It’s almost too good to be true.
He’s the home-school kid who grew up not far from Busch Stadium, who a few years ago meandered to the Ozarks in order to attend an NAIA school, Evangel University, strictly for academic reasons. And yet …
Six years after touring campus and only then asking the Evangel baseball coach for a tryout, here Blake McKnight is in the bullpen for the playoff-bound Springfield Cardinals in the Texas League, the Double-A circuit that sits only two levels from the bright lights and big-league cathedrals.
In other words, looking for another feel-good story before the curtain closes on this minor league baseball season? Or, tired of hearing about first-round holdouts or hoping to steer clear of political talking heads? Well, McKnight, a right-handed reliever, is authoring one of the last, memorable chapters of the summer.
“It’s hard to put into words. It’s just unbelievable,” McKnight was saying just a couple of days after his debut at Hammons Field, which sits about two miles from Evangel’s campus, where he became its first ever draft pick. “I remember probably six or seven years ago coming as a fan while in college, never dreaming I’d be here. Now playing on the other side of the fence is unbelievable.”
A celebration of sorts
McKnight’s arrival all the way to Double-A baseball – truly the proving ground in the minor leagues – should be celebrated and not simply because he has climbed all the way from the 38th-round of
the 2013 amateur draft.
To put it bluntly, McKnight represents a simple truth about the sport: Even if you aren’t an instant sensation in high school, or didn’t play a national travel ball schedule or that your path led to an NAIA school – one of the lowest levels on the college baseball totem pole – you never know if your talent might pique the interest of a scout.
Because that, in essence, was the journey for McKnight, who has proven that having fun and enjoying playing the game could lead to something if you’re simply patient and a talented late-bloomer. Which he was.
Even when he sat in the cheap seats at Busch Stadium in St. Louis, watching his St. Louis Cardinals while he was of middle school and high school age, McKnight figured that was as close to pro baseball as he’d ever get.
Sure, he’d play catch with his dad, Tim, or brothers, Josh and Chase, in their neighborhood in O’Fallon, Mo., and pretend to be Mark McGwire, Albert Pujols or, later on, Adam Wainwright.
But he really only dreamed the dream.
“Growing up, I didn’t see (playing pro ball) as a realistic possibility, even going into college,” said McKnight, who played some travel ball as a youth but was in rec ball while a freshman and sophomore in high school – nothing too competitive, he pointed out – before playing on American Legion teams.
“I came down to play at Evangel because I liked baseball. It wasn’t until my college years when I took off,” McKnight said. “Evangel was as much my mom’s choice. She was the one pushing me to get out of my comfort zone and go to college. She recommended I go to a Christian school. Being three hours away, it seemed like a good fit.”
And here’s the kicker …
“I went on a visit,” McKnight said, “and it wasn’t until after that that I contacted Coach (Lance) Quessenberry, basically asking for a tryout.”
More than 40 friends and family were on hand last Saturday at Hammons Field as McKnight made his Double-A debut. He was roughed up that evening, but bounced back Monday night by working 2 1/3 innings, striking out two, not issuing a walk and allowing only a solo home run.
Among those in the seats was Russell Brand, the longtime pitching coach at Evangel and now in his second season as its head coach. It was Brand’s idea in the fall of 2010 to move McKnight to the mound, and for good reason.
You see, McKnight was a freshman two-way player but only toiling on Evangel’s JV, all the while trying to adjust to the culture shock of a college campus and concentrating on academics.
“At the end of the fall semester, he went to Coach Quessenberry and thought about quitting,” said Brand, who at the time led the JV squad and had McKnight playing shortstop and pitching. “So we thought it was best to let him concentrate on pitching.”
In doing so, McKnight could concentrate on a pitcher’s regimen, somewhat a lighter workload but intense nonetheless. Medicine balls, weighted baseballs, he was working with everything as his body added about 30 pounds.
Along the way, Brand saw the velocity on McKnight’s fastball inch upward. First from 80-81 mph and then to 84-87 mph and it topped out at 94 his senior year. Pretty good for a two-seamer.
“He had always been, as a home-schooled kid relegated to summer ball with Legion work,” Brand said. “When he got to Evangel, it became a year-long process.”
Thus, McKnight got on the map in 2012 when he reached 90 mph, his junior season at Evangel, and a year later took off.
McKnight helped Evangel earn a program-record 32 wins in 2013 and was named an NAIA All-America honorable mention, after he led the Heart of America Athletic Conference with an 11-3 record and 1.56 earned run average.
The plan at that point was to earn a master’s degree through Southwest Baptist University in order to become a physical therapist. That was until the Cardinals drafted him, thanks to area scout Dirk Kinney recommending McKnight.
“One of the things that helped me was that I never really had any pressure (at Evangel). I came in there to play. I wasn’t supposed to be a guy there,” McKnight said. “I worked hard, and it just kind of happened.”
Work in Class A ball
For McKnight, the road hasn’t always been easy in the minor leagues.
But he found success this season in the high Class A Florida State League, particularly because has become comfortable in an adjusted delivery and in working with pitching coach Randy Niemann, a former big-league left-hander who deserves credit for turning lefty Kevin Siegrist into a big-league reliever, among others.
McKnight’s go-to pitch is the one preached in the Cardinals farm system – a two-seam fastball that angles in on right-handed batters and away from lefties – but he also began mixing in a slider and splitter. The right-hander also is now more over-the-top in his delivery, something spotted by Brand on Saturday.
“His ball used to run 14 inches sometimes,” Brand said. “What’s helped him is he’s becoming more precise with the inside-outside location and refining that.”
All of which has come into more focus this season, as has McKnight’s ability to recognize when he is working too quickly on the mound.
Niemann has been instrumental along the way, with McKnight working more than 190 innings in high Class A thee past two years and moving to a relief role in early June. His walks (82) were more than his strikeouts (76) in that league over the past two summers, but his ERA as a reliever this year was 2.78, compared to 3.32. He also threw a 6 2/3 inning no-hitter a year ago.
“(Niemann), we would talk about the mental game on how to calm myself down. I had a tendency to get my timing out of whack. I always work quick, sometimes too quick. Or on the opposite side, I can slow myself down too much,” McKnight said. “And then I was tinkering with pitches. He is the one who recommended the split. He threw it and had some knowledge with it and helped me out.”
Another thing that helped? McKnight has soaked in all the cool things about pitching in the farm system of his boyhood team but has put it aside, allowing him to focus on the job at hand.
Still …
“I’d be thankful for pitching for anybody. But to be able to play for the team I idolized, I can’t put into words,” McKnight said. “My first spring training I was like, ‘What am I doing here?’ But the newness of that has worn off.
“I’m just excited to finish strong, both personally and as a team. I’m real excited to get up here and take this ride with these guys.”
Brand’s advice?
“It’s been one of those deals where we’ve been close throughout his journey at Evangel and in the minor leagues,” Brand said. “We had been eagerly awaiting the day when we would get to see him in Springfield. But I told him, ‘Now it’s about, ‘Let’s see you in St. Louis.’”
Why not? It’s been that kind of journey.
