Former Major League first baseman Kevin Millar shared lessons he’s learned on how to handle success and failure at Tuesday’s Eagle Club Recognition Breakfast at the Kahlmus Center at Mississippi State University Meridian campus.

    Millar helped the Boston Red Sox to the 2004 World Series championship, and in the process freed the franchise from its 86-year curse of not winning the title since 1918. He said the team’s ultimate success revolved around its heart and work ethic, not its talent.

    Millar recounted how he was skipped over five times for the Major League Draft. He eventually signed as an undrafted free agent following his collegiate career at Lamar University in Beaumont, Texas, and a stint with the independent baseball club, the Saint Paul Saints.

    “I had five chances to get drafted, and each time it came and went,” he said. “Basically, I couldn’t throw, I had no speed, had limited power and poor arm strength. But what they could not measure was my heart. I loved the game. I loved it more than anybody else.”

    Millar said he had $11 in the bank when he took up then Saint Paul general manager Gary Hughes’ offer of joining the Saints. He proved he could hit and earned a contract offer with the Florida Marlins’ organization. It was there Millar blossomed and was named Minor League Baseball’s Player of the Year in 1997.

    A native of Los Angeles, Millar was promoted to the major leagues in 1998 and played for legendary coach Jim Leyland. He recounted how his dad got to see him start for the first time against the Arizona Diamondbacks late in the 1998 season.

    “My family comes in to see me play and in my first at bat as a starter, I hit a hard foul ball,” Millar said. “Then on the next pitch, I broke my hamate bone. Still, my dad was happy to see his boy get one good swing as a major leaguer.”

    After starting the 1999 season in the minors, Millar was called back up and went on a tear, hitting .380 over a three-month stretch. He would remain in the Major Leagues until his release by the Chicago Cubs at the end of spring training in 2010.

    He said his trade to the Boston Red Sox in 2003 “changed my life.” It also taught him how to handle immense disappointment.

    The Red Sox had a two-run lead in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series against its hated rival, the New York Yankees. The Yankees tied the game in the bottom of the ninth and then won it in the 11th inning on Aaron Boone’s leadoff home run.

    “I had just tossed my warm-up ball to the ball boy, and then on the first pitch, (Tim) Wakefield makes his first pitch and I turn around and its gone,” Millar said. “Wow, we just lost. There was some grown men crying after that one.”

    The loss served to motivate the Red Sox in 2004. They again faced the Yankees in the 2004 ACLS and this time rallied from a 3-0 deficit in the series to beat New York and earn its first World Series appearance since 1986. In the World Series, Boston swept St. Louis in four games.

    “We sweep St. Louis and end the 86-year curse,” Millar said.

    Millar said he loved playing for Boston.

    “The Yankees had the stars like (Derek) Jeter, (Jorge’) Posada, and (Gary) Sheffield,” Millar said. “We were more known for our bad facial hair.”

    Millar shared with the Meridian audience two of his favorite Red Sox memories.

    One involved a sign he saw at Yankee Stadium during one of the ALCS’s.

    “It said ‘Millar + ground ball = Bill Buckner,'” Millar said of the sign that made reference to Boston’s goat of the 1986 series, who let a ground ball through his legs in Game 6 that cost the Red Sox the World Series.

    The other involved him getting hit by a pitch from Roger Clemens. Clemens was with the Yankees then and Millar said he did not have a problem with it because his teammate Trot Nixon crushed a two-run home run on the next at bat.

    Yet, when he got back to the dugout, Red Sox ace pitcher Pedro Martinez asked Millar, “‘Papi, who do you want me to get for you, tomorrow?’ Pedro was starting for us the next day. I said, ‘Don’t get (Jason) Giambi.’

    “Next game, Pedro starts the game by hitting Jeter and then he hits the next guy. They have two on to start the game, but somehow, we got out of the inning. Pedro comes back and said, ‘Tell Roger, if he hits one of ours, we’ll get two of his.”’

    Pedro Martinez was elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame for the 2015 Class last month.

    Millar finished his major league career as a .274 hitter with 170 home runs and 699 RBI. Following his 2005 trade from Boston, he played three seasons with Baltimore and his last season with Toronto. He was trying to catch on with the Chicago Cubs when he got cut. The man who delivered the news of his release was Gary Hughes – the same general manger who had given him his start in professional baseball.

    Millar said he went back and signed a one-week deal with St. Paul in order for his son to see him play.

    “I had never been released before, but that’s what baseball can teach you – how to deal with failure,” he said. “You do a lot of failing in baseball. Out of 500 times to the plate, you’re going to get out 350 of those times, even if you’re really good.”

    Millar found a way to stay close to the game. Since 2011, he and Chris Rose have hosted “Intentional Talk,” a TV-talk and highlights show that airs five times a week on the MLB Network.