Paul Menhart

Paul Gerard Menhart (born March 25, 1969) is an American baseball pitching coach for the West Virginia Power of the Atlantic League and former Major League Baseball player.

He attended Western Carolina University and was a pitcher for three teams in Major League Baseball.

Menhart was born in St. Louis, Missouri, on March 25, 1969, and grew up in Mystic, Connecticut.

He attended Robert E. Fitch High School in Groton, Connecticut, where he played baseball, basketball, and soccer.

He also played American Legion Baseball in New London, Connecticut.

After graduating from high school in 1987, Menhart played college baseball, pitching for Western Carolina of the Southern Conference for three seasons.

During his college career, he had a 19–17 record overall – 11–6 in Southern Conference games – with 214 strikeouts.

He led the Catamounts in strikeouts in each of his seasons and in innings pitched twice.

In 1988, with an 8–3 record and a 3.55 earned run average (ERA), he was a first-team All-Southern Conference player.

During his college years, Western Carolina won the Southern Conference championship in 1988 and 1989.

He was named the Southern Conference Tournament Most Valuable Player in 1989 after he threw a five-hitter with 10 strikeouts in the semifinals versus Appalachian State.

Menhart opted to forego his senior year of college and enter the 1990 Major League Baseball draft.

On June 4, 1990, the Toronto Blue Jays selected him in the eighth round of the draft as the 231st pick overall.

He signed with the Blue Jays on June 6, 1990.

He began his professional career with eight appearances – all starts – for the Class A-Short Season St. Catharines Blue Jays of the New York–Penn League, pitching to a 4.06 earned run average (ERA) over 40 innings, with 38 strikeouts and 19 walks and a record of 0–5.

He then was promoted to the Myrtle Beach Blue Jays of the Class A South Atlantic League, where he pitched to a 3–0 record and a 0.59 ERA in 30 2⁄3 innings over four starts – one of them a complete game – and one relief appearance, striking out 18 and walking five.

Promoted again, Menhart spent the 1991 season with the Class A-Advanced Dunedin Blue Jays of the Florida State League, where he made 20 appearances, all starts, and pitched 128 1⁄3 innings; he finished the year with three complete games, a 10–6 record, a 2.66 ERA, 114 strikeouts, and 34 walks, and was a Florida State League All-Star.

He rose to the Class AA level in 1992, pitching for the Knoxville Blue Jays of the Southern League all season, finishing with a 3.85 ERA and a 10–11 record over 28 appearances – all starts – and 177 2⁄3 innings pitched, with two complete games, 104 strikeouts, and 34 walks.

In 1993, Menhart advanced to Class AAA, spending the season with the Syracuse Chiefs of the International League; with the Chiefs, he went 9–10 with a 3.64 ERA, making 25 appearances – all starts – pitching 151 innings and four complete games, striking out 108, and walking 67.

However, he missed all of August 1993 with an elbow injury and late in 1993, while playing winter baseball in Puerto Rico during the 1993–1994 offseason, felt something snap in his elbow.

He underwent ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction, popularly known as "Tommy John surgery," and as a result missed the entire 1994 season.

In 1995, Menhart returned to action and made the Blue Jays′ 25-man major-league roster for Opening Day.

He made his major-league debut on April 27, coming into a game at SkyDome in Toronto, Ontario, in relief of Blue Jays starter Pat Hentgen with one out in the ninth inning and Toronto leading the Oakland Athletics 7–1.

He struck out the two batters he faced, Oakland first baseman Mark McGwire and right fielder Andy Tomberlin, to end the game.

He made his first major-league start on May 30, facing the Detroit Tigers in Toronto, and struggled, giving up five earned runs before leaving the game in the fifth inning.

Toronto sent him down to Syracuse, where he remained until the Blue Jays recalled him in late July.

Menhart had his best major-league outing on August 2, a pitchers′ duel with the Baltimore Orioles′ Mike Mussina at Oriole Park at Camden Yards in Baltimore, Maryland.

Recalled from Syracuse only four days earlier and informed only hours before first pitch he would start the game because the scheduled starter, Al Leiter, had a blister, Menhart pitched a complete-game one-hitter; the only hit he gave up was a home run to designated hitter Harold Baines in the second inning.

Mussina, however, shut out the Blue Jays with a complete-game four-hitter, and Toronto lost the game 1–0, dropping Menhart's record on the season to 1–2.

Menhart finished the season with a record of 1–4 in 21 appearances for Toronto, including nine starts, and an ERA of 4.92 over 78 2⁄3 innings pitched, with 50 strikeouts and 47 walks at the major-league level.

In Class AAA play with Syracuse, he finished with a record of 2–4 in 10 appearances – all starts – and an ERA of 6.31 in 51 1⁄3 innings, with 30 strikeouts and 25 walks.

On December 18, 1995, Toronto traded Menhart and relief pitcher Edwin Hurtado to the Seattle Mariners for infielder Miguel Cairo and relief pitcher Bill Risley.

The Seattle Mariners groomed Menhart to be their No. 4 starter for the 1996 season, but he suffered a calf injury during spring training that cost him two weeks and derailed those plans.

He instead made the team as a reliever.

The Mariners sent him down to the Class AAA Tacoma Rainiers of the Pacific Coast League for three weeks in May 1996, and again later in the season.

On August 8, 1996, he underwent arthroscopic surgery on his shoulder.

He finished the 1996 season with six starts and five relief appearances for Seattle, a record of 2–2, an ERA of 7.29, 18 strikeouts, and 25 walks in 42 innings pitched.

At the Class AAA level, he went 0–3 for Tacoma with an 11.03 ERA in six appearances – all starts – and 12 strikeouts and 16 walks over 26 innings.

Menhart began the season with Tacoma, where he made 10 starts and five relief appearances and had a record of 4–7, an ERA of 6.16, and 51 strikeouts and 34 walks in 61 1⁄3 innings pitched.

On June 10, 1997, the Mariners traded him to the San Diego Padres for pitcher Andrés Berumen.