Daniel Carte
Falmouth 2004
Outfielder
Winthrop
Daniel Carte did not have a hit in the first 19 at-bats of his Cape League career.
Think about that for a second, because I think you remember what happened after that. You remember Daniel Carte, and it’s certainly not because he went 0-for-19. If you start 0-for-19, you can go 10 for your next 20, and still only be hitting around .250.
From those beginnings, Daniel Carte had one of the best offensive summers you’ll ever see.
It took him until June 23 — seven days into the season — to get a hit, but the way he got it might have been a clue of what was coming. In the bottom of the ninth inning against Cotuit, Carte led off with a walk-off solo home run that gave Falmouth a 5-4 victory. Not only was that the first hit of the summer for Carte, it gave Falmouth its first win.
The fortunes of the two would continue to improve.
Falmouth ended up with the second-best record in the league, going 25-13 after the early struggles. An impressive turnaround, but maybe not quite as impressive as Carte’s.
He was a small-school kid, not particularly tall, no jaw-dropping numbers at Winthrop. I don’t know how he kept his confidence through the 0-for-19 start. A lot of times, a bad start means a bad summer, and vice versa. The start can be everything.
Carte left it completely in the dust. The day after he hit the walk-off blast, he homered again and drove in two. The next day, he went 2-for-3 with another home run.
Yeah, he was a little streaky, but he never hit a cold spell again. He finished the summer with a .308 average, 11 home runs, 38 RBI and 13 steals. He led the league in homers, RBI, extra-base hits and slugging percentage and he was third in both hits and runs and fourth in hitting. He also became just the sixth player in league history to hit double digits in home runs and steals.
He was the total package — a shoo-in for the MVP award — and the numbers still stand up. Aside from Carte and his 38, no one in the decade had more than 35 RBI. No one hit more than 11 home runs either.
Pretty good for a guy who couldn’t buy a hit when the season began.
After the Cape
Carte’s summer vaulted him into the second round of the 2005 draft, where he was taken by the Rockies. He hasn’t found huge success yet in the minors. His best year was 2007, when he hit .283 with 14 home runs. Carte spent 2009 in Double A.
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