Nolan Ryan, American folk hero.
I used to have a Nolan Ryan t-shirt back in the day, not surrendering it until it finally fell to pieces.
Like the man whose image was emblazoned on it, that shirt lasted a VERY long time, and I miss it greatly.
Does the modern generation even know who Nolan Ryan is?
They should, because the dude is the real deal.
He was born in 1947, made his Major League Baseball debut at 19, played 27(!!) seasons, retired in 1993, and went into the Hall of Fame with 98.8% of the vote in 1999.
That year’s induction class, with George Brett and Robin Yount joining Ryan in Cooperstown, is the high-water mark for my own personal relationship with the diamond game.
Those three, who soared so high in the ’80s, when I was an impressionable teenager, were larger than life figures — old school folk heroes who looked like real dudes, not steroid-inflated cartoons, and their exploits still seem so much bigger than many who have followed them.
Ryan, in particular, was the guy.
He was old man strong, going bald and doing his arm curls in his dad shorts while drawling good-natured wisdom to his own sons in the TV clips we saw.
Then, every fourth or fifth day, he took the ball, went to the mound, and buzzed fools until the game was over.
Pity the manager who dared to think about pulling him early.
Nolan Ryan pitched like the rancher he was — you do the damn job, and you don’t ask, expect, or want, anyone else to come moseying along talking about “hey, do you need some help?”
He threw two of his MLB-record seven no-hitters after age 40(!!) and struck out 5,714 batters — almost 900(!!) more than his closest challengers, Randy Johnson and Roger Clemens.
Today, starting pitchers get pats on the head and orange slices for going five innings, then managers run 300 relievers through the game.
Ryan, death grip on the ball, wasn’t moving off the mound.
Not when Bo Jackson cranked a ball off his face, leaving the hurler (and his uniform) splattered in blood, as shown in the photo above.
Today everyone hyperventilates at the sight of a single crimson drop. Ryan retired 17 more hitters, without changing his uniform.
And not when Robin Ventura, a rock-solid third baseman in the ’90s, charged the mound one August day after being plunked.
Stop. Hammer time.
Ventura was 26, Ryan 46, and the rancher collared the upstart, pulling him in with one arm and raining blows down on the interloper with the other.
There are a ton of fake “fights” in MLB history, and then there is the one where Ryan, who was nearly wrecked after being bum-rushed by man-mountain Dave Winfield 13 years earlier, upheld his vow to protect himself at all costs if the situation ever repeated.
Enter Ventura, exit Ventura — ejected from the game, forever to be remembered more for getting beat down by an old man than for his own strong 16-year MLB career.
And Ryan? He wasn’t even ejected, cause no ump wanted to mess with the old man, either.
So, what’s this all about, other than me getting misty-eyed over a long-gone t-shirt?
It’s about how you all need to go to Netflix and watch the 2022 documentary Facing Nolan.
It’s a reverent look at the kind of baseball player who rarely exists in the modern game, but it’s also a love story.
Between Nolan and Ruth, his wife of 55 years, a champion in her own right, and the true power figure in the family.
Between Nolan and his children and grandchildren, who tease him about his old TV commercials and bring out the softer side in a tough man.
Between Nolan and the state of Texas, and Nolan and ranching.
And between Nolan and the game he played for three decades; a game he dominated in a way few others ever have.
It’s a great film, about a true American folk hero, a man who did his job one 100 MPH fastball at a time, then went home to his family and the ranch, content.
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