Empathy

My son tore is MCL and PCL in the first game of the first tournament post junior summer. Based on conversations and feedback from six colleges my son had targeted he expected offers from each after the following week’s PG tournament. He spent the summer on crutches. All six colleges disappeared.

In the fall he fell during rehab separating his shoulder requiring surgery. He was told he wouldn't be playing his senior year.

My son didn’t spend a second feeling sorry for himself and looking for sympathy. All he thought was how he could overcome the situation.

He was in the opening day lineup senior year. He was fully rehabbed by August. Other colleges offered D1 rides. They weren’t places he wanted to play. He ended up receiving offers from two of the colleges programs previously interested. His travel coach made contact with them and vouched he was 100%.

It’s why I always tell posters of injured players, if your son really wants it he will find a way. Feeling sorry isn’t the way.

Francis;

"And, it happened in a meaningless fall scrimmage game".
As a former College Coach, there are no "meaningless" games.

Every game is a "learning" experience. Every game is a "teaching" experience. Every game provides an "opportunity" for success.

Bob

@Francis7

Some of us see something like that and it never leaves us.   I've seen some horrific things happen in athletics that I'll never forget.   As the father of 3 pitchers, nobody was more excited to see BBCOR bats introduced in high school and college back in 2011.  Not totally safe, but safer.  You all are going to laugh, but I used to practice line drive come-backers with my kids.  I put them on the mound in the follow through position, and I would hit a bucket of tennis balls as hard as I could at them from the batters box.  Trust me, I can hit a tennis ball pretty hard and very accurately.  They got really good at protecting themselves. I taught them to catch or deflect the balls with their mitt.  Yes, I know this is not normal but I wanted my kids ready and equipped to protect themselves.  I saw too many come-backers hit pitchers, and sometimes it didn't end well.   These are among some of the worst injuries I've seen in baseball.

Empathy is a natural human reaction to seeing someone get hurt on a sports field.   What is interesting in my opinion is exactly what @RJM mentioned in his post.   The athlete doesn't look at himself (herself) empathically.   They look at the injury as an obstacle, and the goal is to get healthy and back on the athletic field.   Every injury I've had or my kids have had, it is all about getting healthy and back to competing.   It seems empathy is something we save for others, but we don't look in the mirror empathetically.

Just my experience...

@RJM posted:

My son tore is MCL and PCL in the first game of the first tournament post junior summer. Based on conversations and feedback from six colleges my son had targeted he expected offers from each after the following week’s PG tournament. He spent the summer on crutches. All six colleges disappeared.

In the fall he fell during rehab separating his shoulder requiring surgery. He was told he wouldn't be playing his senior year.

My son didn’t spend a second feeling sorry for himself and looking for sympathy. All he thought was how he could overcome the situation.

He was in the opening day lineup senior year. He was fully rehabbed by August. Other colleges offered D1 rides. They weren’t places he wanted to play. He ended up receiving offers from two of the colleges programs previously interested. His travel coach made contact with them and vouched he was 100%.

It’s why I always tell posters of injured players, if your son really wants it he will find a way. Feeling sorry isn’t the way.

I'm sorry but that is BS.  I'm glad it worked out for your kid.  There are kids who do absolutely everything right and work their ass off to come back and it doesn't work out for them. There are pros that have career ending injuries.  It's not about feeling sorry for yourself.  That is a very simplistic view because it worked out for your kid.

Im not disagreeing with not feeling sorry for yourself, but I completely disagree that if you want it bad enough you’ll make it happen.  

Kid was told to look elsewhere in the middle of his JR year at Nebraska. Landed at ISU to the Covid year. Elbow bothered him over the summer into the fall. First series of the next year out with TJ. Surgery, rehab, and a week before the season a bone bruise that kept him out the first month. Had a decent year. FF to last spring, like first game of the year diving for a ball broken rib. Then dealing with a coach that looks for every opportunity to play a different player because the kid "wasn't fast enough". I understand what RJM was trying to say, I think. Mental fortitude is an asset and something lacking in a lot of youth today. My son was lucky his dad is a dic# and has seemingly raised a strong-willed young man. And all this after a bi-lateral pars defect diagnosis at 12 and told good luck with sports.

Moral to the story? Who knows where life may take you. Maybe that injury to that kid will lead to him being a bum on the streets, or a CEO. My son? Dating a great young woman, and, not the MLB career most said it would be, but... a somewhat happy ending baseball wise.

https://twitter.com/IndStBaseb.../1665526908069756929

• @baseballhs posted:

I'm sorry but that is BS.  I'm glad it worked out for your kid.  There are kids who do absolutely everything right and work their ass off to come back and it doesn't work out for them. There are pros that have career ending injuries.  It's not about feeling sorry for yourself.  That is a very simplistic view because it worked out for your kid.

Im not disagreeing with not feeling sorry for yourself, but I completely disagree that if you want it bad enough you’ll make it happen.  

If you’re in high school and get injured you rehab, get back on the field and make it work for you. Feeling sorry for yourself is a waste of time.

Given he missed all of the post junior year summer and all six college programs disappeared a kid without character and desire might have wilted and given up. It’s why the important question is …

How badly do you want it?

The ortho told my son he wasn’t going to be able to throw until sometime in May. Therefore he would miss his senior year.

I was present at the moment. My son grab the ortho with his good hand/arm. He glared at him and said, “ I’m going to be in the opening day lineup. You’re going to help me.”

He tossed the sling two weeks before the season started. He DHed a couple of weeks. He played left for a couple of weeks and suffered through runners running on him.

Then he unleashed and threw runner out by twenty feet. I cringed. He yelled out for everyone to hear, “I’m back in center next game.”

The ortho told me when my son grabbed him and scolded him he knew he was likely to make it back in time. He said some athletes have a different kind of heart.

Had things not worked out as they did we had a plan B to get where he wanted to be for college ball.

One of our "old coach" advisors told us when my son was in middle school to treasure every minute and every game because every pitch could be your last.

Baseball is a game and/or a job (it’s a job once you’re in college IMO) that we can sometimes obsess over, but it’s not life – it’s an activity, a sport. It’s good drama with individual/team successes and failures, superhuman effort and the risk of injury. We want max effort, top 10 plays and everything left on the field and that comes with the opportunity of injury. As a parent it’s scary and when we see it happen to someone else’s kid, and we’re extremely empathetic – because we know it can happen to our kid too…

As for getting back on the field due to wanting it bad enough, I don't agree. Certainly you’ve got to have heart and work ethic to make it back from a serious injury, but some things cannot be overcome no matter the desire. I know a catcher that played in his HS playoffs with a busted nose (requiring surgery after the playoff run), black eyes and rolls of gauze shoved up his nostrils. Saw the same kid limping through his last two Juco playoff games, still hobbling down the first base line for backup and hitting gappers and only getting singles – turns out he was playing with a fractured tibia (8 weeks in a cast). Next year he was the starting catcher for Texas with a solid season – until a labrum injury - he did the surgery. He lost his starting role the following year, but still pushed. He played in 61 games his first season and total of 57 over the next 3 years (COVID and a medical redshirt) as a backup. To insinuate this kid, one of the toughest and most driven I’ve had the pleasure of knowing didn’t want it bad enough to fully make it back is ridiculous. Somethings can’t be overcome…