“You’re too small.”
“You don’t hit enough home runs.”
“You’ll never make it.”
Those were just a few of the many “encouraging” words Blake Blasi has received over the years.
Now it’s the summer of 2000 and Blasi is the Eugene Emeralds lead-off batter, hitting a team and league-leading .379.
A smile creeps onto the face of the 5-foot-9 second baseman when he looks down at the uniform he gets to wear every day and thinks back to the many people that never thought he would be where he is.
“It’s nice for me because growing up in Wichita (Kan.), I was just an average player,” said Blasi, who was a 10th-round draft pick (out of 50 rounds) by the Chicago Cubs this year. “I never thought I’d get a shot at it. I’m just trying to take advantage of it as much as I can.
“There’s so many people I could say ‘I told you so’ to.”
But instead of gloating, Blasi just keeps on working. Whether that means hitting extra balls off the batting tee or fielding extra grounders in the infield.
And don’t think his coaches haven’t noticed.
“He’s given us such a good jump start to the season,” manager Danny Sheaffer said. “He’s probably as good a lead-off hitter as you’re going to find right now.”
“He brings such great discipline to the team, and it’s hard to teach discipline,” hitting instructor Tom Beyers said. “We’re probably one of the youngest teams in the league, and without players like him, it’d be really tough.”
Blasi softly chuckles when reminded that he is “the old guy” on the team at a ripe old age of 21. But on a team with many 19-year-olds fresh out of high school, his college experience is paying great dividends.
Blasi was a part of the rich baseball school of Wichita State. This past season, he led the Shockers in average with a clip of .391 and only committed nine errors in 163 attempts.
Such stellar play warranted him the Missouri Valley League Player of the Year.
“Awards like that are nice, but there are so many guys in the league that are deserving of it,” Blasi said. “I was just the one who got it.”
He was then drafted by the Cubs, which presented a dilemma to the junior, who had planned on coming back for his senior year.
“It was tough because I was on track to get my degree,” Blasi said. “But if an opportunity is there to fulfill a dream that you’ve had growing up as a child, why wouldn’t you take it?”
Blasi also knows how precious the game of baseball is.
That lesson was driven home to him on April 23, 1999.
Blasi was getting ready to start at second base for Wichita State as they prepared to take on Evansville.
He was fielding warm-up grounders from his first baseman when he it happen.
Wichita State pitcher Ben Christensen was getting irritated by Evansville batter Anthony Molina for creeping closer to home plate and timing his pitches.
Still before the game even started, Christensen fired a 90-plus mph fast ball directly at Molina’s left eye and was ejected.
It may have taken 23 stitches to close the gash on Molina, but Blasi says nothing will ever be able to erase the memory of that eerie moment.
“It was crazy,” said Blasi, while slowing shaking his head in reflection. “It’s one of the weirdest things that I’ve ever experienced in baseball.”
Christensen was a member of the Eugene Emeralds last year and struggled. This year, however, he is a member of the Cubs’ AA team, and is excelling. He’s off to a 3-0 start with a 1.70 earned run average, and Blasi couldn’t be more thrilled for his ex-teammate.
“Baseball is already a tough enough mental game, but it’s got to be overbearing to deal with something like that every single time you play,” Blasi said. “He’s not someone who wants to hurt people. He knows he made a mistake.”
One that Blasi uses to remind himself that baseball is a game that needs to be respected. A game where the moment you become complacent, you become vulnerable.
“When you get to this level, you find out that you have to get into good habits to keep improving,” Blasi said. “There are so many talented athletes who never make it all the way.”
But first things first, Blasi says. He wants to help lead the Ems to a Northwest League championship. His team is 10-11 in preparation for the upcoming five-game home stand starting Wednesday against Spokane at Civic Stadium.
And about those critics of years past?
Too small, they said?
“I think that’s overrated,” Sheaffer said. “I really don’t know who wrote the book on baseball to show how big you’re supposed to be. The bottom line is how you play the game.”
Not enough home runs? Blasi knows he’s not here to hit home runs, although that didn’t stop him from belting two over the fence in Sunday’s game against Yakima.
Never going to make it? Well, he has and you better believe he’s savoring every moment of it.
“We’re adults now and we can say we’re playing a kids game and getting paid for it,” Blasi said. “Who else can say their job is to play games every day?”
Clearly Blasi is thrilled to be a part of the game and Eugene should be the same that it gets to be his playground.