wasn’t as good as the late Jose Fernandez’s, but it wasn’t that far off either. Ankiel was awesome.
As you know, things completely fell apart for Ankiel in the 2000 postseason. He made two postseason starts -- one against the Braves in the NLDS and one against the Mets in the NLCS -- and allowed seven runs in four total innings. He walked 11 and uncorked nine wild pitches in those four innings.
Ankiel developed the yips. It was tough to watch at the time:
Ankiel never did overcome the yips, though he was able to carve out a successful career as an outfielder. The greatness of his rookie season will forever be one of baseball’s great “what if” stories. What happens if Ankiel hadn’t develop the yips? Does he win a few Cy Youngs? He had the talent to do so, certainly.
Ankiel retired following the 2013 season, and this April he and author Tim Brown have a book coming out called The Phenomenon. According to the publisher, the book “tells the story of his personal battle with an anxiety condition widely known as the yips, the courageous soul-searching that followed, and his eventual triumph over the demons in his own mind to re-enter the game.”
Monday morning Ankiel joined 590 The Fan’s The Ryan Kelley Morning After radio show to discuss the upcoming book, during which he revealed he drank before starts early in the 2001 season to help combat the yips. From 590 The Fan:
On drinking in his first start after the famous meltdown in Game 1 of the 2000 National League division series against the Braves:
“Before that game…I’m scared to death. I know I have no chance. Feeling the pressure of all that, right before the game I get a bottle of vodka. I just started drinking vodka. Low and behold, it kind of tamed the monster, and I was able to do what I wanted. I’m sitting on the bench feeling crazy I have to drink vodka to pitch through this. It worked for that game. (I had never drank before a game before). It was one of those things like the yips, the monster, the disease…it didn’t fight fair so I felt like I wasn’t going to fight fair either.”
Ankiel’s first start in 2001 went well. He allowed two runs in five innings, striking out eight and walking three. Things fell apart after that. Ankiel allowed 19 runs in 19 innings in his next five starts, walking 22. The Cardinals then sent him to the minors, and for all intents and purposes, his days as an MLB pitcher were over. It wasn’t until 2004 that he returned to the big leagues, and it wasn’t until 2007 that he returned for good.
I can’t pretend to know what it’s like to be a big-league pitcher going through the yips. That Ankiel would turn to drinking a bottle of vodka before starts to calm his nerves tell you how serious it can be. I can’t imagine Ankiel is alone. I’m sure other pitchers who have gone through the yips have turned to the bottle to help calm themselves. That’s scary.
