Struggle of years gives way to tears
Barrett back in majors three years after breaking humerus in right elbow
Aaron Barrett used the walk from the mound to the dugout — taking no more than 10 seconds, stretching no more than 90 feet — to process what had just happened.
He threw an inning in a majorleague game, more than four years after his last appearance, and more than three years after his arm exploded while throwing a fastball.
He knew all of that as he exited the SunTrust Park field Saturday night. He knew his phone was probably already buzzing in the clubhouse, that hundreds of texts would slow the thing down, that everyone he knew, and everyone he loved, would send their own version of congratulations. He just didn’t know how he was going to react. Then the tears came. “After the outing was over, I’m just walking off and all the emotions just hit me,” Barrett said after the Nationals fell, 5-4, to Atlanta on Saturday “Just, you did it, man. You did it.”
A broken humerus in his right elbow threatened Barrett’s career, and his physical well-being, in July 2016. A broken humerus set him on a three-year recovery that included learning to throw again, and to trust his arm again, and climbing through the minors again as if he were that kid out of Ole Miss.
And a broken humerus is why he was crying after the fifth inning in Atlanta, his red face pressed into a white towel, his teammates cycling by to tap his shoulder and tell him good job.
Barrett worked a scoreless frame against one of the best lineups in baseball. He struck out Ronald Acuña Jr. looking, with a changeup.
But what really mattered in that moment — what will be remembered, what the scoreboard couldn’t say — is that Barrett was out there pitching at all. The 31-year-old set a goal, four long years ago, of returning to the majors with the Nationals. Now he did it with his wife, parents, grandparents, two brothers, his physical therapist and extended family in the stands. “You dream about the moment, you picture the moment, you try to visualize what it’s going to be like,” Barrett said. “And you know whatever moment or whatever happens, it’s unlikely anything you envisioned.”
After Barrett was called into the game, and after he jogged in, warmed up and whispered a prayer behind the mound, he was a bit too hyped up. His first pitch was a yanked fastball that bounced in the opposite batter’s box. His second was about a foot over the strike zone. He wound up walking Adeiny Hechavarria on four pitches, only one of them close.
He drew a big breath as Acuña stepped up, crouched down, then squinted in for the sign from catcher Kurt Suzuki. It took just three pitches for him to send the 21-year-old phenom back to the dugout. It took him three more to get Ozzie Albies to fly out to centre field. That’s when Barrett began his walk to the dugout, and he was soon sitting on the bench with his head in his hands. Manager Dave Martinez walked over and draped a towel around Barrett’s neck. Paul Menhart, his pitching coach and longtime mentor, pulled him in for a long hug.