THIS WAS A RIDE I WILL NEVER FORGET
6/27/2019 2:18:00 PM | Baseball, Champions' TriBUne
Baylor Opened the Door to the World of Possibilities for Me.
Champions' TriBUne ArchiveBy: Richard Cunningham
Champions' TriBUne is a special feature through Baylor Athletics that gives you the student-athlete's perspective and the chance for them to share their own story. Richard Cunningham, a fifth-year baseball player from Austin, Texas, earned his MBA and undergrad degree in finance. An Academic All-American in 2018, Cunningham hit .318 over the last four seasons and finished his career ranked in the top 10 in program history with 256 hits, 169 runs, 51 doubles and 14 triples:
I don't have the words to fully capture just how special my time at Baylor was. Quite honestly, as I sit in the aftermath of my final season just having come to an end, I don't think I have even fully processed that my Baylor days are over. I had a job interview last week and I almost didn't want it to be real. Yes, I am thrilled about this exciting next chapter of life, but so much of me wishes come August I will roll back into Waco to get another school year rolling at Baylor. Everything about my Baylor story was that full and that good, it's hard to fathom those days are behind me.
My time at Baylor certainly didn't go how I expected, but it went exactly how it was supposed to, and for that I am so thankful.
No one shows up to college baseball anticipating a bunch of bizarre injuries or playing for a coaching staff different than the one that recruited them. I certainly didn't show up on campus as a freshman with the hope or expectation to ride the bench all year in 2015 – not because I wasn't healthy but simply because I wasn't good enough to play yet. I never thought I would turn 24, still playing college baseball and having opposing teams calling me "Grandpa" and yelling at me to just graduate already.
If you would have had me map out my days at Baylor as a senior in high school eager to get to Waco, I could have dreamt up a thousand scenarios different than the path I actually took. But here I am, in June of 2019, nearly five years to the day of when I first showed up to Baylor, and I wouldn't trade any of my time there for the world. The outcome and the journey I was privileged to take in feels like I won the lottery.
In May of 2015, I watched most of the Baylor baseball road games from my house in Austin or my couch in Waco. Not exactly how I would have drawn it up. Show up to college baseball and make such a weak impression that I don't even make the travel team. I was an immature baseball player and was simply not ready for the college game. I was so afraid of failure when I stepped on the field, that I couldn't play with freedom, leading me to not be able to play well. It was one of the most humbling seasons of my entire life. I had dreamed of being this impact freshman phenom that made an immediate splash in the program. Instead, I spent most of my days at practice worried about whether or not I was going to get cut.
But what's so insane is God used this time in my life of constant shortcomings on the baseball field to grow me spiritually. He got my attention in a major way and completely flipped my perspective upside down. I went from viewing baseball as who I was to just something I was so fortunate to do. I went from being identified by my performance on the field to turning my time in between the lines to worship. The whiplash of success and failure, although still very real all throughout my time in college, no longer owned me. I let the God of the universe who I trusted with my eternity finally have the game I was so lucky to play, and I learned to play the game of baseball with freedom. I remembered how to enjoy every aspect of baseball and soak it all in as opposed to being defined by how many hits I collected that day. So, while the 2015 season was long and humbling for me personally, it turned out to be the greatest blessing for my relationship with the game.
In the fall of 2015, my second year of college and redshirt freshman year, we got a new coaching staff. And let me tell you, these guys meant business. All of a sudden, we were working out at 5:45 in the mornings four days a week. We were getting challenged and pushed harder than we could have ever dreamed of in every aspect of the game. Steve Rodriguez and company were not here to play around. I went home for Thanksgiving that year, and my family didn't even recognize me. I had put on so much muscle, they came up with a new nickname making fun of me every five minutes. It wasn't easy having a new coaching staff on a mission, but it was the best thing that could have ever happened to Baylor Baseball.
Selfishly, I spent my whole freshman year trying to impress a coaching staff that had some belief in me because they brought me to Baylor. Now, here I was, starting over from scratch and trying to earn a spot in front of an entirely new set of eyes. And as I mentioned before, Coach Rod and his staff had a high standard. If something wasn't done right, it was done again and again and again until it was perfect. Coach Rod's famous words that first fall were, "You should be concerned when we stop teaching you and getting on you. This means we don't believe in you anymore." And as one can guess, the staff was on us all year long. They believed in us and pushed us, and as a result executed one of the most impressive and efficient turnarounds our sport has seen in recent history.
2017 comes around. Year two for the Rod, Strauss, Taylor, Noriega coaching regimen. I was fortunate enough to earn my stripes in the 2016 season under Coach Rod's staff and ended up starting almost every game in the outfield that year. With a full season for the team under this new staff's belt, myself and everyone is excited for a special 2017. And man, it was just that. We start 10-0. Guys like Aaron Dodson, Matt Menard, Kameron Esthay and Steve McLean played like the veterans that they were. These new kids on the block by the name of Shea Langeliers and Davis Wendzel are blowing people's minds with their ability. Tucker Cascadden hits a huge grand slam at Minute Maid. We take a team no one gave a chance and bring Baylor Baseball back to its rightful place by making a regional. Coach Rod, deservedly, wins Big 12 Coach of the Year.
