Ribs Won’t Be on Florida State Menu

OMAHA â€”  The ribs, they say, are all the rage here, except for the ones that belonged to Phil Nevin Friday.

Not grilled, not barbecued, these merely stung nearly every time Nevin took a deep breath. And this being Omaha at College World Series time--a.k.a. The Deep Breath Capital of the World--Nevin was faced with a pregame choice:

Oxygen deprivation.

Or potential victory deprivation.

Nevin was really in no shape to play a College World Series game Friday evening. “He woke up Wednesday morning,� said his father, Norm, “and it was like somebody stuck a knife in his side.�

But more pressing than that, Fullerton was in no shape to play without Nevin. Hours earlier, Nevin had carted off a Baseball America player of the year trophy taller than his 2-year-old daughter, Koral. For the past three days, Omaha has been buzzing with the rumor that Houston is about to make Nevin the top selection in Monday’s amateur draft.

Obviously, this was no time for Nevin to sit. One DNP by your keystone player in a double-elimination tournament is one too many.

Not that Nevin needed reminding.

“No one was going to keep me out of this game,� he declared. “They would have had to drag me off the field.�

So Nevin played and took his cuts in the first inning. Outside delivery low, an awkward lunge across the plate and a check-swing pop fly is flared into right field. Wince.

In the fifth inning, a ground ball is bounced toward Nevin, who fields it and flings it, side-armed, into the seats behind first base for a two-base error. Wince.

“I kind of thought that once I got into the game, the adrenaline would start to flow and I wouldn’t feel it,� Nevin said. “But it was kind of there the entire game.�

All of this merely dovetailed into Nevin’s most stirring moment on a baseball field, pre-Astrodome at least. A 2-2 tie with Florida State in the bottom of the sixth inning, the bases loaded with Titans, submarining reliever John Nedeau on the mound . . . and Nevin drags his aching ribs into the batter’s box and sends a 3-1 pitch 380 feet to the opposite field and over Johnny Rosenblatt’s bright blue right-field fence.

Grand slam.

Fullerton leads, 6-2, on the way to a 7-2 triumph.

And in the dugout, Nevin grins at Coach Augie Garrido and says, “Gee, it doesn’t hurt when I hit the ball.�

Tell Florida State about it.

What were the odds? Nedeau hadn’t allowed a home run all year, the Seminole pitching staff hadn’t allowed a grand slam all year. Nevin was gritting his teeth at home plate and watching Nedeau fling those dreaded underhanded warm-up pitches into the glove of catcher Colby Weaver.

Nevin had gone an entire season without seeing such offerings. “The only time was against (Fullerton starting pitcher Dan) Naulty, in intrasquad games,� Nevin said. “I must have gone 0 for 40 against him.�

In the on-deck circle, Jason Moler teased Nevin: “Just like Naulty.�

Nevin flinched. “I was going to tell Moler, ‘You have fun hitting off him,’ when I walked back to the dugout.�

Just then, just once, Nedeau’s Kent Tekulve sinker didn’t sink. Nevin could scarcely believe his eyes. “He got it up,� Nevin told the assembled media, almost incredulously. “The reason he’s been effective all season is because of his good sinker.

“But he got one up and away.�

So did Nevin. With one swing, he delivered four RBIs, to sandwich the single runs he drove in with fifth- and eighth-inning singles.

That’s six RBIs in one College World Series game, one short of the tournament record.

“A gutsy performance,� Garrido said. “That’s just another reason why the team that drafts him is going to get a great player.�

Nevin answered every postgame question except one: How did he hurt the ribs?

He claimed he didn’t know. It might have been by swinging a bat in practice, it might have been by lifting weights. The only thing that was certain is that he woke up with the pain Wednesday morning.

Strange bedfellows, these Titans. A week earlier, Moler awakened to a stabbing pain in his groin area. “We thought it was a hernia,� said Garrido. “And then the next day, just like that, it was gone.�

Not so with Nevin. The ribs ached on Thursday and again on Friday, necessitating a visit to a local doctor. “We had to make sure they weren’t broken,� Garrido said. “We wanted to know if this was something that could’ve got worse by him playing with it.�

Given medical clearance--the injury is believed to be a muscle strain--Nevin was given the kid-gloves treatment. Only a handful of swings in the batting cage. No infield practice.

The cautious approach helped, and it didn’t. Nevin began the game unsure of how to throw a baseball across the diamond. “I tried it from the side at first,� he said, “and that really hurt. So then I went over the top on the next one--and the ball winds up in the 10th row.�

Nevin was eventually able to block out the pain, Garrido surmised, because that’s what makes him Phil Nevin.

“He’s dealt with so many things off the field the last two years,� Garrido said. “Agents, scouts, the press. Baseball becomes a sanctuary for him. It’s the sanctuary that enables him to block out all the pressure.�

By night’s end, the ribs were feeling better.

What’s a rib or two compared to six RBIs?