photo: Dakota Hudson (Brian Walton/The Cardinal Nation)
Saturday could not have gone better for Dakota Hudson.
In front of 13 family members and a national television audience, the 23-year old made his Major League debut following a standing ovation from the Busch Stadium crowd of 47,514, a new 2018 season best. It occurred just one day after the right-hander was officially added to the 40-man roster and promoted to St. Louis.
Hudson threw a 13-pitch, seven-strike, 1-2-3 seventh inning. The 6-foot-5, 215-pounder fanned two of his three batters faced, then yielded to the most dependable members of the St. Louis Cardinals bullpen, Jordan Hicks and Bud Norris, to secure the final six outs in St. Louis’ 6-2 win over the visiting Chicago Cubs. In doing so, the Cardinals have clinched the weekend series, with Sunday evening’s contest remaining.
In his post-game remarks, manager Mike Shildt noted that Hudson had a “nice debut” and that he possesses “pretty special stuff.” The skipper said the rookie “was completely locked in.” (The above photo is Hudson’s first MLB pitch and if you look closely, you can see the 96 mph two-seamer just miss inside to Kyle Schwarber.)
Even though Hicks and Norris had pitched on Friday, Shildt felt the two had not had “a lot of stress” and decided to use them even with the four-run lead. That seemed to have much to do with Hudson’s debut going just one inning, though Shildt also acknowledged the obvious benefit of the positive reinforcement that comes with the three-up, three-down performance.
Following are the manager’s post-game remarks. At the 1:25 mark, I asked him if the predetermined plan had been for Hudson to go just one inning.
After waiting a long time in the clubhouse for Hudson after the game, I learned he was on the field with his friends and family members, including his newborn daughter, on Family Day. (Coincidentally, in the Cardinals clubhouse, Hudson has been assigned the spot right next to the pitcher he followed on Saturday, Miles Mikolas.)
After waiting awhile longer by the dugout, we were brought out to the warning track as Hudson stepped away from his group to talk with us. It was surreal as I had to walk around a Clydesdale, which was the focal point of a group photo with Matt Carpenter and his family at the time.
The always resourceful Jim Hayes got to Hudson before the rest of the media.
Dakota Hudson after his major league debut: "Just jogging out of the bullpen, I didn't expect a standing ovation like that. … It was awesome." #STLCards pic.twitter.com/AC9RNL1P3C
— Bally Sports Midwest (@BallySportsMW) July 28, 2018
Here is our talk with Dakota. Among the questions I asked him was how he seemed to compose himself after falling behind in the count to his first batter, Schwarber, before coming back to fan the Cubs’ left fielder.
In an interesting footnote, Hudson helped tie a telling Cardinals team record in his debut.
Interesting tidbit from #stlcards media relations. Today, Dakota Hudson became the team's 26th pitcher to take the mound this season. That ties the all-time record, set in 2002 – with two months remaining in the season! Tyler Webb seems most likely to set the record very soon.
— Brian Walton (@B_Walton) July 29, 2018
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