There was an unforgettable scene at PNC Park on Oct. 1, 2006.
That day, Freddy Sanchez went 2-for-4 in a 1-0 victory over the Cincinnati Reds in the final game of the regular season and clinched the National League batting title with an outstanding .344 mark. To the delight of the crowd of just over 25,000 highly enthusiastic fans, the 28-year-old Pirates infielder collected singles off Reds starter Matt Belisle in his first two at-bats to cement his claim to the crown.
Knowing that history was unfolding before their eyes, the Pirates’ faithful surely let Sanchez know how much they appreciated what they had witnessed from him over the course of his second full season in Pittsburgh.
“That last day, so many fans were out there chanting my name, holding signs and everything, and they gave me a huge standing ovation,” Sanchez said on the phone from his home in Chandler, Ariz., recently. “All the support they showed me is truly something that I’ll never forget. I remember being on first base after my first hit that day, and thinking, ‘Man, this is crazy.’ The place just erupted.”
Sanchez began the 2006 campaign as a utilityman, but he became an everyday player when third baseman Joe Randa suffered a foot injury in early May. After hitting .333 in April, Sanchez batted an eye-popping .360 in May and .380 in June as Pirates play-by-play man Lanny Frattare began to refer to him as “Frederick The Great.”
The All-Star Game was played at PNC Park that summer and Sanchez, a member of the NL squad along with Pirates outfielder Jason Bay, had an MLB-best .358 batting average at the break. He closed out the season by hitting .355 in August and .327 in September and that one fateful day in October.
Sanchez's ordinary month came when he batted “just” .301 in July.
He secured the title by holding off runner-up Miguel Cabrera of the Florida Marlins, who compiled a .339 mark. St. Louis Cardinals superstar Albert Pujols finished in third place at .331. Sanchez is proud to have topped two sure-fire Hall of Famers to win the crown.
“Those guys are two of the best hitters in the history of the game,” he said. “Even if it was just for one year, to be able to say that I finished ahead of Miguel Cabrera and Albert Pujols -- two guys that I have tremendous respect for and loved to watch swing the bat -- is definitely something special. That’s cause for a little bit of bragging rights, because everybody knows who Miguel Cabrera and Albert Pujols are, but they might not know who Freddy Sanchez is.”
Sanchez became the 11th Pirate to lead the league in hitting and the first since Bill Madlock in 1983. Among the others on the list are Honus Wagner, Paul Waner, Arky Vaughan, Roberto Clemente and Dave Parker -- all of whom are enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y.
“It’s a great feeling to be on that list along with true Pirate icons and Hall of Famers, guys you would never expect to be on the same list with,” Sanchez said. “All those guys are Pirates through and through. And being on the same list with any Hall of Famer for anything is just surreal.”
Sanchez's .344 batting average rightfully received the lion’s share of the attention in 2006. After all, it was the highest by a Pirate since Clemente hit .345 in 1969. However, Sanchez also posted other numbers that were quite impressive. Namely, he collected 200 hits, batted .386 with runners in scoring position, drove in 85 runs, scored 85 runs and led the Majors with 53 doubles while playing in 157 games.
Plus, Sanchez struck out only 52 times in 582 at-bats.
“I hated striking out. I just couldn’t stand it,” he said. “I felt like even with two strikes, I should be able to find a way to make contact and put the ball in play. When you strike out, you’re not giving yourself a chance. With two strikes, I shortened up a little bit more and just tried to put the ball in play to make something happen.”
Sanchez, who was acquired by the Pirates from the Boston Red Sox at the July 31 Trade Deadline in 2003, was a .321 hitter in the Minor Leagues. His first full Major League season was 2005, when he batted .291 in 132 games for Pittsburgh while mostly splitting time between second base and third base. He believes the success he had that season set the stage for what transpired in '06.
“Yeah, I felt like I finished with a pretty strong season for my first full year,” Sanchez said. “I was getting consistent at-bats and that definitely gave me confidence going into 2006.”
Looking back 20 years later, Sanchez recalls that it wasn’t until the final few weeks of the season that he began to seriously think about the possibility of winning the batting title.
“You need to remember that I started that season as a utility player, so my angle was just to keep producing and stay in the lineup,” he said. “I was just trying to keep my job, to be honest. That was all I was thinking about most of the season.
“But then those last few weeks in September it really kind of clicked in like, ‘Oh, man.’ Even being in contention was pretty awesome. Then, human nature being what it is, you start looking around, seeing what’s going on and where you’re at. That was when I started to feel like there was a realistic chance of it happening.”
Sanchez was also an All-Star for Pittsburgh in 2007 and in '09, a couple weeks before he was traded to the San Francisco Giants. The California native batted .301 in 676 games in a Pirates uniform over six seasons.
He was a member of the Giants’ 2010 squad that won the World Series, but he suffered what turned out to be a career-ending shoulder injury when he dove for a ball on the slick grass in San Francisco in June of the following season.
“When it happened, I was thinking, ‘OK, dislocated shoulder. Pop it back in and I’ll be able to play next week,’” Sanchez said. “But the ruthless, brutal truth was that was last time I was ever on a big-league field. I rehabbed and rehabbed and rehabbed, but was never able to come back. I wasn’t able to go out on my own terms, which kind of stinks.”
These days, Sanchez is 48 years old and still enjoys coaching youth baseball, which he’s done for many years. Currently, he’s also an assistant coach at Valley Christian High School in Arizona where his younger son Ryan -- who has accepted a baseball scholarship from the University of Oregon -- plays.
“Ryan [who was born in 2008] knows about my career. He’s especially interested,” Sanchez said. “He’ll watch some highlights or videos, and say, ‘Whoa, look at you.’ He understands what I experienced during my career.”
And who knows? Maybe there will be another batting champion from the Sanchez family in the big leagues someday.