Courage keeps Patin playing
Thorndale senior still battling 2 seasons after severe brain injury.
Opposing fans sometimes heckle Thorndale senior right fielder Devin Patin, the only Bulldog who wears a protective batting helmet while pl aying in the field.
Patin does not wear the maroon and gold helmet to make a fashion statement or to be different. It serves to protect him after he suffered a severe brain injury two years ago, when he was struck above his right ear by a line drive while pitching for Thorndale in a playoff game.
On that night — May 10, 2013 — Patin was transferred to University Medical Center Brackenridge where he experienced numbness on the lef t side of his body and vomited numerous times. Thorndale coach Kelly Kuhl said Patin never saw the ball that caromed off the side of his head with such force that it rolled all the way to the dugout.
“If Devin were to get hit in the head again, it could be 10 times worse than the first time,” said his mother, Tammy. “I do a lot of praying before every game.”
Patin’s injury resulted in seizures and migraines, and he was forced to miss the final month of school. The brain trauma left him unable to watch TV or use his laptop computer.
Despite bouts of memory loss, he returned to play baseball as a junior. Now he knows his days of competitive baseball — a sport he has played since he tried T-ball at age 5 — are near an end.
Thorndale trails 1-0 in its best-of-three Class 2A series against Flatonia. The Bulldogs (18-7) have to win games scheduled for Friday and Saturday to continue their season.
To lessen the possibility of his suffering another head injury, Patin dons that batting helmet that his doctors ordered him to wear at all times.
“I’m a better person now than I was beforehand,” said Patin, who’s batting .300 with one home run and 13 RBIs. “This whole incident taught me that I have more to offer than everything that was taken away from me that night. ”
Patin’s comeback has not been free of struggles. Tammy said he dropped Advanced Placement courses as a junior because the work overwhelmed him. This year he has rebounded, taking AP calculus, physics, chemistry and English.
“My grades and my brain have gotten me this far,” said Patin, who plans to major in chemical engineering at Texas A&M. “That’s what will get me through in the future.”
Patin still faces hurdles. He suffered a severe migraine after taking the SAT last semester, and he also tends to be forgetful.
“Just yesterday I forgot where I put the keys to my truck,” he said. “I’m not sure whether that’s just part of being a teenager or the head injury.”
Outside of baseball, Patin stays busy with 4-H and Future Farmers of America. He regularly shows steers he has raised at livestock shows in Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio.
One goal has been to finish playing baseball on his terms. He didn’t want his final memory being of a line drive that bounced off his skull.
“I knew if I never got back on the diamond, I would never be the same again,” he said. “I had to get out there because I can’t stand quitting ... I have to see this through until the very end, and here I am.”