On the hill for the Central Arkansas Geocaching all-stars is all-time strikeout king Nolan Ryan.
Lynn Nolan Ryan, Jr., nicknamed "The Ryan Express", pitched for four different teams during his 27 years in the bigs. Ryan was an eight-time MLB All-Star, and his 5,714 career strikeouts rank first in baseball history by a significant margin. Ryan's right arm was a cannon, and he could still throw a triple digit fastball into his 40s. He backed up his fastball with an equally devastating deuce that could break from 12-6.
Though he never threw a perfect game, Ryan is the all-time leader in no-hitters with seven, three more than any other pitcher. He is tied with Bob Feller for the most one-hitters, with 12. Ryan also pitched 18 two-hitters. Ryan is one of only 29 players in baseball history to have appeared in Major League baseball games in four different decades and the only pitcher to have struck out seven pairs of fathers and sons. Interestingly, Ryan never won the Cy Young award. Other than Jackie Robinson (whose number was retired by the entire MLB), Ryan is currently the only major league baseball player to have his number retired by at least three different teams: the Angels, Astros, and Rangers.
No matter what team he played for, it was hard not to love watching Nolan Ryan pitch. His fastball left a vapor trail when it left his hand, and it was always fun to watch him frustrate hitters. There's no sound in baseball more awesome than the sound of your favorite player putting the barrel on the ball, but the sound of your team's ace pitcher hurling heat across the plate and hitting nothing but leather comes in a close second. You'd hear that sound a lot when Nolan was on the mound.
But for my money, it doesn't get any better than the bench-clearing brawl on August 4, 1993 between the Rangers and the White Sox.
In the bottom of the second, The Rangers were at bat when Alex Fernandez hit Juan Gonzalez with a pitch. Julio Franco then hit into a double play. Pudge Rodriguez got a base hit, and Dean Palmer hit an inning-ending lineout to Tim Raines in left field.
The Rangers took the field in the top of the 3rd, and Robin Ventura was the second batter up after Matt Merullo flied out to center. Ventura dug in, and Ryan went way left, hitting Ventura square between the shoulder blades. Ventura shook it off, threw down his helmet, and charged the mound. Big mistake.
Don't mess with Texas!
Incidentally, Ryan was 46 years old at the time, and Ventura was 26. I believe that the two reconciled later, and have both autographed photos of the incident. And to this day, Ryan denies hitting Ventura intentionally....at least with the baseball
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