Harris: 'Make the dash in your life matter'

Mitch Harris knows he's most remembered for the major league history he set as a St. Louis Cardinals pitcher in the 2015 major league season.

But, as Harris said during Friday's banquet honoring the 2021 American Legion World Series teams at Kings Mountain, N.C., American Legion Post 155, he said he wanted to make more of an impact on life than being known for his athletic accomplishments alone.

The 35-year-old Harris, who is a special guest for ALWS "Military Appreciation Parade" on Saturday, said that was driven home to him shortly after his now-5-year-old daughter Rylan was born.

"When I first held her, I realized something," Harris told a crowd that included players from all teams in the 2021 ALWS and several top American Legion officials. "She'll never see me wear a baseball uniform or wear a military uniform.

"But what she will experience is my significance in life."

Harris, who lives in the Atlanta suburb of Cumming, Ga., is a financial advisor for Merrill Lynch in nearby Alpharetta, Ga., and he and his wife Mandi have Rylan and 3-year-old son Camden.

A former Gaston Braves, N.C., Post 144-266 standout, Harris blossomed into a major league prospect while earning top honors at the Naval Academy. After a four-year, eight-month, eight-day deployment in the military that sent him to bases all over the world, Harris started his professional baseball career in 2013 in the Cardinals' organization.

By 2015, he was promoted from Class AAA Memphis to the major leagues and spent the rest of the season with the Cardinals, going 2-1 with a 3.67 ERA in 26 relief appearances. It made Harris the first Naval Academy product to play in the major leagues since 1921.

Following the 2015 season, Harris was honored by the St. Louis Baseball Writers Dinner with the Stockton/Broeg Award for outstanding achievement in baseball.

An elbow surgery in 2016 limited his career to two more pitching appearances before he announced his retirement from baseball in 2017 at 31.

Harris began his speech on Friday saying, "All of us have a Google story, something we look up online. I'm on Google but I'm not going to talk to you about what you can look up about me. I'm going to tell a personal story."

Harris said he wanted the players to remember three things:

·       "Don't hit the snooze button. Get up and get moving every day."

·       "Visualize the view of what you want your life to be."

·       "Make the 'dash' in your life matter."

Harris told stories about his efforts to get into physical shape during his first summer at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. And he used two songs associated with the military —  "Reveille" and "Taps" — as motivators.

Of "Reveille," Harris said it helped prod him to do pushups and running exercises that caused him to lose 20 pounds during his first three weeks at the academy.

And of "Taps," Harris said we all face mortality whether in the military or not.

"When we die, there's going to be a tombstone or monument listing the day you were born and the day you died," Harris said. "For us veterans, we'll have a flag folded that is given to our next-of-kin.

"The 'dash' is the key and the difference. What are you doing during the time of that dash."

Harris then followed with what he wanted his "dash" to be.

"I don't want to be remembered as the guy from the Naval Academy that made the big leagues," he said. "I want to be the guy that encouraged people to do special things and to do things that people say you can't do."