Getting released at baseball is not as simple as packing up your team bag and hitting the road. While the sight of your career—neatly folded, ball in glove, shoes cleaned one final time—packed into a travel bag is, in itself, remarkable, the biggest part of a baseball player can’t be packed at all.
The identity of active professional baseball player is now officially gone. The reasons for the routines that have drove my existence are now in limbo, replaced by questions about the future and reflections on the past.
Will I ever do this again? Is this the last time I’ll hear the laughter of my teammates or the sound of the post game radio? Will I ever take the field again in front of a professional crowd? Will I ever talk to some of these men now that they’re not contractually obligated?
Is this the climax of my life, and I just don’t know it?
Steady employment gives the idea of purpose in life. I believe, in a world where we live to work, the carrot we chase as we move through life forms a symbiotic relationship with us and after time, we can’t imagine living with out knowing exactly where we stand with the other. For me, that carrot was the big leagues. For others, it may be an executive position, or record breaking, or a gold watch. Whatever it is, we equate ourselves to it in a way that defines our purpose.
What is my purpose if not baseball? I find myself asking this over and over these last few days as the sun sets but the stadium lights do not turn on. What is the next step for me?
It is a heavy weight that sits on me. The fear of the future, the remorse of the past. No matter how positive your outlook is, there is still the feeling of loss. I’ve only been playing for 25 years now, from T-ball to the Big Leagues—the bulk of my life in service to game.
I suppose I can fold at the loss of my identity and concede that there is a strong chance life may never be as interesting as it was when I was a player. I can let the fear that I am no longer relevant to my fellow man because I do not entertain them on a field or rub shoulders with superstars, hold me down. It is a cruel reality we live in, but after years in the industry I know that even names that get cheered regularly are forgotten with astounding ease. Even as I key these words, I feel the stroke of my letters to be less heavy, sure, and powerful since I know when people read them they are no longer the novel words of an active athlete, but, now, just more introspective babble lost in the sea of the internet.
I feel the urge to rush to a new source of employment and find a new routine, and new sources of validation; preferably dealing with baseball so I can avoid major life upheaval. After all, I can still play, I can teach this sport, I can talk about it or write about it. But when I think this way, another question comes to mind, one as big as those above: for all the things I know I can do, how many things have I never been able to try? This question excites me.
If there is one thing baseball has taught me in it’s many life lessons, it’s that what you do should not define your life, and your life should not be a slave to your job. No, what you do should be a tool that enriches your life and those around you, and it should exist to support your lifestyle, not the other way around. This is a hard lesson to learn when you are in a profession that others swear is best one to be in, living in a world that equates happiness to money, fame, and success, but, what others believe is best doesn’t always turn out to be so.
During this time when baseball and I are at odds, I want to really search out why I play, why I live, and what constitutes success and happiness for me. Right now. If there is a better avenue to reach fulfillment through other than baseball, I want to be brave enough to try it, even if it means the doorway back to being a player shuts irrevocably.