“You know, it was kind of surprising,” he said. “I hadn’t ever had that much success on that sort of stage, so yeah it was surprising. But you know I was confident going out there. I was confident of giving my team their best opportunity to win a game. And that was going out there and trying to throw zeroes up there every time. Guys behind me were making plays and we were getting wins.”

As he talks, there is this ever-so-slight smile that dances across his face.

“But it was a pretty incredible experience,” he said.

And now all he has to do is do it all over again.

The exposure he got last October alerted the entire baseball world of his pitching talent. On a staff that is already loaded with clear Cy Young talent (ace veteran Adam Wainwright), another rookie who finished in the top three in NL Rookie of the Year voting (15-game winner Shelby Miller), and an abundance of proven veterans (Lance Lynn, Jaime Garcia, Joe Kelly), Wacha might have the best upside on the entire staff.

He just has to prove he can do what he did in that half-season in St. Louis over the course of a full major-league season.