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Rusty Meacham realized a dream when he first toed the rubber in a big league game. Though he played professional baseball for 19 seasons – a lifetime in pro sports – and pitched in 218 MLB contests, he had no trouble identifying his most memorable moment in the game.

In this questionnaire, Meacham writes that two moments stand above the rest. Both involve members of the 3,000-hit club. Meacham identifies facing Dave Winfield in the final at bat of the Hall of Famer’s career and being George Brett‘s teammate when the third baseman recorded his milestone 3,000th hit as the two moments that stand above all others.

That Meacham made it to the big leagues at all is a surprise. Drafted by the Tigers in the 33rd round of the 1987 draft, Meacham was largely overlooked by scouts.

He played for five different minor league clubs in before making his big league debut in 1991. Meacham ended up playing 20 professional seasons in the game.

The hurler played his last Major League game on June 20, 2001 for the Tampa Bay Rays. He finished the season in Triple-A. The next two seasons Meacham played in the independent Atlantic League.

In 2004 he pitched for the Chinatrust Whales of the Chinese Professional Baseball League. From there it was back to Indy Ball with the Yuma Scorpions. After pitching in one single game in 2006, it looked like Meacham’s time in baseball was coming to a close.

Interestingly, he came back at age 42 to pitch one last professional game for the Tijuana Cimarrones in 2010.

Here Meacham writes about his greatest thrills in the game.