Goold: Wainwright Finally Has Attitude to Match Stuff

[haltz]

A bit long, but I enjoyed this article, and didn't see it on the board.

ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
03/18/2007

ORLANDO, FLA. — Somebody was desperate to reach him, but Adam Wainwright ignored his cell phone and remained focused on the conversation he hoped would change his life.

That's when his girlfriend's home phone rang.

Let it ring, Wainwright wished. He wanted his girlfriend's father to answer the question hanging between them, not the phone. Nancy Wainwright was calling to tell her son the Atlanta Braves had just traded him to the Cardinals, crying as she told him. Stunned, he hung up the phone and returned to his task.

"Listen," he said. "I just got traded. But that doesn't matter. Let's talk about what we're here to talk about."

Jenny Curry's father paused, then said, "Yes, you can marry my daughter."

On Dec. 13, 2003, as Wainwright sought permission to propose to his high school sweetheart, his professional life turned in a different direction.

The climax of changes that started that day came last fall, as Wainwright won the National League pennant with a curveball New York is still talking about and clinched the Cardinals' 10th World Series with a slider. The pitches he threw are more well known than how he came to throw them — the back story to his ascent from being a puzzling prospect to Tony La Russa's "cool customer" closer and now a starting pitcher for the Cardinals.

That is a story of a single mother juggling two high-octane boys. Of an older brother turned pitching coach. Of former All-Star pitcher Dave Stewart pulling Wainwright aside for a humbling talk about how stuff alone does not make a major leaguer. Of becoming a new father even as Adam and his brother gradually built a relationship with the father they barely knew.

October brought all these threads together.

"I think that whole series of events started his maturing that put him in that position ... to be successful," said Trey Wainwright, Adam's older brother. "Dave Stewart planted that seed, which may not have sprouted until a little later. He decided to get married. He came to a new club and he wanted to impress everybody. ... He bucked the doubters. He made the team. He also started a family.

"That day (Dec. 13) was really a turning point for him."

Early lessons

The mound in the family's backyard originally was for Trey, but so were many things. The adjustable-height basketball hoop at their home grew as Trey grew, so by the time young Adam was chucking shots, the basket long had been at 10 feet.

Seven years older and eight grades ahead, Trey would help his mom, who was working two jobs, by taking Adam with him to play with the boys.

"These were my friends," said Trey, now an attorney in Atlanta, "so if he wasn't able to catch a ball, he was going to catch it in the mouth."

Then Adam showed a gift for pitching.

"He saw potential in me and wanted to make sure I didn't waste it," Adam said recently of Trey. "He came to me and said, 'If you're going to get serious about this then you need to really act like it.' ... He believed in work ethic. I was always trying to impress him. I mimicked him in everything I did."

Right down to his four-seam fastball grip.

Adam Wainwright still holds his four-seamer unlike other righthanders. He holds it backward, with the logo toward his pinky, because he was taught that way by his brother, a lefthander.

Adam and his brother would sit and watch games working on different grips, tuning in the New York Mets whenever possible to watch hotshot youngster Jason Isringhausen grip and rip his curve. When Trey went off to college at Georgia Tech, he mailed home newspaper articles about Braves pitchers. He called Adam one night to make sure he read a Sports Illustrated article that explored Greg Maddux's approach to pitching. Trey scoured Baseball America's ads for instructional videotapes, pitching books, anything and everything he could purchase and use to help his brother.

He immersed himself in being Adam's pitching coach, and Adam plunged in right after him.

The backyard mound got a makeover.

Through a net that served as the catcher, Trey had threaded a rope to outline the target of the strike zone. When Adam took over the mound, Trey spray-painted areas in the strike zone that he had learned were prime targets. Adam wasn't just throwing at a rectangle; he threw to marked edges of the strike zone.

"Trey has always been a take-charge person," said Nancy Wainwright, their mother. "He certainly was a role model. Still is. I introduce it as Trey is his mentor. That was important. I ran a strict ship for those boys. I wanted to see to it that they were well-rounded."

Adam wasn't yet in school when his parents got a divorce.

At 18, Adam said, a man he knew was his father showed up in Orlando, Fla., at the Braves' rookie-ball camp to see the newly minted, first-round pick play. It was the first time Adam had seen his father, who lived in the Orlando area, in seven years. That began, hesitantly, what Adam and Trey call "a process" that continues this spring.

