An aside about recovery from injury and its impact on the player and game

It is the time of Spring Training when people begin to think they know the outline of a team, who the top performers will become, and how the season might go.

It happens every year. This isn’t meant to be any kind of judgment or comment or snark, what have you. There just aren’t many things you can take for granted, and especially not elbow health. Jeff Passan wrote in The Arm that any team that figures out how to keep elite arms healthy is pretty much going to crack the code (paraphrased heavily). Looking up and down the Guardians’ roster and reflecting on the number of Cy Young winners under the knife across baseball recently makes his 2016 book feel prescient. It also doesn’t seem like any organizations are close to figuring it all out.

Here are the current Guardians pitchers suffering from injuries of various sorts:

Shane Bieber (UCL)
Trevor Stephan (UCL)
John Means (UCL)
Franco Aleman (hernia)
Sam Hentges (shoulder)
Nic Enright (lat)
Daniel Espino (rotator cuff/anterior shoulder capsule)

I think that’s it. I might be missing people.

And those are the players who felt something, realized it wasn’t worth trying to pitch through or that they wouldn’t be able to hide it, who said something, and went on the IL.

Throwing things very hard over and over again is a leading cause of repeated stress injuries to the arm. This shouldn’t be surprising to anybody. I just wonder if the demands placed on pitchers now make this level of injury and length of recovery inevitable. Conversations from the mid-2010s occasionally included a joke that every pitcher got Tommy John surgery eventually. It felt edgy then but as time continues to pass it is starting to feel like an actual truth.

Should that be required of every Major League Baseball pitcher who isn’t Nolan Ryan?

What if Tommy John’s original UCL reconstruction surgery wasn’t one of the most successful? Would we still reach for leg tendons or cadavers when a critical part of the body tears or snaps? Might pitchers take a more sustainable approach, whatever that could look like, or would the pressure and financial incentive to record outs however possible have pushed things to this point no matter what?

It’s just something I think about as I read and listen and watch players try to come back from traumatic injury for fifteen months at a time. While I’ve never broken a bone or suffered an injury worse than head stitches (which I’ve managed four times...) there were incidents in my life that felt like season-ending injuries in a different way. While they didn’t start from physical pain that certainly became involved because brains are fiercely strange. The universe will, from time to time, level a life. Recovery from that is exhausting, and whether the initial cause is physical or mental they are never wholly separate phenomena.

Coming back from something that sidelines you for a year or more is brutally difficult on its own. Forget the pain or the nagging voice that maybe a little bit of a different approach or more thorough preparation might have prevented it; there is moment-to-moment work as one tries to climb back to their prior performance after the equivalent of a falling rock smashed into them. And you are aware, the entire time, exactly how you used to feel and perform.

Can’t waste time worrying about falling rocks. That’s just a thing that happens. But what happens if young athletes start to decide that the risk of repeated injury and lingering issues after a two or three year relief career (after five or six or seven years in the minor leagues) isn’t worth it anymore? Money is money, baseball is fun, but life is larger than anyone ever really grasps. Self included.

For now it does not seem like there is any shortage of players willing to take the mound while bracing for what continues to feel more and more inevitable. I wish players did not miss as much time due to reconstructive surgeries or severe non-contact injury, but throwing things very hard over and over again is a leading cause of repeated stress injuries to the arm.

TAYLOR-Jane Wedge, 24, couldn’t believe it when her mum cheated with her man.

But more heartache was to come . . . 

BUMPING into the familiar looking woman in a Blackpool pub, my body shook with nerves.

It was my long-lost mum, Mandy O’Brien, who I hadn’t seen since I was six months old, when I was put up for adoption.

My adoptive father, who died aged 61 from natural causes this year, and my adoptive mother, now 58, were always open with me about my past.

They explained to me that my biological mother was just 17 when I went to live with them. But I was eager to know more.

My mum, now 42, and I wrote to each other through social services until I was 11 — but over time, the letters stopped.

In my early twenties, I wanted to contact her again. I just didn’t expect it to be so easy.

It was winter 2022 and I was having a drink with my fiancé Dave Shaw, now 48, at a local pub near where I lived when I spotted her.

I recognised her immediately from the photos and couldn’t help but steal glances at her. Eventually, she came over and asked if I was OK.

“Do you have a daughter named Taylor-Jane?” I asked her. She nodded, just as gobsmacked as I was.

From there, we just couldn’t stop talking. It felt like everything was falling into place. First, there was Dave and now Mandy, who I soon started calling Mum.

I donated a kidney to my boyfriend – but he dumped me a few months later

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I’d met Dave two years earlier through his son, my 25-year-old friend, and I knew right away that he was the one for me.

He was incredibly sexy and we clicked — he was like the male version of me.

After just three days of dating, he proposed. I was shocked, but over the moon. I said yes straight away.

My family was supportive. Dave had even asked my adoptive dad for my hand in marriage. It was quick, but Dad laughed and said: “Time to go to the pub to celebrate!”

