Baseball Notebook: Opportunity

30 seconds. That's all it takes.

That is, if you don't consider the time spent at numerous 6 a.m. workouts, the throws, the bullpen pitches, the fielding practice, the traveling, the conditioning, or the many hours spent up late working on home work, but I promise you that's all it takes.

Every summer, there are thousands of camps, clinics and showcases available to high school athletes with aspirations of playing NCAA sports. However, most of them cost a considerable amount of money – something that my family wasn't always able to afford. So, as a 10th grader, I earned money the only way I knew: I sold candy bars throughout the day at school. It wasn't a million-dollar industry, but I was able to make enough money to attend baseball and basketball camps throughout the year. None of these events yielded more than a couple short conversations with division two and division three coaches.

Fast forward to the spring of my senior year of high school. It was the first round of baseball playoffs and there were about two weeks left in the school year. I'd had a couple discussions with college baseball coaches, but hadn't committed to play anywhere. As a matter of fact, I had no idea where I was going to attend in the fall. My situation was not an ordinary one.

Lucky for me, there was a teacher at my high school whose son played for the University of Pittsburgh at the time. He knew the head coach of Pitt baseball, Joe Jordano, and recommended that Pitt come and watch me play. Skip (what we all call Coach Jordano) and Jerry Oakes were in the stands that day as I pitched 5.0 innings of scoreless baseball. Following the game, I met Skip and Jerry for the first time. A week later, I was committed to play baseball at an NCAA Division I university in the ACC. I was a Pitt Panther!

The MLB Draft has a unique format when compared to the NFL and NBA. The NBA has two rounds in its draft and the NFL has seven. The MLB, on the other hand, has 40 rounds in its draft. In those 40 rounds, there are 1,215 players selected over the span of three days.

Unless someone is a top round pick, there can be a lot of uncertainty in the draft process – and I was not a top rounder. I understood that going into the draft. What I did not understand is how much the process can wear on a person. For three days, I watched the television religiously. With each selection, I got more anxious. My 30 seconds of opportunity were approaching, I just didn't know when or how they would transpire.

Back in the summer of 2014, I sat across a picnic table from the then first baseman for the Pitt Panthers, Eric Hess. His dad sat next to him and my dad next to me. We were meeting to discuss what I should expect going into my freshman year at Pitt. I remember Eric telling me to condition as hard as I could, that the coaches wanted to see that I'd been working hard in the months leading up to the school year. He also offered some general advice for being a freshman on campus. I soaked in every drop of information that was offered that day.

By August of that same year, I was on campus at the University of Pittsburgh. That first fall was a growing period for me. I realized quickly that everything Eric said was true, including the amount of effort it would take to succeed both on and off the field. Off the field, I found a group of men who encapsulated who I wanted to become. On the field, I saw men who played with heart and a drive that exceeded everything I had come across in years past. I struggled to keep pace for the first year. College athletics has a way of humbling even the best high school athletes.

The fall and winter of my sophomore year, I learned what true commitment to a craft was. I saw it every day from my teammate T.J. Zeuch. Many people look at him and see a tall guy with a gifted arm that was just born with a talent for pitching. There's no doubt he's talented, but what I was fortunate to see that off season was that he was willing to run through a brick wall to get what he wanted. I did my best to keep pace with his work ethic. My efforts paid off with the opportunity to follow in his footsteps and play with the Chatham Anglers in the Cape Cod Baseball League during the summer of 2016.

It was with the Anglers that playing professional baseball went from being just a dream to a goal for me. I was part of a team that was stacked with talent from across the United States. Athletes from everywhere came to Cape Cod to showcase their talent in front of hundreds of professional scouts. Every one of us hoping to play at the next level, but taking careful steps to hide how deathly afraid of the future we were.

Entering my junior year of college, being a Pitt Panther had become part of who I was. The team values – purpose, integrity, team and toughness – had become engrained in my DNA. Coach Jordano's mantras and acronyms began to take on a new meaning. Coach Oakes' passion for the game and care factor remained high. I began to realize that many of my teammates were becoming not just college friends, but lifelong companions – close enough to consider family. As the 2017 college season went by, I began to realize how real my decision to stay or go would be.

It wasn't until the final series of the season that it hit me. We were playing at Wake Forest and I had pitched 3.1 innings of relief. It was the bottom of the 7th inning with two outs as the next hitter stepped into the batter's box for Wake. Manny Pazos, our catcher, called time-out and started walking toward me. At first, I didn't realize what he was doing. Then it hit me that the hitter was left-handed and we were going to play the odds and get a lefty on lefty match-up to get the last out of the inning. I handed Skip the ball, confident that the next pitcher would get the job done. With each step I took to the dugout, I was walking toward uncertainty. I stepped into the dugout and high-fived teammate after teammate. I hugged a few guys. I sat down on the bench. I held back tears. That was the last day I competed as a Pitt Panther. We won the game.

My phone rang on the coffee table in my parent's living room. It was June 14th and the clock read 2:42 p.m. as my parents and I sat across from each other. I picked up my phone and the conversation was brief. I hung up and told my parents the Angels wanted to draft me. My 30 seconds of opportunity had come and it was time to decide. My phone rang again and I answered quickly. "I want to play professional baseball," I said. Less than a minute later, my name was called on the MLB Network broadcast. The remainder of the day was a complete blur.

This past summer, I played for the Angels minor league team in Orem, Utah, a town about 45 minutes south of Salt Lake City and nestled between Rocky Mountain ranges. My off days were spent hiking local trails with teammates but, on game days, life was routine – a constant cycle of waking up, going to the ballpark, working out, playing, and heading home. Nevertheless, the grind involved in the life of a minor leaguer was something I enjoyed. There is no glamour in minor league life, but there is opportunity and that is all I can ask for.

In the spring of 2014, Skip and Jerry gave me an opportunity to pursue a college athletic career. I owe them and the University of Pittsburgh so much. In the fall of 2015, I had the opportunity to see what hard work was. T.J. Zeuch remains a close friend. In the summer of 2016, the Chatham Anglers gave me an opportunity play against the best of the best in college baseball. It was the best summer ever. In June of 2017, the Angels gave me an opportunity to play baseball and do it as a profession. I am forever thankful and cannot wait to see what the future holds.

The opportunity to do something great is all that anybody can ask for.

However, opportunity rarely shows its face for longer than 30 seconds.

What one does with those 30 seconds makes all the difference.

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