Rendon has always had a muted stance
Childhood coach recalls slugger’s approach as a kid
WASHINGTON — Willie Ansley didn’t see the Washington Nationals beat the Los Angeles Dodgers in Wednesday night’s Game 5 of the National League Division Series. He fell asleep in the fifth inning, or maybe the sixth, with the late start conflicting with his early alarm.
It wasn’t important for Ansley to watch every out of the victory that pushed Washington into its first National League Championship Series. He wouldn’t describe himself as a big Nationals fan. He may not describe himself as a Nationals fan at all. He’s just the guy who taught Anthony Rendon to hit a baseball.
“Eventually I woke up and looked at the score and thought, ‘Oh my god. What happened?’” Ansley, his childhood coach, remembered Thursday. “And then it was, what did Anthony do?”
Ansley pulled the highlights up on his phone. As it turned out — as it often turns out for Washington — Rendon did a lot. He scored the Nationals’ first run after doubling in the sixth. He hit the first of back-to-back solo homers off Clayton Kershaw in the eighth. Then, he revved a 10th-inning rally with a scorched double that stuck in the padding on the left-field wall. Everyone will remember the ending, the Howie Kendrick grand slam, the moment that pushed Washington into an NLCS that it now leads 2-0. But Rendon’s bat made the win possible. He’s followed with two hits and three walks so far against the St. Louis Cardinals. The country is finally seeing a superstar. Ansley just sees a small kid grown up.
He has, after all, seen Rendon’s swing before. He has seen the muted stance. He has seen Rendon lift his front foot in the middle of the pitcher’s windup, no more than an inch off the ground, before dropping it as if the dirt is an eggshell he can’t break. Rendon learned it all from Ansley, when he just a 9-year-old in Houston, and has made only subtle changes since. His hands are a little lower while he waits to hit. His front leg is opened up a bit more this season.
Aside from that, Rendon has stayed the same. The key to the 29-year-old’s offensive success is that he gets ready early. Nationals hitting coach Kevin Long puts says, “the thing with Anthony is that he’s never, ever late.”
“A lot of guys have that big leg kick, they are loading late and trying to time the pitcher, but I could never do that,” Rendon said of his approach. “For me, it was always really simple: Get your foot up, get it down in the same spot, do it all before the pitcher is releasing the ball and that way you’re ready for anything. Then all you have to do is hit the ball.”
Rendon laughed at that last part. He knows that hitting 98-mph heat, or sharp breaking balls, is so far from easy. He just has a habit of making it look that way. And that’s really the root of what he does at the plate: He’s relaxed. He removes as many variables as possible. He gives himself every opportunity to adjust.
He often shrugs off questions about his swing or success at the plate, about the 34 home runs, 44 doubles, leagueleading 126 RBI and 1.010 on-base-plugslugging percentage that made him an MVP candidate this season. His swing has made him the heartbeat of the Nationals’ order and, soon, one of the league’s most sought-after free agents.
Rendon, though, would rather explain it all with basic cliches. He says he just does the same thing every time. He says he’s just trying to hit it where the defense isn’t playing. He even suggested recently that his career-best season was largely a product of luck.
But there is science to the simplicity. It started when Rendon signed up for the Houston Thunder and Ansley first became his coach. Ansley, who was in the Houston Astros organization in the early ’90s, took interest in how naturally Rendon used his wrists. Most kids didn’t know to snap them while making contact. Rendon did, before any real coaching, and that gave Ansley a good starting point. Ansley had a drill that put a metal pole behind Rendon’s back leg to force him to keep his swing tight. If Rendon didn’t go straight to the ball, he would smack the pole and a loud sound would ring in his ear. It didn’t take long before he was taking cuts as if the pole weren’t there.
“It was sort of like playing a video game, even when he was that young,” said Ansley, who still coaches and works for a Houston-area school district. “You could tell him to do something and he was so coordinated that he figured it out right away.”