"He wants to patch things up," Adam said. "My brother and I respect that. We're trying to slowly let him."

Trey said, "We're starting over from scratch."

"I was nervous, no question," Bill Wainwright said of first approaching Adam in 2000. "I think 'process' is a fair description. That was the beginning. I think time is the biggest part of it."

Most of Adam's youth, it was three against it all. Nancy chose careers she could fit around the boys' schedules, often working until late night became early morning. So she could attend Trey's games, Adam would do homework on the sideline, stopping only to watch his brother pitch or bat. Nancy once crisscrossed their native St. Simons Island, Ga., and Brunswick, Ga., five times between games to see both boys pitch.

A real estate agent, Nancy has stacks of baseball cards signed by her son and autographed baseballs at the ready for most anybody who asks. If a charity needs something signed by the new World Series champ or a baseball team coach would like an autograph for a kid, Nancy is happy to oblige.

The community was there for her, helping shuttle her boys from game to game, activity to activity. It was patient, for example, when she sent the boys to Junior Cotillion to learn the waltz, proper silverware placement, and etiquette, but could pay only in installments.

"I could have a truckload (of cards) and not have enough," Nancy said. "Everybody pitched in for our family. You don't ever forget that. ... I was determined that my boys would never use any of these things in our life as a crutch. No one would every say to them, 'Oh, well, of course, they didn't have a father at home.' Or, 'Well, it must have been tough with a single mother.' ... I was determined it would not be an excuse of any kind for them. My proudest accomplishments in my life are these two men."

Poor timing

The family ribs Adam for his flair for timing. On the day he requested permission to propose, he got traded. His and Jenny's daughter, Baylie Grace, arrived Sept. 10, almost to the day Adam was anointed the Cardinals' closer. On his brother's wedding anniversary, Oct. 19, Adam struck out Carlos Beltran with a curve ball, of which the Mets' outfielder still says "I don't think I can hit that pitch."

He flew his wife to San Francisco for the game on her birthday, May 24, last season. That day, he became the 22nd player in history to hit the first pitch he saw in the majors for a home run.

It all likely wouldn't have happened if not for a case of poor timing.

The Braves' No. 1 prospect in 2003, Wainwright was also one of 30 players invited that fall to try out for the 2004 Olympic team. He started the first game for Team USA tryouts and "got lit up. Got crushed," he said. Another bad outing followed and then the inevitable. Frank Robinson, the manager, told him, "You can't help us right now."

Pitching coach Stewart pulled him aside.

"He sat me down and said, 'Fall league or not, thin air or not, you should be mowing through these guys,'" Wainwright recalled. "He said, 'I see a guy with great stuff who doesn't believe he has great stuff.' It was completely true. It took me about three years to really get that."

Wainwright still believes that if he had made Team USA or "lucked out" and got a couple outs, he might not have changed. As the Cardinals headed to the playoffs in 2005, he headed to Georgia after tasting the majors as a call-up in September. While fishing one day, thinking of why he was home and not in the majors, Stewart's words took hold.

Wainwright finally understood what he meant.

Trey remembers seeing a change in attitude. Nancy said her son had to "re-identify himself." Adam went from waiting for his stuff to carry him to the majors to believing he had the stuff of a major leaguer.

Every workout "was to prepare for the big leagues," he said. Every bullpen session was "focused on making this team." Stewart's words rang in his ears.

Where the story goes from here is familiar.

The Georgia boy forced his way onto the opening day roster, pitched his way into a prominent role in the bullpen and, when Isringhausen was lost to injury, became the clinching closer for the postseason. But there was a subplot. When the World Series approached, Wainwright was given some advice from a friend: Share the experience, share the ride.

He did. His mother and brother joined him for all of the World Series games. As his relationship with his father continued to progress, Adam welcomed him for games in St. Louis.

While fireworks popped overhead and the World Series trophy was awarded, Wainwright stood in the middle of the celebration clutching and cherishing another prize — his 1 1/2-month-old infant daughter Baylie Grace, who was barely big enough to fill a batting helmet.

Who better to share that with?

"It's such a special time in my life right now," Wainwright said, cheers nearly drowning him out. "It's been the best year of my life and I'll never be able to top it. Had a little daughter. Won the World Series. How can it get any better?"