When it comes to trying to extend an athletic career there's a fine line
between doing "whatever it takes" and "spitting into the wind." Quite
honestly, I'm not sure what side of that line I'm on right now, but I don't
really care either. I'm moving in a direction, which I know is better than
sitting still, and I'll get an answer soon enough. Ultimately what I've been
chasing and maybe somewhat fearing all along is who I still am, if
anything at all, as a baseball player.
My story has been chronicled here on my website and a couple of other
places as well. The injury, the conversion to side arm, the stem cells, the
PRP, the rehab, the ups and downs, the confidence, the doubt and now the
opportunity or maybe more appropriately, my first real test.
This is Phase 2 of an attempted comeback and it didn't come easy, not by a
long shot. I suspect many in my shoes may have thought it wasn't meant to
be a long time ago but I wasn’t ready to let it go so easily. I got myself
ready to pitch, I did the work, lots of it, that was the easy part. Now I
needed an opportunity. My phone wasn't going to ring, I would have to
knock on doors and I would have to accept them being slammed in my
face. They were.
I just needed a place to show what I could do. I believe in this side arm
conversion and believe in the work I've done on my arm but my opinion
doesn't really matter and it certainly doesn't create a job. For me an
opportunity meant tryouts with MLB teams or winter ball. With 17 years of
professional baseball under my belt I thought both would be relatively
easy to come by. I was wrong. If I wanted an opportunity I'd have to create
my own, so I did.
I've never played winter ball, I've never even been to Venezuela, the
Dominican Republic or Mexico. But I knew these were the places I had to
go. There were winter leagues there with professional hitters and there
would be scouts. Step 1, get on a winter ball team where I could test my
side arm and find out if it is good enough to get professional hitters out.
Step 2, scouts see it, like it, recognize its value and tell their bosses.
I went through my contacts of former teammates and coaches who I
thought could get me a lead on a winter ball opportunity. Nothing was
coming up and as it got to mid December the outlook was grim.
If they haven't already this is where most guys turn back. I told my agent
to find a winter ball team with even remote interest in adding a lefty
specialist and tell them I'll come down there on my own for a tryout. I
thought that would be an easy sell too, it wasn't. It took much more time
than I ever expected, but finally, with the clock ticking on the winter ball
season and me just about ready to give up, a team agreed to see me for a
tryout, at my expense.
I spoke with a former big league teammate recently who asked me, "You
went down there with nothing guaranteed??" His insinuation was obvious,
"who does that?" In my mind, the guy who wants it the most.
The Cibao Gigantes of the Dominican Republic winter league agreed to see
me, which in itself was an adventure that could inspire its own chapter in
a book. Now they have also agreed to sign me, smack dab in the middle of
the playoffs. Why not? I haven't faced a professional hitter in 15 months,
let's make it really count when I do.
The opportunity I've been feverishly working towards, the one I wasn't
sure would ever come, is now in front of me. I came here looking for an
answer and I will get one. My expectations are to dominate left handed
hitters and secure an invite to a major league camp. A little lofty? Maybe.
Or perhaps it doesn't go my way, maybe my side arm isn't as good as I
think it is or my arm craps out and the journey ends here. I don't know.
But what I do know is that I wasn't going to get an answer sitting on a
couch waiting for the phone to ring.
Tim Keown 8/24/11 via ESPN.com
Pretty good article here about the state of youth baseball in
America and how it effects Little League. The author admits to
some over generalizations and they’re definitely are some but
this is a good piece for crazy baseball parents and coaches. I
live in Atlanta and they are everywhere. I started writing a
column on the topic and offering an argument for travel ball
but I was going to go an easy 5,000 words and realized I
needed to save it for another time. Youth travel baseball has
it’s benefits over Little League when run right, it just isn’t run
right very often.
Jim Bowden 8/14/11 via ESPN.com (Insider only)
Nice insight on signing first round picks prior to the Aug 15th
deadline. Jim cites personal examples with Washington
including Ryan Zimmerman and Aaron Crow. Jim drafted me
with Cincinnati in 1994, 9th overall and I’m not sure I could
have made the process any easier. I was signed, reasonably,
in less than 24 hours.
Jon Heyman 8/13/11 via Twitter
“Yankees owe this opportunity (and more) to Scott
Proctor after the way they overused him early in
career”
This a great observation that most miss. Middle relievers get
abused in some organizations, especially righties. Proctor
was one of those who got beat up under Joe Torre in NY &
LA. It is an unfortunate side of the life of a reliever. Trying to
succeed and survive in that role is difficult. Getting to
arbitration and making some real money is a battle. I think
Scott is one of those whose career was derailed by overuse.
In a more protective environment he could have hung on
longer and put up some big seasons. Hoping for him he has
some more left in the tank.
Buster Olney 8/11/11 via Twitter
“Once again: Colon has excellent stuff, a fastball
that's popping and running; lots of late life inside to
left-handed hitters.”
I don’t mean to pick on this guy, a lot of his columns are good.
But unless he’s repeating verbatim what an ESPN analyst told
him he usually misses pretty badly when it comes to trying to
break something down on the field. When a RH pitcher’s ball
runs, it runs away from a LHH, not in. When it has late life it’s
almost always a 4 seam FB that jumps on the hitter. Late life
is never exclusive to one side of the plate versus another with
the same pitch, you either have it or you don’t. “A” for effort,
execution needs some work, we can’t have fans repeating
these inaccuracies.
Jeff Passan 8/11/11 via Yahoo! Sports
A great read here about a tight AL Cy Young award race. Jeff
uses advanced metrics without being annoying to make his
case and he pokes some holes is some newly accepted
statistics that might not be as useful as you think. Although I
don’t fully agree all the numbers he used should be brought
into the discussion this was a really good piece. I even
laughed out loud a couple of times. (I believe as I creep up on
40 I should never type LOL.)
Rob Neyer 8/3/11 via SBNation.com
From the article: “When a pitcher really wants to get a
guy, he throws slightly behind his head”
When I first read this I thought the author was serious, then I
thought maybe he was just kidding, but have since settled on
serious. So to save you from believing this is even slightly
good insight in to how a pitcher thinks let me help you out, it’s
not. Pitchers have intentionally thrown at batter’s head before,
those pitchers are complete a-holes. I was an a-hole in
college once and as a professional later realized how dumb
and irresponsible that was. When you send a message you
go up and in, move a batter’s feet or flip him on his back.
When you want to hit him you drill him in the butt or back.
Head is off limits, dangerous and borderline criminal.
Atlanta Braves Fantasy Camp
