Walking the walk.
Sebastian Walcott is out to change the game. But first, he’s busy changing his.
The Rangers had hammered St. Louis behind Jacob deGrom, 8-1, on a Sunday afternoon in early June, two days after scoring 11 in a 10-run throttling of the Cardinals. The offense was showing signs, once and for all, of acting like itself.
Nearly an hour later, 350 miles to the northwest, there was a baseball moment less riveting than any of deGrom’s 81 pitches or Josh Smith’s no-doubt bomb that completed a five-run eighth or Marcus Semien’s video game box score.
Less riveting to most, at least.
Amarillo Sod Poodles reliever Hayden Durke had fanned Frisco shortstop Sebastian Walcott two days earlier in the top of the ninth, in the 23-yr-old righty’s AA debut after he’d blown through High-A with 36 strikeouts and only three hits allowed in 20 ⅓ innings. Frisco had held on that day for a 3-1 win.
This time, the RoughRiders were down, 2-1, in the top of the eighth. Durke was brought in to protect the lead as the Sod Poodles looked to hold on to salvage a second win in the six-game series.
Walcott took the first pitch: ball one, just off the plate.
He fouled the next pitch off, evening the count.
Ball two.
Ball three.
Walcott then took a strike on the outer edge, and dug in for the full-count pitch.
And refused to chase a 90-mph slider down and away.
Carlos Cardoza knew the player from spring training, from a couple Fall Instructs, from the eye-opening week and a half at the end of the 2024 season when, at age 18, Walcott was promoted to Frisco in time for its Texas League playoff run.
But that moment — a leadoff walk in the sixth game of a six-game series on the road — revealed something new to Walcott’s manager.
“The way he celebrated, it energized the whole club.”
The RoughRiders went on to score three in the inning to flip the lead. Walcott — the youngest everyday player in the league, more than five years younger than average — drove in an insurance run the next inning, and the Riders banked another win before getting on the six-hour bus ride back to Frisco.
“Scott Littlefield [the longtime Rangers Special Assistant and onetime Scout of the Year] once told me, ‘A lot of players show up to play. Only a few show up to win,’” Cardoza says. “Moments like that walk, moments where Wally shows his emotion and energy towards his teammates — I’ll always remember that. He shows up to win. Shows up to beat you.”
The best prospects are the ones who can beat you in all kinds of different ways.
There is work to be done. But it looks like the Rangers may have one of those.