For me, it was a rollercoaster ride of a year. I finally experienced the trials of the injury bug, and I didn't realize how tough fighting back from an ailment could be. At one point early on in the year, I was hitting well above .400 and didn't think there was anything that could slow me down. Then, on a freak play on a Tuesday night at Sam Houston, I break my left index finger on a push bunt gone wrong. Little did I know, that broken finger would cause me to miss a massive chunk of the season and require full-on surgery. Not only that, I come back from my injury and I had lost all timing at the plate. I went from hitting .450 to .250 faster than I could get control of the situation, and it was such a helpless feeling.
That's baseball, though. Nothing is ever as bad as it seems, and the coaches never let me get too down. They pushed me to remember how special a player I was just a few weeks back, and any day I was destined to get hot at the plate again. They would call me and check in after I would play poorly. Coach Rod would break down my swing with me and get me dialed in mechanically. Coach Taylor would help me evaluate film. I think the coaches wanted me to succeed almost more than I even knew I wanted to succeed. Thinking back on it, that's pretty insane. How fortunate was I to have men in my life who would care so deeply about my own individual success that they would daily help me ignite my own fire!
And what do you know . . . as we get to the toughest part of our schedule, I start going nuts. Balls start leaving the yard. The entire teams' bats get rolling, and just what those coaches had told me was possible happened and we walk away from the 2017 campaign with Baylor Baseball back on the map and me feeling on top of the world about my play to finish the year.
It's 2018. My fourth year of college. I am a graduate student now in the MBA program. This is all thanks to my amazing mother and her foresight back in high school to get me enrolled in dual credit classes and push me because it would pay off down the road. Well, it paid off in a big way, and I was able to graduate in three years with a degree in finance.
Going into that season, we knew the offense was going to be potent. The big question was whether we could fill the void on the mound from losing Nick Lewis and Montana Parsons. This guy, Cody Bradford, decides to take matters into his own hands and dominate college baseball on Friday nights for an entire season. We don't get off to the start we want, but then we proceed to forget how to lose the entire second half of the year.
Then in late May, we make history. I remember standing on third base in Bricktown with a 3-2 count on Shea, trying to wrap my mind around everything that had just transpired in this game versus TCU. Before you know it, I am crossing home plate, getting crushed in a dogpile as Shea just walked it off and we took home the first-ever Big 12 Tournament championship in program history.
That game and that victory was, and to this day, probably the greatest baseball memory of my life. It just barely edges out looking up into the stands in my very first ever college start, on the second day of the season in 2016, and seeing my dad tear up as he realized I was in the lineup for the very first time at Baylor. That was pretty dang cool, finally cracking a Baylor lineup after a year of sitting on the sidelines, but that Big 12 Championship was perfect in so many ways.
That was the ultimate reward that seniors like Alex Phillips, Troy Montemayor, Drew Robertson, Joe Heineman, Collin Sharp, Levi Gilcrease, Tucker Johnson and Tucker Cascadden deserved. They had poured their heart and soul into bringing Baylor Baseball back to where it needed to be, and for the first major time they got a taste of the fruits of their labor.
The craziest part of that entire 2018 run for me was that I got so lost in how much fun we were having and how thankful I was to be contributing as the DH, I forgot I couldn't even throw a baseball from tearing my UCL on opening day.
Tommy John. Just about the last words any ballplayer wants to hear. I was told that was my destiny if I ever wanted to throw again just days into that special 2018 season. I didn't even know it was possible for non-pitchers to tear a UCL, and here I was just lucky to swing a bat pain-free so I could still be in the lineup.
I could have wallowed in self-pity, thrown in the towel, had the surgery and watched the 2018 season from the training room. But, my teammates and coaches wouldn't allow that to happen. Never once did they put pressure on me to play, but how much fire, energy, passion and desire there was in that team's culture took getting surgery and missing the 2018 season completely out of the conversation. We would take care of the elbow later. I wasn't missing out on what was brewing with that team. Man, am I glad I didn't! We made history.
June 12, 2018. I get a repaired elbow. Josh Ogden and the medical staff go above and beyond for me. The road to 2019 and full health begins.
Four years in the books. Back-to-back regional appearances and a Big 12 title to our names. I have completed exactly half of grad school and am working an internship with my arm in a sling. The freshman arriving to campus for the 2019 campaign were in 8th grade when I showed up to Baylor. I am shopping for engagement rings and making investment decisions and presiding over the weddings of former teammates, and there are guys in the locker room treating me like I'm their lame dad because I am not up to date with the lingo or don't know how to use snapchat. My fiancé is down in Austin making a living and cheering me on from afar as I get one last ride at Baylor to finish well. Finish up the MBA. Finish up my time in the green and gold. Love on guys in the locker room and help lead a special team one last year.
2019 was that and more. Adversity was the name of the game this past season. Key player after key player went down, and it felt like the odds continued to stack against us at every turn. Ironically, after the injuries I had faced, it was as if God prepared me for a year of attrition to those around me, and even after my big surgery I didn't miss a single start this past year. I was so proud of the way this years' team battled. I watched guys handle so many different pressures and trials and walk through them with boldness and strength all year.
