Old Friends At Last Meet As Opponents

Pitching for the Chicago White Sox, Mount St. Joseph graduate Gavin Floyd earned his 14th win last week in front of family and friends at Camden Yards.  (Mitch Stringer/PressBox)

By: Keith Mills

It remains one of the great days in local sports history -- June 4, 2001, the 36th anniversary of the major league baseball amateur draft.

Joe Mauer was picked first by the Twins. The Cubs selected Mark Prior second and Tampa Bay took Dewon Brazelton third. The Phillies and Rangers picked fourth and fifth, and in a quiet neighborhood in the Severna Park section of Anne Arundel County the anticipation was excruciating.

"It was an experience I will never forget," said Gavin Floyd, who had just graduated from Mount St. Joseph and was considered the top high school pitcher in the country.

"That's a day I will never forget," said Mark Teixeira, also a Mount St. Joe graduate who had just completed his junior year at Georgia Tech, where he won the Dick Howser trophy as the National Collegiate Player of the Year.

In the days leading up to the draft it was almost a sure thing that the Phillies would take Floyd and the Rangers would take Teixeira, but as Floyd, his mom Elaine and dad Rodney waited in their basement for the phone to ring, the tension was brutal.

Across the street, about 70 yards away, Teixeira was waiting with his mom Margy, dad John and his older sister Elizabeth.

The phone rang at the Floyds' house first as then-Phillies general manager Ed Wade informed Gavin Floyd Philadelphia had made him the fourth pick in the draft.

Five minutes later, the phone rang in the Teixeira house and Mark Teixeira was told he was going to the Texas Rangers with the fifth pick.

What happened next was pure Hollywood. Gavin, Elaine and Rodney Floyd walked across the street to the Teixeira house to congratulate Mark and his family. A local television station captured an emotional embrace between Gavin and Mark and a champagne toast between the two families that seven years later remains as vivid as it was then.

"I can replay in my mind what transpired throughout the whole day," Gavin Floyd said. "Looking back, it doesn't seem like seven years. It was a great moment for both of our families."

The day wasn't over. About seven hours later, Gavin's older brother Mike was picked in the 22nd round by the Phillies, completing a Floyd daily double and a neighborhood triple play that had never happened before and hasn't since in major league draft history.

"I didn't realize how big a deal it was until I got back to college and saw everything," said Mike Floyd, now 28 years old and a sales representative for a national beer distributor.

Mike Floyd is one of Mark Teixeira's best friends. They were teammates on Dave Norton's Gaels, graduating together in 1998.

Teixeira hit .517 with 12 home runs his senior year at Mount St. Joe and was named USA Today's Maryland Player of the Year. He was chosen in the ninth round of the 1998 amateur draft by the Boston Red Sox but decided to attend Georgia Tech instead. Mike Floyd was also named to the first team all-state team by USA Today and enrolled at South Carolina, where he played until he was drafted by the Phillies.

"It was an experience I will never forget," Mike Floyd said. "I was really surprised, ecstatic about the entire situation."

***

With the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim heading to Chicago this weekend to face the White Sox, fans could see another memorable moment -- the first on-field meeting between Gavin Floyd and Mark Teixeira. Floyd is three years younger than Teixeira and was a freshman at Mount St. Joe when his brother Mark and Teixeira were seniors. He has never faced Teixeira in a game.

Until now. Or at least until Saturday evening at U.S. Cellular Field when Floyd is set to take on Teixeira's Angels in the second game of a huge three-game series in Chicago.

"Once he got traded (from the Braves to the Angels) I thought, 'Hey, I could actually pitch against him,' " Floyd said. "When that opportunity comes, it will be fun."

Floyd is 15-6 on the year, his latest victory coming last Sunday against the Red Sox. His 14th win came last week at Oriole Park at Camden Yards when he pitched eight strong innings, allowing just four hits and one run as the White Sox beat the Orioles, 8-3.

It was a special night for Floyd and his family. In April, he pitched six innings against his hometown team, but the White Sox lost, 6-5. This time the scenario was different. The White Sox are in a pennant race and Floyd is firmly established as one of the team's starters.

"I feel great," Floyd said. "Super happy. I've been working to get back to the norm and I feel I'm back. This is just a confidence boost for me. To be able to go out there and show what I can do in the heat of a pennant race is just great."

Floyd's family was scattered throughout Camden Yards. Elaine and Rodney Floyd were sitting in the front row of box seats behind third base and to the left of the White Sox dugout. Gavin's younger brother Brendan, who also played at Mount St. Joe and is now a junior pitching for the University of Hartford, was sitting in the upper deck while older brother Mike was wearing a gray No. 34 White Sox jersey (Gavin's number) and sitting with friends about 20 rows behind home plate.

"It was a very nice experience," said Mike Floyd. "I wish it could've been Gavin in a Baltimore uniform. That's something we always talked about growing up as kids. But I am very happy for him. It could not have happened to a nicer guy."

Mike Floyd spent two years in the Phillies system, playing for the Lakewood, N.J., Blue Claws and the Clearwater Phillies. He was traded to Houston in 2005, spending part of that year in Salem, Va., before heading back to Clearwater and ending his minor league career in the Phillies organization.

Gavin Floyd was traded from the Phillies to the White Sox in December 2006. Last year he won just one game with Chicago but was put into the rotation at the start of this season and now he may be the team's best pitcher.

"Gavin's done everything we've asked," said manager Ozzie Guillen. "He's stepped it up."

Against the Orioles last week, Floyd did it on a pitching mound he first threw from seven years ago. One month after the 2001 draft and his graduation from Mount St. Joe, Floyd started the Crown All-Star Game (now the Brooks Robinson All-Star Game) at Camden Yards.

"There was nobody in the stands that day, just a lot of my family and friends," Floyd said. "It was really special for me to do that in high school and then to come back and do it now in the big leagues. I feel blessed."

But was it just another game?

"Beforehand -- no," Floyd said, "because I'm home and where I'm from. My family's here, my fiance's here, my friends are here. It's very special when I come back here to pitch in the ballpark I grew up watching. But once I get on the field it's just like any other ballpark. I try to get in the competitive mode and just get people out and keep my team in the dugout."

He will try again Saturday in Chicago against the Angels and his former neighbor Teixeira.

"My brother is great friends with Mark," Floyd said. "I remember looking up to [Teixeira] when I was young. I admire what he's done with his career. It's awesome. But when I get on the mound I have to get him out."

Issue 3.36: September 4, 2008