PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Brian O’Keefe was a star catcher at Saint Joseph’s University. He was drafted by the St. Louis Cardinals in 2014 and after years of hard work in the minor leagues, he finally made his major league debut this past season for the Seattle Mariners.
O’Keefe got the call that he was finally heading to the big leagues at the end of September, and he remembers his reaction after he got the news and hung up the phone.
“It was like a mixture between some nervousness, some excitement, a lifetime of hard work and dreams had been finally paid off,” said O’Keefe.
“I literally think I stood up and paced around in my hotel room for five minutes, kind of just feeling everything and just kind of taking it all in.”
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In O’Keefe’s first game with the Mariners on Sept. 30, they clinched their first playoff berth in more than 20 years.
The next game on Oct. 1, he was penciled into the starting lineup and made his big league debut, getting his first hit against Oakland A’s left-handed pitcher JP Sears in his second at-bat in the 5th inning, a single to left field. (The call of his first hit came from Philly native Dave Sims on the Mariners TV broadcast.)
“He threw me a changeup,” O’Keefe said.
“I knew when I hit it, it was a hit. It was kind of surreal. And when all that stuff happened, I remember just kind of stepping in the (batter’s) box and the most calm I was throughout the entire day was actually in the box. It was the nerves [of] sitting in the dugout, waiting to go back up to the plate.”
You can listen to Brian O’Keefe talk about his days playing baseball on Hawk Hill by checking out the latest episode of my podcast, “1-on-1 with Matt Leon.” below.