Saturday, March 5, 2011
10:14 a.m.
By Brett Ballantini
CSNChicago.com
For the first time, Jake Peavy felt comfortable acknowledging what every White Sox fan was holding their breaths aboutnever pitching again.
When you do something as unprecedented as I did, tearing the lat completely off the bone, there certainly can be some doubts creeping in your head with what the future holds, Peavy said. At the same time, being an athlete and competitor who prides himself on being mentally tough and strong, you have to get it in your mind Im going to come back from thisI dont care what has to happen of what I have to do.
By being back on the mound just less than eight months since his devastating injury last July, Peavy has beaten expectations by some 150 percent.
I was told to expect about a year to come back, Peavy said. Thats the norm when you tear tendons. And this wasnt a minor tear, I detached something from the bone.
With expectations set very conservatively, Peavy submitted to surgery in mid-July truly having no idea what was in store.
MLB
It was experimental surgery, he said. First off, they asked me if they could videotape the surgery to have some documentation of it. Anthony Romeo out of Chicago did my surgery. I felt very confident in talking about the procedure, of how he was going to get it attached back to the bone.
Romero had to get his muscle from his back and run stitches, sutures and anchors into his bone in order to reattach and anchor the muscle, Peavy said.
I did watch the video, he said. Im not ashamed of what happened for worried about risking anything in the futureI wish I would have had Tommy John or some other surgery instead where there was some history.
We had to sit down and come up with our own throwing program and rehab program. Theres not really any precedent set for doing what I did. You want to document everything, because if this injury was to happen again to another pitcher, there would be some help for guys coming back.
And yes, there was a game
While Peavy was the main story Friday and rightfully so, the White Sox fell to 1-4 in early Cactus play with a 3-1 loss. Kendrick was the nemesis, stroking run-scoring safeties in the fourth off of Jesse Crain and in the sixth off of Josh Kinney. In the seventh, Phil Humber gave up a run to account for L.A.s tallies.
The White Sox continued to be mostly anemic on offense, mustering just one afterthought run in the ninth inning. Jim Gallagher, who is playing as if hes the only one in camp who thinks he has a shot at the Opening Day roster, tripled leading off and was knocked home on a Brent Lillibridge single. Lillibridge, who might need to be reminded his roster spot is very much in jeopardy, then was picked off of first base by Ryan Brasier for the first out of the inning. The White Sox also loaded the bases in back-to-back innings (with one out in the fifth and none in the sixth) but were turned away empty-handed.
Brett Ballantini is CSNChicago.com's White Sox Insider. Follow him @CSNChi_Beatnik on Twitter for up-to-the-minute White Sox information.