21-Year-Old World Series Champ Evan Carter is Still Floating

Your early twenties can be a difficult and fraught period. You’re coming into your own as a semi-formed person, trying to decide who you are and what you want to be, probably subsisting on gnarly combinations of fast food and cheap beer. Unless, that is, you’re Texas Rangers’ left fielder Evan Carter, in which case you just won the World Series!

Carter turned 21 in late August, only a handful of days before he got the phone call every minor-league baseball player dreams of. When he debuted for the Rangers on September 8, the team was in the thick of a pennant race, trying to ward off several challengers and secure a spot in the postseason. You could say they accomplished that goal—and then some. The Rangers squeaked into the playoffs during the final days of the regular season, then went supernova. Texas won each of its first seven postseason games—sweeping the Tampa Bay Rays and Baltimore Orioles in the early rounds—on the way to the first World Series title in franchise history. Hard-fought series against the Astros (to win the American League pennant) and Diamondbacks (to win the whole thing) stood in their way, but the resilient Rangers were up to the task.

A fixture of their fairy-tale run, Carter—who was playing for the Frisco RoughRiders in Double-A just 68 days ago—was spectacular. The young buck batted .300 with nine doubles across 17 playoff games, proving he was worthy of his meteoric, late-season rise through the minors. Mere minutes before joining the Rangers’ victory parade, Carter spoke to GQ about finding glory so early in his career.

I would say I’m still floating. Out of our window right now we can see all the parade people lining up. This is really fun. We’re at the field, so it still kind of feels like, I gotta go get ready to play! Once we settle in for the offseason it’ll be like, Oh my gosh! What did we just do?

Man, yeah, it’s awesome! At the end of my career, that’s going to be one of the coolest moments. First one in Rangers history! This was an unbelievable experience.

I wasn’t expecting to make the team. That was more of an opportunity to get in front of the coaching staff and everybody—your future teammates, you hope—and veterans of the game. I was realistic. I had played a week in Double-A [at that point], so I was like, I’m not here to make the team. But it was definitely a valuable experience to be a part of a big-league camp.

I wasn’t there to not compete, though. I showed up and did the best I could. I tried to show them that I thought I was ready. At all times, I do think I’m ready. At the same time, there were a lot of steps through the minor leagues that I hadn’t really done yet.

The goal of every minor leaguer is to get called up. When you do get called up, it’s awesome. But you know, we’re here to win. We’re not here just to get called up! We were in a race with the Astros and Mariners there at the very end. Every win counts. All of a sudden, you get thrown into the playoffs! Each week has been bigger than the last one. It’s crazy.

I think it kind of worked out in my favor. There was no real time to sit back and think. That was probably for the better. Alright, regular season is over. It’s on to the playoffs. On to the next, on to the next. Nerves didn’t really have time to creep in. Expectations didn’t really have time to creep in. All these things that you would expect in your first big-league season never really showed up, because everything was moving so quickly, you know? Everybody around me, too, was so great. Having confidence in me—my teammates and Boch [manager Bruce Bochy] alike—they all encouraged me. It was really good.

The more I think, the worse I am at baseball.

Gosh, everybody has amazing stuff, and at the same time, they’re better at controlling that stuff. They’re going to live on the edges—we saw that against [Diamondbacks’ pitcher] Merrill Kelly in the second game. He just lived on the edge of the zone, and there’s nothing you can really do as a hitter. I experienced that a whole lot more. In the minors, sometimes you get the starter out and it’s like, Alright, sweet! We’re in the bullpen. The guys coming in might not necessarily be as good as the starter. In the big leagues, you get into the pen and sometimes they’re even better than the starter! There’s no real break, I would say. Everybody is there for a reason. You gotta be locked in at all times because they are, too.

There were a lot, but the one that stood out to me was [Tyler] Glasnow when we played the Rays. He was…his slider was the best slider I’ve ever seen. Then obviously he’s throwing 99 on top of that. He’s really, really good. It’s a funky motion and the stuff is electric. Everything about it is just…different.