Dave moved into my then-one bedroom flat. I was marrying my best friend and I loved our whirlwind romance.

We hadn’t made any solid plans yet, and with money being tight, we hadn’t booked a venue. But we knew we wanted to get married in May 2024, on our four-year anniversary.

Whirlwind romance

I’d even ordered a stunning dress from eBay, with a sweetheart neckline, four-foot train, veil and tiara.

I couldn’t wait to feel like a princess for the day — everything seemed perfect. So much so that we even got matching tattoos of the date we met: 06/05/2020.

Meeting Mum was the icing on the cake. After that, we started meeting almost every day, chatting non-stop.

It was around this time, as we sat in my living room discussing plans for my wedding, that Mum dropped a bombshell — she had once dated Dave. I was hurt and shocked Dave hadn’t told me.

When I asked him about it, he said he didn’t remember, and I was left confused as to why Mum had brought it up. But I figured it was all in the past.

Not long after, things started to feel “off” in my relationship with Dave. He became distant and we were bickering.

Still, I pushed my worries aside and invited Mum to move in with me and Dave as she needed a place to stay.

By that point, we’d moved into a bigger home. At first, I kept a close eye on them, sticking to Dave like a limpet at home.

But, as time went on, I noticed that he and Mum weren’t awkward or flirtatious, and soon I began to feel more at ease.

A year passed. I didn’t suspect any jealousy from Mum over my relationship with Dave. She and I grew closer to one another.

But even though she had her own room, my sex life with Dave began to fizzle out, which worried me.

We’d postponed the wedding because of money, but had every intention of marrying. Then came a night which still haunts me.

It was there I saw them having sex, doggy-style, on the floor. Feeling horrifically betrayed, I screamed: ‘What the hell is going on?’ I stormed out, while Dave stayed with Mum

Taylor-Jane Wedge

It was May 2024, and I had just returned from a night out with some friends.

I turned the key in the lock, let myself in and poked my head around the living room door to let Mum and Dave know I was home.

It was there I saw them having sex, doggy-style, on the floor. Feeling horrifically betrayed, I screamed: “What the hell is going on?” I stormed out, while Dave stayed with Mum.

I went to stay with a friend while Mum and Dave set up home together. It was like they were playing happy families — living together in my house — but neither tried to contact me.

It made me feel awful every day. I only went back a couple of days later to collect my wedding dress, which I immediately set on fire in my back garden. I felt numb as it went up in flames.

I couldn’t believe it. I’d found my mum just two years earlier and now I’d lost her all over again. A friend was kind enough to let me stay, but two weeks later, I found something more permanent in Preston, Lancs.

I was there when my phone began blowing up with texts from concerned friends, all asking if I was OK.

It emerged my two-bed rented house back in Blackpool, which I had spent time and money decorating, was on fire.

Despite everything, my first thought was for Dave’s safety. I did not even think about my mum, honestly.

I began ringing around everyone as I had got rid of his number. He’d betrayed me in the worst way imaginable, but the truth was, I still loved him.

A few days later, we managed to reunite after a mutual friend told him I was desperately hunting for him and he came to where I was staying.

I hugged him. He told me Mum had too much to drink and set my house on fire with them both inside. Our local newspaper reported that Mum had torched the house on purpose.

They were playing happy families … It really did break my heart

Taylor-Jane Wedge

I was fuming when I read that Mum had claimed Dave had dared her to do it — I knew he’d never do anything so reckless.

Dave lost important paperwork and we both lost sentimental pictures.

After fire crews battled the blaze until 5am, Mum was charged with arson with intent to endanger life.

Then Dave told me he didn’t know what he was thinking and he loved me.

It wasn’t easy, but we kept on talking and, in time, we reunited.

We’re not rushing into a wedding and are rebuilding the trust between us, but I never stopped loving Dave.

In October 2024, Mum was jailed for four years after pleading guilty to aggravated arson.

Preston crown court was told she drank ten cans of Carling before setting fire to a pile of T-shirts, and that it had been a “cry for help”.

Dave and I have now moved to Rhyl in North Wales for a fresh start.

I’ve heard of keeping it in the family, but I never expected to catch my fiance doing the dirty with my mum.

I’ve heard of keeping it in the family, but I never expected to catch my fiance doing the dirty with my mum

Taylor-Jane Wedge

It really did break my heart, but I’ve learnt to trust him again.

Sadly, I’ll never be able to forgive Mum — I don’t want to see her again.

Dave told Fabulous: “I deeply regret cheating on Taylor-Jane with her mum. It was a big mistake and I’m happy that we’ve moved on. I can’t wait to marry her.”

Mandy says: “I’d say I was a bit jealous. I wanted Dave back. There was quite a lot of flirting going on.

“Me and Dave were just watching a film and then one thing led to another.

“We didn’t hear her come in and she caught us having sex. I was going to tell Taylor. I’ve never lied to her.”