Odd Man Out – Yale Graduate Gives Professional Baseball a Try

If you can throw a baseball 92 miles per hour you are destined to draw interest from the world of professional baseball. And if you are willing, you will even get a chance to pursue what kids categorize as the ultimate dream, the chance to make a living playing a game.

At age 21, Matt McCarthy could hit 92 mph on a radar gun. And in a rare development for a Yale graduate, the lefthander would give the world of pro baseball a whirl.

If you have ever dreamed of the opportunity, you can now see just what the experience entails with McCarthy’s new book. All told, “Odd Man Out” offers a less-than glamorous look at minor league baseball.

But the book, if accurate in its portrayal (some are now questioning the veracity of the tale) should be required reading for every parent who dreams of a professional career for their son, as well as for all college athletes (the language makes it tough to recommend to high school students).

Chasing the Dream

In McCarthy’s case, the time pursuing the dream ended up as the proverbial cup of coffee, not much more than a year. But the time was memorable for the future Harvard doctor and the man who would ply his medical skills in distant Cameroon and Malaysia.

In one way, McCarthy’s short-lived battle for baseball greatness matched the experiences of the majority of aspiring pros. For every player who makes it to the big show, there are hundreds who one day receive the ultimate pink slip.

The one that says sorry buddy. You just aren’t good enough.

Yet, as a Yale graduate, McCarthy’s perspective was quite different. Such is the case if someone brings balance and a touch of wisdom to the experience.

McCarthy began his efforts in 2002, in Provo, Utah, in the California Angels farm system. He notes it was at the height of the steroid era and that amphetamines were passed around the clubhouse like candy.

While top draft-picks could expect to receive contract offers of hundreds of thousands of dollars, McCarthy was drafted in the 21st round. That meant a take-it-or-leave-it signing offer of a $1,000 bonus and the monthly minor league standard salary, $850 a month.

The small money came because at 21, McCarthy was also “old” for a prospect. More importantly, as a college graduate, he had no leverage, the if I don’t get a great signing bonus I will return to college type of leverage most real prospects have.

Like Politics, Baseball a Two Party System

Unbeknownst to most fans, McCarthy categorizes the baseball minor league as a two-party system. “You’ve got your Dominicans, and you’ve got everybody else.”

The term Dominicans being what the non-Hispanic players called all the Hispanic players.

McCarthy notes the majority of those Hispanics were just 17 or 18 years old. Many had been rescued from poverty.

In contrast to McCarthy, these youngsters had signed six-figure contracts. They wore “large smiles, larger gold chains and designer sunglasses” and “they seemed to be playing life with Monopoly money.”

The two-tiered system also featured the U.S.-born players, most of whom had signed professional contracts directly out of high school.

Baseball was “the only life they knew or wanted to know” and they were “fond of saying that Don Zimmer, then the Yankees’ bench coach, had lived a model life because at 71 he had never drawn a paycheck outside of professional baseball.”

Interesting Insights

McCarthy offers some other very interesting tidbits about the entire experience. He discusses the baseball version of the Wonderlic test, the exam used by corporations and the NFL for decades to evaluate prospective employees.

The Wonderlic is administered as a timed test that features 50 multiple-choice questions. The less-challenging version administered by ML baseball featured 100 true-or-false statements.

McCarthy offers this sample: “Athletic competition began on Earth in 1974.”

To fit in McCarthy portrays himself as something he is not. He tells folks
he is not typical Ivy League, that he barely graduated.

“I didn’t go to class and didn’t do any work,” he says. “I just played baseball.”

Such lines seemed to work, allowing the Yale graduate to fit in with a group of men who were quick to assert, “I’m sure you’ve got some Wall Street job if this (a chance at a baseball career) falls through.”

McCarthy shares his showering experiences (one might expect juvenile behavior from the 17-and 18-year-olds) and his first meeting with number one draft choice Joe Saunders, the 12th player selected in the country. A man who signed with the Angels for $1.8 million.

At their first meeting Saunders asked McCarthy what round of the draft he was selected in. The newly signed phenom was a little uncool in asking according to McCarthy, a bit “like a Yalie who went around asking people what they got on their SATs.”

And when the man dubbed Joe Millionaire inquires about Yale, the former president and his daughter, McCarthy again struggles to fit in, offering some lies about the younger Bush and her attendance at Yale.

McCarthy also shares his experiences regarding young Bobby Jenks, the man who would help the White Sox win a World Series title in 2005. Jenks featured a 100 mph fastball and after failing with the Angels farm system, he would “pitch in each game of the ‘05 World Series and get the very last out, after which his teammates charged the mound to celebrate the franchise’s first title in 88 years.”

Other than that description, what is shared about Jenks is anything but flattering.

McCarthy also shares in detail his receipt of his pink slip in March of 2003. The tears of the other players receiving pink slips that day overwhelm the man delivering the news to McCarthy, causing Tony Reagins, the executive, to break down as well.

However, McCarthy’s tears come when he talks with another released player, one without a future.

Great Reminder

For those wanting a real, gritty look at the world of professional baseball, Odd Man Out is a must read. The book clearly indicates why, with-in the process of playing organized, interscholastic sports, the real key is to be sure you take the education part seriously. Without an education, those pink slips represent not only the end of a dream for most of these players, it spells the end of any chance at a career.

Not so for McCarthy and it seems to allow him to look upon the whole experience with a certain detachment that renders this experience just another step in his life.

Exactly what athletics should represent.

Editors note: In recent weeks, a number of people quoted in McCarthy’s book have sited what they insist are fallacies or inconsistencies. McCarthy has stood by his work, insisting that he kept meticulous notes during his time with the Angels. Sports Illustrated’s baseball editor Chris Stone notes: “To suggest that the book is fraudulent is a stretch and unfair.”