Jack Cust

John Joseph Cust III is a professional baseball player currently signed as an outfielder and a designated hitter for the Oakland Athletics of Major League Baseball (MLB). He was born on January 16, 1979, in Flemington, New Jersey.

Cust was a first round, 30th overall draft pick of the Arizona Diamondbacks in 1997. He made his debut for the Diamondbacks on September 26, 2001. In 2002, Cust was traded along with J. D. Closser to the Colorado Rockies where he would then spend the majority of the 2002 season with the Rockies Triple-A affiliate, the Colorado Springs Sky Sox.

In 2003, Cust was traded by the Rockies to the Baltimore Orioles. In 2004, he signed as a free agent with the Oakland Athletics. In 2005, he was signed as a free agent with the San Diego Padres.

On May 3, 2007, the Oakland Athletics acquired Cust from the Padres. He was assigned as the Athletics' designated hitter and an outfielder.

Major League Career

2001 - 2006

Cust made his major league debut with the Diamondbacks on September 26, 2001.

On January 7, 2002, Cust was traded by the Diamondbacks with catcher J. D. Closser to the Colorado Rockies for pitcher Mike Myers. Cust spent the majority of the 2002 season with the Rockies Triple-A affliate, the Colorado Springs Sky Sox. He played in 35 games with the big league club, going 11-65 (.169 batting average) with 1 home run. On March 11, 2003, he was traded by the Rockies to the Baltimore Orioles for outfielder Chris Richard and cash.

During an August 16, 2003, game between the Baltimore Orioles and the New York Yankees, Cust was the tying run in the 12th inning with two outs when he tried to score from first base on a single to the gap by Larry Bigbie. Cust first stumbled and fell down between third and home plate, resulting in his being caught in a rundown. Cust outmaneuvered the defense, and eventually found himself sprinting towards home plate with nobody covering it. Instead of scoring easily, however, Cust fell down for the second time in the same play. He was tagged out by third baseman Aaron Boone to end the game, providing one of the wildest endings to a baseball game in recent history.

Cust finished the 2003 season batting .260 (19-73) with 4 home runs in the majors after being with the Ottawa Lynx (Orioles Triple-A team) for the first 4 months of the season. He would have just 1 one at-bat in the majors with the Orioles in the 2004 season and was granted free agency after the end of the season.

On November 15, 2004, he was signed by the Oakland Athletics. He spent the whole season in Triple-A Sacramento and was granted free agency after the season. On December 6, 2005, he signed a minor league contract with the San Diego Padres. He just had 3 at-bats in the 2006 season.


2007 - present

Cust began the 2007 with the San Diego Padres Triple-A team, the Portland Beavers. On May 3, 2007, the Padres traded Cust to the Oakland Athletics, although he was rumored to be joining Japan's Chiba Lotte Marines. The Athletics needed another designated hitter due to an injury to veteran Mike Piazza. He made his season debut on May 5, 2007, going 1-3 with a home run. Cust quickly endeared himself to A's fans by hitting 6 home runs in his first 7 games with the A's. Cust hit .346 with 14 RBI during the seven game stretch. On May 13, 2007, with two outs and an 0-2 count in the bottom of the ninth, the A's rallied to score 5 runs to beat Joe Borowski and the Cleveland Indians 10-7, with Cust hitting a walk-off 3-run home run off Fernando Cabrera.

After hitting .348 with 1 double and 5 home runs along with 13 RBI, Cust shared Co-American League Player of the Week honors along with teammate Dan Johnson for the week ending May 13, 2007. On August 10, 2007, Cust hit his first major league grand slam off relief pitcher Macay McBride of the Detroit Tigers. He also hit a 3-run double earlier in the game to give him a career high 7 RBI. He finished the 2007 season leading the Athletics in home runs with 26. In 2007, he walked 21.0% of the time, tops in the major leagues, and struck out 41.5% of the time, also tops in the majors.

On December 13, 2007, he was named in the Mitchell Report.

On September 19, 2008, he broke the AL record for most strikeouts in one season with 187. The pitcher was Felix Hernandez of the Seattle Mariners. For the season he struck out 41.0% of the time, the highest percentage in major league baseball. He also walked 18.8% of the time, the second highest rate in the majors.

Jack Cust Baseball Academy/Diamond Nation

In Cust's hometown in Flemington, New Jersey, he as well as his two brothers and father operate one of the largest youth baseball facilities on the east coast. Cust's father bought a small warehouse property in the mid 1990's and eventually turned it into the Jack Cust Baseball Academy, which completed in 1997. Three fully astro-turf fields were built along with indoor batting and video review, and a health and fitness center. In the winter, a dome is put over all three fields, where various youth baseball leagues run throughout the winter. All of this would total out to be 250,000 square feet. More recently in 2009, the completion of another portion of the Jack Cust Baseball Academy was completed where ten more turf fields were built on property across the street from the original three turf fields and is referred to as Diamond Nation. The entire academy and complex is now over 700,000 square feet and attracts some of the most talented teams and players in both youth and college/highschool showcase tournaments.