Osborne’s Win Changes Luck

I saw the wife of one of the St. Louis Cardinals’ owners get struck with a foul ball during Saturday’s game at Busch Stadium. To me, the surprising thing was not that something bad had happened to someone connected with the Cardinals, but that it didn’t happen to Donovan Osborne.

Thus far this season, the 27-year-old pitcher from Carson City, Nev., has nearly been killed in a car crash, has been tossed into jail, and has cut his finger on a champagne bottle during a Cardinal celebration. I don’t know what’s going on in Donovan’s brain. He’s done everything but trip over the Gateway Arch.

After pitching his heart out against the Atlanta Braves, earning the victory, 3-2, in Game 3 of the National League championship series, Osborne summed up his spring, summer and autumn, saying, “I guess my luck had to change sometime.”

Then he flexed his left arm, revealing a scar.

“And that doesn’t even count my zipper, here.”

Reconstructive surgery on Osborne’s throwing arm resulted in his sitting out the entire 1994 season. Just like current teammate Ron Gant, he was on the disabled list and couldn’t have played in the World Series that year, even if it hadn’t been canceled because of a labor strike.

Then came the 1995 season, during which Osborne was working on a 5-0 shutout against the Cincinnati Reds one day when he was rudely interrupted by Gant, who slugged two home runs against him, same way Gant did against Atlanta’s Tom Glavine in the game played here Saturday.

“Do you remember that?” Osborne was asked.

“No,” he lied.

“No?”

“No,” the pitcher said, the corner of his mouth crinkling into a smile. “Why would I possibly remember that?”

Bad luck is so common to him, I wouldn’t blame Donovan if he couldn’t remember one mishap from another. He tries to stay mellow, this left-hander whose flower-child parents named him after a popular ‘60s pop singer, by taking the bad with the good, and being grateful that he can pitch at all.

He even keeps a keepsake champagne bottle atop his locker, a reminder of that Sept. 24 twist of fate when a teammate accidentally opened a gash on Osborne’s left thumb with a broken bottle, while celebrating the division championship. This came two days after Osborne had to leave a game because of a blister that popped on his left index finger.

And this is just what’s happened to him lately.

Come, let’s visit the other hazards of Oz:

During spring training in St. Petersburg, Fla., the pitcher’s car was involved in a terrifying collision, but he ended up more frightened than hurt. A few months later, Osborne got arrested for public intoxication, not while driving, luckily, but serious enough that he spent a few hours behind bars.

“He’s had a full year,” Cardinal Manager Tony La Russa says.

Working the first seven innings of this vital game with Atlanta, the best news for Osborne was that he wasn’t nearly as nervous as he was during a recent playoff start against San Diego, when, he said, “I couldn’t stop my knees from knocking.”

Pitching coach Dave Duncan calmed him down this time, as did catcher Tom Pagnozzi, who had less trouble with Osborne than he did from toppling into the stands in pursuit of a foul pop-up, the one that landed on a woman in the owners’ private box.

“He was excited, but not nervous excited, you know?” Pagnozzi said. “Donovan threw the ball very well, and then he let our old-timers take over, our senior citizens.”

That would be Rick Honeycutt and Dennis Eckersley, 84 years young between them, who co-pitched the ninth inning for the Cardinals.

No golden oldie like them, Donovan said, “I’m a major leaguer like everybody else in here. I just haven’t been around forever like Honey and Eck. The simple fact of today’s game, though, is that I gave up one run to the world champions, at least at the point I got removed from the game. I’ll take that every time.”

When he went out, two Braves were on base, with nobody out.

I asked Osborne: “Weren’t you worried?”

“Me?” he asked.