You can hate the New York Yankees.

You can hate the way they do business, and you can make an argument that the money they throw around is what is wrong with the game of baseball.

But, you really can’t, deep down, hate Brett Gardner because Gardner is what is right about the game of baseball. Gardner’s story is a story that all sons who tote their glove around the backyard need to hear. Those fictitious ninth-inning blasts that every little boy hits can come to fruition. It can be done, we know now, because Brett Gardner came right from our very own community, right from down the road in Holly Hill, hitting those sandlot “World Series” homers. He fell so in love with the game, that he worked as hard as he could to make his dream come true. Wednesday night, he earned a World Series ring in his first full season in the Major Leagues. Pretty heady stuff considering that none of the “big” college programs wanted Gardner coming out of high school.

The kid from Holly Hill

Brett Gardner was a star for the St. George American Legion Post 105 baseball team, but it wouldn’t have been all that hard to imagine him not taking a single at-bat for the team.

Marty Kinard coached St. George during Gardner’s time on the team, and as it so happened, Kinard was also the coach of Orangeburg the first time Gardner tried out for Legion ball.

St. George didn’t have a team at the time, so the skinny kid from Holly Hill Academy decided to try his luck in Orangeburg.

“I cut Brett Gardner,” Kinard said, laughing, during a 2007 interview with The T&D. “I cut Brett Gardner, and I tell everybody that I cut him.”

Cut from the team, Gardner didn’t go home, Kinard said. Instead, he hung around the Orangeburg American Legion team and gave them all his support. When St. George fielded a team, Gardner was on it.

“He was – I remember – the leader of our team,” said Kinard. “He was the vocal leader of the team.

“Now, whenever I talk about the best players I’ve coached, Brett Gardner’s name comes up. He got cut, and it didn’t deter him. He just kept working hard. I am glad that I had the chance to get him back as a player.”

From Holly Hill Academy and St. George Post 105, Gardner’s college options were few. He chose to walk-on at the College of Charleston. Immediately, former CofC head coach and current Auburn coach John Pawlowski noticed Gardner showing up early for practice and staying late. Gardner worked himself into an All-SoCon performer with the Cougars, and in 2005, he was selected in the third round of the amateur draft by the Yankees.

Gardner in a nutshell

While Kinard would tell you that Gardner was one of the best players he ever coached, there are those that would argue he wasn’t the best player on his Legion team.

So, how then, did Gardner make it to where he is now, a World Series winning center fielder for America’s most storied baseball team?

Hard work.

Talk to anyone that has ever rubbed shoulders with Gardner, and they will tell you the kid just wanted it more. That will translates over into his play. Gardner is one the Yankees because he is a scrappy, frustrating player who will run through walls if it means winning a ball game. He nearly did as much during Game 5 of the World Series as he gave up his body, crashing into the wall, to make a highlight catch on a long drive by Phillies outfielder Jayson Werth.

Gardner is no prima dona. He simply wants to do what is best for the team ... always. That’s why, despite losing his grip on the Yankees starting center field spot that he established coming out of spring training, he offered up zero in the way of complaints while seeing spot duty behind Melky Cabrera.

“No matter if I’m in the starting lineup or on the bench, I’m happy to be a part of this,” Gardner said last Tuesday. “If I do get a start, then I’m happy. If I do get in there in the eighth or ninth inning, then I’m happy. If I don’t get to play, and we win then I’m still happy.”

You have to figure with a World Series ring headed his way he is pretty happy today.

Hard work not unnoticed

Holly Hill Academy headmaster John Gasque said his school and the town of Holly Hill were abuzz Wednesday.

“There is a lot of talk,” Gasque said. “The community, the town, everybody knows Brett. People are calling me wanting to know if he is in the lineup. We have watched all his ball games. We are really proud of him. Coming from a small school like ours to play the Yankees is beyond a dream.”

It is an unlikely story, for sure. The kid from the small town, the small school who was, himself, a little too small in the eyes of many, working his butt off to get to the game’s biggest stage. In an age of instant gratification, the story highlights the virtues of patience, persistence and hard work. Chances are, not a single athlete at Holly Hill Academy today will play a professional sport. One could say that about any school. But, Gasque said, the story of Brett Gardner and how he has accomplished so much has not been lost on the students of his school.

“We’ve got kids on the baseball team now that think some things are real,” he said. “They can go play some college ball. There are realistic expectations out there that if they work hard like Brett did they can get after it.”

Maybe they will get to the big leagues and play in a World Series. They probably won’t, but one thing is for sure, if they do their best to follow the path laid out by their school’s most famous athlete, the young men down in Holly Hill should have no problem finding success.

T&D Sports Editor Brian Linder can be reached via e-mail at blinder@timesanddemocrat.com or by phone at 803-533-5553.

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