I knew some people from spring training and stuff. I’d been around them and played with them. Triple-A is weird. They’re always bringing in new pitchers because lineups always change in the big leagues. So, there were definitely some guys I was not familiar with. But as far as the position players, I knew a lot of them. They were guys I came up with.

But yeah, I never even went to the home stadium! We were on a two-week road trip, so I was in Oklahoma City, a couple days in El Paso, and that was it.

I think that’s what’s so great about this team and this year for me. I can’t necessarily narrow it down to one, or even two people. It’s a big group of guys. Everybody kind of had their own little piece of the puzzle. Brad Miller was awesome to me. Josh Smith and Josh Jung were kind of the younger guys showing me the ropes. Cody Bradford, too. There’s so many people that had their own perspective, whether they’d been here for 10 years or a couple months. Everybody in between added their own little advice.

Mechanics don’t ever really change for me. But as far as approach—how I want to deal with certain pitchers—I’m always talking to Corey [Seager] or Nate Lowe, the other lefties on the team. Hey, what do you got on this guy? Because they’ve faced them before, and obviously, everybody that I faced was for the first time. Being able to pick their brains—Fastball, slider, what’s it feel like?—that was super valuable for me.

Credit to CY [Rangers’ general manager Chris Young], ownership, and the team that they built. They knew what they were doing, they knew what they wanted, and they went out and got it. You’ve got people who have been around that were great leaders. Seager and [Marcus] Semien, gosh, I don’t think there’s a better middle infield in baseball. Here we are getting to play with them, and they get to share their experiences with us. Corey has been to the World Series, that’s super valuable for a team where not a lot of people had been.

I mean, it’s unbelievable. When Adolis was hitting all those home runs in Houston—then a walk-off home run in the World Series—he was just on a different planet. Him and Corey were both really cool to watch. It gets to the point where, after being around them, you don’t expect it, but you’re not surprised when it does happen. Go figure, Corey hit another homer.

The best way that I’ve tried to describe it—when he hit it, everyone in the dugout is yelling and screaming. I remember jumping up, and I couldn’t hear myself yelling. I felt the vibrations, but I didn’t actually hear myself. All I could hear was the crowd. Loudest moment I’ve been a part of.

I’ve got two. Obviously Corey’s homer and Doli’s walk-off are right there. Those were really, really cool. But for pitchers, Monty [Jordan Montgomery] diving for a ball in Tampa. That fired me up! It was like, Dang! He wants it! He’s out here diving for balls! You don’t see that a lot with pitchers. It made me want to go out there and compete even more, be there for everybody. You never expect a pitcher to do something like that because you don’t want them to land weird and mess something up. It showed everybody that he’s out here and ready to go. That was really cool to see.

Austin Hedges and Brad Miller are the two people that come to mind. Brad wasn’t active, but the presence that he brings to the locker room every single day—what they both bring to the locker room—they’re always the most excited for everybody. When people are down low, they’re bringing us back up. That’s one of the most important things that was brought to the table during the postseason.

Corey kind of stepped up and gave us a pick-me-up. But everybody knew we were here to win, not to lose. We never lost sight of that. Going down 3-2, they still had to beat us twice! That’s a hard thing to do.

Umm, I would say [smiles] I’m always gonna go after balls no matter what. I’m thinking I’m going to catch it until I don’t catch it. As far as robbing it, that was a really, really tough play. Especially because it was more on a line than a fly ball so you don’t really have time to time your jump. I don’t know that I would have been able to get to it even if I had a perfect jump.

He’s not going to go out there and scream at anybody. He’s more of a quiet guy. But also, he’s really funny! He’ll be walking past you or sitting next to you eating or whatever, and he’ll just say something super short but super funny out of nowhere. That kind of takes you by surprise. He’s got that real deep, raspy voice. He’s a great guy.

Yeah I do! They have a couple of songs that I listen to now that I hadn’t before all of this. I knew of the songs, I guess, but it wasn’t something I was listening to all the time. Now it’s on the playlist for sure!