The Week in Pain

I promise this will be an upbeat post before I’m done.  But for now it’s going in a different direction.

I once had a brilliant inspiration. (So at least I have had one brilliant idea to justify my existence.)  I explained to Melanie that I enjoyed fantasy baseball in part because it connects me to so many players’ — ie, human beings’ — stories.  This was brilliant because I linked something important to Melanie (knowing and caring about people’s stories) to my biggest time-absorbing hobby. I  believe this has bought me a good measure of her tolerance for the EFL.

And it’s even true! I know almost as much about Kyle Schwarber’s ligaments as I do about Phil’s. And the effect goes well beyond my own victimized players. BP’s Michael Baumann used Schwarber as an entry point today to get me to think about Daniel Winkler, whose story is even more moving:

To invest your whole life—and make no mistake, this is not a normal job; that’s what you need to do in order to be a professional athlete—in achieving a goal and then being forced to quit, not only before you’ve done it, but before you’ve had the chance to do it, has to be an unfathomable disappointment.

That’s what I thought of when I saw Kyle Schwarber lying on the warning track Thursday night. He had burst onto the scene last season in sensational fashion, then ended the year by playing humiliating defense in a playoff defeat. Imagine how much he wanted to get back out onto the field … After an offseason’s worth of hard work and anticipation, Schwarber lasted two games in 2016. He didn’t even get a hit, and now he’s done for the year.

Now consider what happened to Daniel Winkler yesterday. Go and watch the video…

Winkler spent 2015 rehabbing, working to get his arm—the source of his livelihood—back in working order, then, on a sunny Sunday afternoon, he twisted it with such force that the connective tissue pulled on the bone in his elbow with such force that the bone snapped. Think about that…

Now watch the second half of the video. Winkler throws the pitch, then pulls his arm up against his torso like a wounded bird guarding a broken wing as he runs off the mound toward the dugout. He does it so quickly it seems instinctual, like he can outrun the pain. Then he collapses in the grass and Braves trainer Jeff Porter kneels beside him, hugs him and pats him on the back.

After almost two years of preparation, and a lifetime of dreaming, Winkler had finally made a big-league roster on Opening Day. He made it 1 1/3 innings before his own body destroyed itself with unthinkable force, in a storm of unimaginable pain.

…[T]he physical pain is bad enough, but the disappointment just feels unfair.

Really do go watch the video.

Old Detroit:  W, 6 – 6.

Portland: DNP, 0 – 0.

Canberra: L, 6 – 11.

Flint Hill: W, 6 – 0.

Haviland: L, 4 – 7.

Cottage: L, 5 – 5.

Pittsburgh: W 1, L 1; 11 – 13.

Peshastin: DNP, 0 – (-2)

Kaline: L, 3 – 8.

D.C.:  L, 2 – 7.

 

I promised this would end on an upbeat note.  And, you know, I think it has — at least for the Wolverines and the Tornados.  That should be enough, don’t you think, Jamie?