Barely two minutes into his press conference and J.D. Drew was already making jokes.
A reporter asked Drew what it meant to have one of the best careers in Florida State's history along with being inducted into the College Baseball Hall of Fame.
"I'm going to argue that it was the best. I'm in for that argument," Drew joked about his career. "It's an awesome honor. It's not your intention when you come here as an 18-year-old. You don't comprehend or reflect on anything like that."
Drew spoke for 10 minutes Friday prior to FSU's game against Notre Dame at Dick Howser Stadium. He was in Tallahassee as the team is honoring its former players who played for the Seminoles in the 1990s on Saturday.
Drew was inducted into the College Baseball Hall of Fame in late March and will be enshrined at a ceremony in early July. He is the second player in FSU history to become a Hall of Fame member, according to the NCAA.
A two-time consensus All-American, Drew broke 17 ACC and/or FSU records. His best season was his junior year in 1997.
Drew had a school-record 34-game hitting streak. He finished the season hitting .455 with 31 home runs, 100 RBIs, 84 walks, 32 stolen bases and struck out 37 times in 233 at at-bats.
It was the first 30-30 season in college baseball history, and he became the third player in NCAA history to record a triple-triple with 100 RBIs, 106 hits and 110 runs.
"I told someone the other day, I was afraid of failure more than anything," Drew said of his junior season. "I was trying to get hits against this guy and that guy. Really, I can remember my sophomore year going to the Golden Spikes Award and Travis Lee won that year.
"And I thought, 'Man, I really want to win that next year.'"
Drew captured the Golden Spikes Award and Dick Howser Trophy. He also was named the Collegiate Baseball Player of the Year, and the Baseball America Player of the Year.
It led to Drew being the No. 2 pick of the 1997 Major League Baseball Draft by the Philadelphia Phillies. Drew chose not to play for the Phillies and was selected fifth by the St. Louis Cardinals in 1998.
"I learned a lot about how to play the game here and it translated a lot over into my junior season," Drew said. "Really, my whole time here. It carried over into those organizations I played with in the big leagues for sure."
Drew played in the major leagues for more than a decade. He hit .278 with 242 home runs and 795 RBIs while with the Cardinals, Atlanta Braves, Los Angeles Dodgers and Boston Red Sox. In 2007, Drew won a World Series with the Red Sox and was named to his only All-Star team the following year.
The 40-year-old Drew had a sense of humor when talking about his career.
He joked how FSU's current crop of players have an easier time compared to when he was a Seminole. He said he was surprised when he walked into the clubhouse and saw the players eating a nice pre-game meal.
"[FSU's coaching staff] had us raking the field and doing the tarp and cleaning the clubhouse," Drew said. "Coach [Mike] Martin was probably at a different level of his coaching style at a different time. We all learned a lot about ourselves as baseball players."
Drew recalled when he first came to the Cardinals and was asked to meet an instructor to review baserunning fundamentals.
"I showed up, we got to first base and asked, 'What do you do here?' and I gave him three different styles of leads," Drew said. "He kinda looked at me. We go over to second. Went over to third and took about five minutes for the whole thing.
"He said, 'You're the only player that knows exactly what to do in every circumstance. I said, 'We would practice this an hour-and-a-half a day at Florida State. We couldn't get away from the field because Coach Martin was obsessing about our baserunning abilities."
Drew said the Hall of Fame started to become a possibility after speaking with Howser's daughter Jana, who serves as the executive vice-president for the Hall of Fame. Drew said he and Jana Howser started talking about the Hall when he retired in 2007.
He admitted there was hesitancy at first. But after he and his wife had their third child, Drew said it was time because he wanted his children to share in the experience.
Jana Howser told Drew she could not guarantee he would be inducted.
"She had mentioned to me [former Florida star] Brad Wilkerson, who I played against a while back, had went into the Hall of Fame," Drew said. "I said something kind of jokingly, 'If Brad Wilkerson is in the Hall of Fame and these people do not vote me in, you can never put me on the ballot again.'"
They spoke again and Drew had a feeling he was going to be inducted.
"They did it in a way where they sent a ball out with a Hall of Fame logo that said, 'Congratulations, you've been accepted into the Hall of Fame.'" Drew said. "That was pretty neat."
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