Jerry Augustine: A front-row seat

By Kris Leonhardt

Editor-in-chief

Continued from last week

“I left the World Series, I went to winter ball came back and I started the next year. Pete Vuckovich had hurt his arm; so, I started the year in the starting rotation. In fact, I think we went into California and I got our first win,” former Brewers Pitcher Jerry Augustine recalled.

“The next game I started was in Toronto. It was an ice-cold day and I had a torn knee. I had a problem and had knee surgery back my first year with a Big League and the Brewers organization. And hit the front of the mound, and I sprained my knee. So, from then on I started part-time and worked in the bullpen part-time. So; that year I was kind of bouncing back and forth between starting and being out in the bullpen.”

After leaving the Brewers organization, Augustine said, “I still thought I could pitch.”

Augustine then spent one year with the Orioles and then the Yankees picked him up and added another year to his pitching career.

“Then I had to make a decision between baseball and family, and my family was more important,” he said.

“I can really go back and say that if I did it over again, I would do it differently. And I would say that probably the biggest way that I would do it differently was mentally — I think the mental part of the game — the physical part of the game I could do. I never doubted myself on the physical part of the game, or my attitude for the love of the game. But it was the mental part of the game that I think was a little bit of a breakdown for me because everybody told me that I had as good an arm as anybody in the organization. But, the mental part of it, I wasn’t as strong as mentally as I should have been.

“And to this day when I watch guys pitch, I learn so much about myself. I reflect back on the days when I played and when I talked to kids or I did my coaching that really helped me because the mental part of the game is so important and you’ve got to be so strong.”

Augustine followed up his baseball career by giving pitching lessons for four years.

“Paul Wagner — former Milwaukee Brewer — I gave him lessons. He was in college at the time. He ended up making it in the Big Leagues and pitching with the Pirates and the Brewers and a couple of other teams,” Augustine said.

Jerry also got into the insurance business and about 10 years later, he was approached about another opportunity.

“All of the sudden, Ken Bigler, who was at the Grand Slam where I gave lessons, asked me if I would be interested in coaching at UW-Milwaukee (UWM) because they needed some help. His son, Cory, was a pitcher there,” he added.

Augustine spent 12 years at UWM as a baseball coach, helping to turn the program around.

“Augustine helped put Milwaukee baseball on the map in his 12 seasons (1995-2006), finishing with an overall mark of 347-297-1, the most career victories by any coach in MKE’s NCAA DI history. The program had just two winning seasons in school history prior to his arrival and had won 20-plus games just twice. Augustine claimed 21 victories his first season and then improved that win total each of next four years, setting a school record each time – peaking in 2001 at 39 games,” Augustine’s 2021 UWM Hall of Fame induction information stated.

Through it all, Augustine has had a front-row seat to all of the changes in baseball.

“Nowadays with all of the stuff they have — with the charts and all of the things that they have in baseball — it has really changed the game. It allows you to become better. Now, the Brewers have the science lab, it tells you about your pitches; it tells you what you can do, where you can throw, how successful you are, what’s the velocity. When you can get that along with all of the films that they have today, it’s going to make you a better pitcher. It’s going to help you on the mental side of the game to become better,” he said.

“I think as life changes, things get bigger and better. I think that that’s just the transformation of baseball.

“Learn about the game, really study the game. I wish I would have done that better. I think if I would have done that better, I would have had a much longer career. I think I would have been much more successful.

“I thought it was the biggest honor of my life to be drafted by Milwaukee; to make it as one of the first Wisconsinites to make it through the organization. To me, that is a great honor.”