10 years ago today, former No. 1 prospect Rick Ankiel made his debut as a position player

Baseball demands specialization. Because the sport is really, really unbelievably difficult (kind of like the calculus final that you were totally going to study for), and is based largely on skill instead of pure athleticism, players have to focus on developing one particular attribute. Like hitting the ball a long way. Or throwing it incredibly hard. 

Every now and then an X-Men-esque mutant arrives and can do both. Rick Ankiel was one of those people.

After making his debut as a 19-year-old in 1999, Ankiel went 11-8 with a 3.46 ERA and 10.1 K/9 across 208 innings through the end of '00. Those numbers are all the more impressive when remembering that this was a time when teams were scoring more and striking out less than they are today. 

Of course, because destiny didn't want to deprive us of Ankiel's performance at the field and at the plate, it had to step in. Removing that homing mechanism that pitchers use to throw strikes, Ankiel fell prey to the dreaded Steve Blass disease. Unable to find the strike zone, Ankiel famously threw five wild pitches in the third inning of 2000 NLDS Game 1 against the Braves: 

His control never returned.Over the next three years, Ankiel battled wildness and Tommy John surgery before finally giving up on the pitching thing. So, on March 10, 2005, two days after informing the Cardinals that he didn't want to pitch any longer, Ankiel made his first Spring Training appearance as a position player in a Cardinals intrasquad game. He went 1-for-2. 

But even his ascent to the Majors wasn't easy. After spending the 2005 season splitting time between the Cardinals' Class A and Double-A affiliates, the new outfielder missed all of the 2006 season. On Aug. 9, 2007, Ankiel appeared in his first Major League game since Oct. 1, 2004. All he did was go 1-for-4 with a home run and three RBI: 

Over the course of the next seven years, Ankiel would hit .242/304/.427 with 74 home runs -- not too shabby for a former pitcher. That would include this 446-foot shot:

Not to mention a number of diving catches:

And let's not forget that throwing arm. Using the talents that made him such a dominant pitcher, Ankiel racked up 32 outfield assists despite runners knowing that to test him was to test the heavens themselves:

And have you ever heard someone get this excited for an outfield throw without a runner going? 

Though Ankiel has retired and taken up a post as a life skills coach with the Nationals, his spirit lives on in the game. Jason Lane, who once hit 26 home runs with the Astros in 2005, made it back to the big leagues last year as a pitcher with the Padres.