San Francisco – On a cool Monday night before a national TV audience and in front of 43,000 fans, Matt Holliday shrank the stage.
Forget AT&T Park. He might as well have been a kid in his Oklahoma backyard. His brother, Josh, a ninth-round selection of the Toronto Blue Jays years ago, was pitching to him. His dad, Tom, was sitting in section 115 behind home plate, grinning with each swing.
Added to the Home Run Derby just eight hours before the contest, Holliday didn’t win but legitimized his candidacy with a strong performance. He finished tied for third with Albert Pujols with 13 home runs. The Los Angeles Angels’ Vladimir Guerrero won the title.
“It was a lot of fun, an opportunity for me and my brother to play ball on the same field again,” said Holliday, who missed the chance to team with Josh at Oklahoma State when he joined the Rockies’ organization out of high school. “I was happy with the way it worked out. I found out at the last minute and just winged it.”
Holliday ranks second in the National League in batting average and leads in hits, yet he is less recognizable than the guitarist for Counting Crows, the event’s warm-up band. If nothing else, he evolved from anonymity to an interesting curiosity. The fans quickly embraced Holliday because of the distance on his home runs.
He blasted a 462-foot shot on his fifth and final home run of the first round. That proved an appetizer to his 475-footer to left field that nearly landed on the concourse an hour later. That crush was the longest before Guerrero launched a 503-footer.
“He did great,” Rockies teammate and fellow all-star Brian Fuentes said. “It’s not the same as batting practice, because you don’t get into the same rhythm. But I was happy for him.”
Major league officials contacted the Rockies on Sunday night about Holliday participating. The slugger was already in transit from Coors Field, setting in motion a dizzying 24 hours. He caught a commercial flight with his family, took a long cab ride to the hotel and, after a few winks of sleep, learned that he was in the derby on Monday morning.
Rockies manager Clint Hurdle had hoped that Holliday wouldn’t be asked, saying, “Nothing good comes of it.” Holliday understood Hurdle’s concerns, but wanted to get his chance. David Ortiz, David Wright and Ryan Howard, last year’s champ who exited in the first round, were among peers to endorse Holliday.
In the end, he didn’t wring out many more calories than usual. He took 33 swings, and all 13 homers were to center and left field.
“I am glad that I did it, and I would do it again,” Holliday said. “I am not tired. I got pretty lucky with the cool weather. It wasn’t that taxing on my body.”
Family made the derby memorable.
After the first round, Jackson, Holliday’s young son, joined him on the field. Jackson was wearing a bandage on his left hand after slamming his fingers in a door, requiring a hospital visit. Matt smiled when talking about the chance to watch the video of the contest with his son someday.
First, he owes his brother dinner.
“He did awesome,” said Josh, currently the hitting instructor at Arizona State. “It was a lot of fun to be out there with him.”