I saw Kyle Hill reap the harvest he had so diligently sown and have a historic year. Just go look at his stats. I saw Davis Wendzel go from being the most overshadowed player in college baseball to Big 12 Player of the Year. I witnessed a teammate in Cole Weaver become an officer in the U.S. Army, all the while stepping up and helping us win games even when he wasn't sleeping the weeks before as he was preparing himself and others to serve our country. I got to witness firsthand Ryan Bertelsman come to know Jesus Christ, and I then saw the Lord lift him up as a leader and one of the most clutch hitters on the team. I could go on and on and share the stories of our locker room. Each one of them makes me swell up in pride as those are my brothers and my guys.
I can't help from tearing up thinking about how I won't get to talk business ideas with Cole Haring or debate economics with Andy Thomas anymore as we all get ready for practice in the locker room. I hate to admit it, but I might even miss Shea trying to tickle me just because he knows how mad it would make me. I know I am going to miss watching Biss field ground balls and Nick go on another 10-game hitting streak. Kills me that I won't get the satisfaction anymore of seeing guys on other teams get as ticked off as I would when they swing and miss at Ket's changeup for the third time in a row.
I would have never guessed in my wildest dreams that I would spend all five years at Baylor and turn 24 as a college baseball player. I thought three years and get drafted, maybe four at most. The best part about it, though, is each year just got that much better and that much more evident that the Lord kept bringing me back to Baylor for a reason. If I had a sixth year, I'd use it just because the prior five were that amazing. My future bride and Coach Rod would probably not allow it, that guy has to be tired of me by now, but I would go back and do it all again. Over and over and over.
Don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled about where God will take me. Marriage and work and a family someday all get me extremely excited. If you know me, you know how badly I can't wait to be a dad. But there will be those moments when my mind wanders, and I am back in centerfield again on a gorgeous spring night at Baylor Ballpark, running down a fly ball, awaiting the cheer of the crowd when I make the catch. I can't help but think about rounding the bases after a homer and slapping hands with Coach T and running back into the dugout to 34 of my best friends freaking out in excitement and Coach Rod giving me knucks in approval. I am going to miss every second of it all. Sitting and talking life and baseball with Coach Rube are some of my favorite times to date. I will miss it all.
I look back and I still get excited about the big wins. I smile thinking about the clutch base hits and the nice plays out in center. I don't know if I will ever be able to recreate the feeling of accomplishment I would experience after a monster game.
There's other stuff that is even more special, though. I look back and I love the pain of prowler races at morning workouts, and Matt Menard telling all of us to finish. I remember looking around knowing each and every guy was fighting through the same pain I was feeling and refusing to give in because our teammates deserved our best. I love the long bus rides and the pointless debates in the locker room about Lord knows what. I love Coach Rod and Coach Nelly and Jeremy and Kale pouring their heart and soul into us about becoming great men and fathers and husbands. I love getting a hug from the entire team, one by one, as I fly out to end my baseball career and am sobbing in realization that I won't get to lace it up and put on my Baylor uniform ever again. I love the bus freaking out when our teammates get their names called in the MLB draft. I love walking out of the locker room to hug my family and future bride as we celebrate the win or they help me brush off the loss.
I will miss everything. Yes, because I might not get to do it all again, but more than anything, because of just how special it was.
Thanks for everything, Baylor. You made a man of me. You opened up the door to a world of possibilities for me. You gave me more people I love than I could have ever dreamed of, and you gave my family the time of their lives. You got me a bride.
To any current or future student reading this: Don't waste a second of your time on that campus. It goes fast. I dare you to lean in, see how good the ride can be.
Previous Champions' TriBUne Features
Men's Tennis - Jimmy Bendeck (June 14, 2019)
Baseball - Shea Langeliers (May 30, 2019)
Track & Field - Kiana Horton (May 22, 2019)
Men's Golf - Garrett May (May 9, 2019)
Women's Golf - Maria Vesga (May 2, 2019)
Acrobatics & Tumbling - Camryn Bryant (April 25, 2019)
Equestrian - Shannon Hogue (April 16, 2019)
Women's Tennis - Angelina Shakhraichuk (April 9, 2019)
Women's Basketball - Lauren Cox (March 22, 2019)
Track & Field - Wil London (March 7, 2019)
Men's Basketball - Jake Lindsey (March 4, 2019)
Softball - Nicky Dawson (Feb. 21, 2019)
Baseball - Josh Bissonette (Feb. 14, 2019)
Men's Tennis - Will Little (Jan. 31, 2019)
Men's Basketball - King McClure (Jan. 17, 2019)
Women's Basketball - Chloe Jackson (Jan. 3, 2019)
Football - Blake Blackmar (Dec. 13, 2018)
Volleyball - Braya Hunt (Nov. 29, 2018)
Soccer - Jackie Crowther (Nov. 16, 2018)
Cross Country - Alison Andrews-Paul (Nov. 8, 2018)
Football- Ira Lewis (Nov. 6, 2018)
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