‘It’s been a wild ride to get here’
Rays reliever Anderson took years to get back on track after conviction
ARLINGTON, TEXAS— The telephone rang Wednesday evening. They called out his name. He uncoiled his six-foot-five body from the chair, and it was time to go to work.
The phone rings often for him these days, but it’s not those early morning wake-up calls in the dead of winter in Minnesota anymore. Gone are the days of grabbing a tool box and hoping his car would start, then going to do roofing, lay carpet or gut bathrooms. Nowadays, he only needs a glove.
Nick Anderson, who gazed into the crowd earlier in the day at Globe Life Field, knowing his parents and sister were in the stands, started to warm up in the Tampa Bay Rays bullpen in the fifth inning of Game 2 of the World Series.
With Los Angeles Dodgers fans screaming and trying to rattle him, Anderson took the mound for his first World Series game, facing slugger Justin Turner in a key spot with two runners on base.
“Come on,” he said to himself. “You really think this is pressure?”
Ball 1. Ball 2. He walked around the mound, exhaled and decided to go with the best he’s got, his four-seam fastball. He threw a 95.7-m.p.h. fastball that Tuner swung at and missed. Came back with a 94.4-m.p.h. fastball that was fouled back. And then a 95.5-m.p.h. fastball that Turner missed again
Inning over. Soon, game over, 6-4. The winning pitcher: Anderson.
“I know people think I would be nervous,” Anderson said, “but to tell you the truth, I was calm. Crazy huh?”
Pressure is sleeping on an air mattress at your buddy’s house, working eight hours a day in Brainerd, Minn., as a home remodeler, then going through rigorous workouts at night in pursuit of your dream.
Pressure is having to report to your probation officer to get permission every time you need to cross the state line to play a summer baseball game. It’s pitching your heart out and making $600 (U.S.) each month in an independent baseball league, praying someone notices and, if they do, pardons your past.
Pitching in the World Series, with finally enough money to
move out of your mom’s house, and even buy your own car? Sorry, that isn’t pressure.
“It’s a little crazy when you think about it,” Anderson said. “It’s been a wild ride to get here. And believe me, there were a lot of rough spots. But I never gave up. I never quit. I really believed one day I would get here.
“I just didn’t know it would take the crazy path it did.”
This is a man with a DWI conviction and felony assault charge while in college, for which he received seven years probation. He pitched three years in independent leagues, a summer in an amateur league, four more years in the minors, was signed by his hometown team, and traded twice in nine months, only to become one of the game’s best relievers.
Anderson was nothing short of phenomenal in the regular season, yielding a 0.55 ERA and .091 batting average. He gave up only five hits the entire season, striking out 26 in 161⁄ 3innings.
“He’s been as good as any reliever in baseball from the day
we acquired him,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “Nick is invaluable to us.”
Classes were about to start for Anderson’s senior year at St. Cloud State University on Aug. 13, 2011, when he went out with a few buddies to a local bar. At about 1 a.m., Anderson’s cellphone rang, with one of his old roommates on the line. A fight had broken out in the house, and they needed help.
Anderson, 205 pounds, was the type of guy you wanted on your side. He put down his beer, hustled over to the house and found himself in the middle of a college brawl.
He jumped in the mix and grabbed a baseball bat when he saw someone holding a knife. He was shoved, knocked offbalance, and struck a student over the head with the bat.
Anderson was charged with second degree assault with a dangerous weapon and spent eight days in jail. He eventually received seven years probation
and was ordered to pay restitution for the injuries, take angermanagement classes and attend an Alcoholics Anonymous program.
“It didn’t start with me,” he said, “but I got the worst end of the stick.”
Anderson transferred to Mayville State University, an NAIA school in North Dakota, where he went 5-2 with a 1.95 ERA his senior year. He was drafted by the Milwaukee Brewers in the 32nd round.
Only he never heard from the Brewers, who found out about his arrests and lost interest. So did everyone else in baseball.
“That was a life-changer,” said Anderson, whose probation was reduced and ended after three years in 2014. “It makes you grow up. It makes you reflect on life. It takes years for people to overlook those things and trust you again.”
Nick Belmonte, a Chicago Cubs scout who runs the Indy Pro Showcase, remembers the date, Feb. 15, 2015, the first time he laid eyes on Anderson.
“This tall lanky kid strolls in from Brainerd, Minnesota, and he hasn’t played in a year,” Belmonte says. “It’s February. He comes out and he’s throwing 92-94 m.p.h. I said, ‘ Whoa, what’s this all about?’ I asked him, ‘Where have you been? Why didn’t you play last year?’ He tells me his story about those incidents but that he learned from it.
“I called up Vinny Ganz, who was the manager of the Frontier Greys, a travelling team in the (independent) Frontier League. I told him, ‘You’ve got to see this kid.’ He signed him that day.”
Billy Milos, the Minnesota Twins scout who spent three months trying to persuade his team to sign Anderson, talks about heart-to-heart chats that frequently lasted into the wee hours of the morning and his belief and faith in Anderson as a person.
“The odds were so stacked against him, but I knew he could do this,” said Milos, who discovered Anderson with the help of veteran scout Bill Bryk. I’d be lying if I said he’d be this good, and have one of the best arms in the game, but I’m not surprised he’d have success in the big leagues.”
It would be easy for Anderson to be bitter, wasting years of pitching development in independent ball.
Sure, he didn’t have the kneebuckling curveball in his arsenal until developing it at the age of 27. He didn’t always have the pinpoint control, commanding the upper part of the strike zone, Cash said, as well as any pitcher in baseball.
Yet, when you have a 2.25 ERA and 232 strikeouts in 1832⁄ 3 minor league innings from 2015 to 2018 and still aren’t called up, you wonder if you’ll ever get a chance.
Anderson got his when the Twins traded him to Miami in November 2018. The Marlins gave him his first taste of the majors in 2019 but dealt him to the Rays at the deadline in July.
“I think everything happens for a reason,” said Anderson, who struck out 15.2 per nine innings in 2019.
“I mean, what if I had gotten drafted out of high school and made it earlier, who knows what would have happened? You put a lot of money in a young man’s hands, you could have trouble. I don’t know if I could have handled it.
“In a way, this was the path meant to be.”