The Return | Lance McCullers Jr. (Mini-Documentary)

[Music] i was facing the blue jays in um august i think august 3rd or so was facing donaldson threw him a heater and i felt like um my whole form just like sucked up now an apparent injury to mccullers is surfacing here this is not good he's out of this game there you go i came into spring training in 2016 and i felt i was 22 felt just uh like ready to conquer the world felt like i was really gonna make a big leap that year it's a fantastic day when we can watch a major league debut for a first place club he's the ninth different pitcher to start a game for houston this year that ties the dodgers for tops in the major he gets a punch out how about that number one 2015 i got called up about a month into the big league season and i pitched every single time i was asked to pitch i was never hurt never had any problems now this energized crowd we'll see if mccullers can get davis [Music] [Applause] what a night for lance mccullers jr an 11 strikeout complete game but it's not really considered a full year because i got called up late into the season made the jump from double a all the way to the big leagues in may and really didn't miss a beat whatever you want to call it moxie guts whatever so far the look and mccullar's face and body is he's in control and on attack that kind of stuff right there will play that's going to be all for the rookie right-hander mcguller's done pitching the astros into the seventh with a one-run lead fast forward to 2017 kind of popped up a couple of times here and there but ultimately um you know i got for the year and felt really good you know obviously we we won it all and um i played a a pretty big role in that postseason and felt confident leaving that year that my my elbow problems were behind me so in 2018 i was i was rolling right through finally felt like i was finally finding my groove and taking that next step things were just coming together so you're thinking two more months of pitching like this and you're going to end up in a spot where you wanted to be where i thought i was going i go out there in august and 2018 against the dodgers i'm through three or four innings of great baseball and i throw a 3-1 heater to matt kemp and i felt the same sensation i felt back in 2016 except this time it was way worse [Music] lance mccullers who's done after just four innings and 60 pitches well we see him fidgeting with his forearm elbow area and my wife was actually there in the stands and uh i was walking in and she kind of looked at me and i just like kind of pointed out my elbow because i knew at that point that uh it was probably going to be time for me to have surgery the procedure that we decided on when tommy injured his arm when the ligament was ruptured was to make some attempt to replace it with another structure and what we did was to replace a ligament with a tendon a ligament of course is something that holds bone to bone and keeps his elbow from coming apart as he brings it through in a pitching motion a tendon is made out of the same material with a little different chemistry and is used to connect muscle to bone as a motor power [Music] when i had surgery uh you know it was it was a scary time i remember i remember the those first couple days of rehab band it was like the rehab was literally just like try to touch like your fingers like this like this was like the rehab it's like try to touch and like get that feeling back in your fingers because i was numb probably from about end of my scar to about my wrist for like probably like uh four months it's like my whole arm would just would just be numb some days men were tough like i dealt with like a little bit of like depression feeling uh not a part of the team all things that are natural when you're going through this process but i tell guys all the time that have tommy this is like the biggest thing that i would tell guys like every single day it's gotta be it's gotta be a new day so that day yesterday good or bad this is it's as old as its oldest time as old as dirt so every time you walk into that locker room to walk into that rehab facility it's like right now in the present like i'm going to get 100 better um you know i've been reading a lot of uh wabi-sabi books it's a japanese aesthetic and kind of way of living and and the main thing behind it is like to find beauty and imperfections and to find the the gratitude and the ugliest things of life and for me 2019 started off about as ugly as you can get young kid young man i should say rehabbing really for his future career for his future earnings with the weight of a wife and a baby on the way to support and you know that ultimately became my ultimate motivation and there's not a lot of things to compare to holding your child for the first time or for me my daughter for the first time and so seeing the way my year started and the way my year ended really just speaks to god's plan and what he had in store for me this year i was able to be a husband i was able to be supportive from my wife through the process but ultimately she was the one that kind of had to shoulder the most burden she had a rehabbing husband who wasn't always in the in the in the best of spirits but she always pulled me up and uh she uh you know carried our our girl around for for nine months so without her i don't know if i'd ever made it back as strong or at all from this rehab and you know obviously without her i would never have our have our daughter which is um been by far uh the most amazing thing that's ever happened to me [Music] you're not just rehabbing your ligament you know you're rehabbing your mind you're rehabbing your entire body every single day attacking rehab didn't matter if i was in a good mood bad mood just keeping everything in the present and just saying can't worry about what has happened can't worry about what's going to come i can only change who i am each moment in the present really like set me up to come out of this thing no matter how this goes i'll always be able to look back and always be able to go into everything with 100 confidence knowing that like this version of myself is is the best version that i could give there's dusty baker always with a toothpick and ready to roll there familiar look a strikeout of goldschmidt he's at his pitch limit gets the handshake here comes dusty with his toothpick and a smile on his face and he says that's enough you can see his teammates congratulating him on making it back well done nice round of applause for mccullers and we begin with breaking news the number of coronavirus cases in the houston area continues to climb [Music] we will take drastic steps major league baseball to delay the 2020 opening day [Applause] it doesn't no none of it matters to me um i don't think 60 games is it's going to be weird it's it's a short you can you know baseball is a marathon it's not a sprint it's one of the beauties about it um but we're we're in a sprint this year we're running 100 meter dash everything you know from the off season you know all all the all the all the talk you know all the social media stuff it's just it's gotten to the point where we're just we're just ready to play ball i'm really just done talking i'm really just done with the long talk and the in the back and forth with um people who who i know deep down or just are just scared worse who's high who not tell me who rock who sell out in the store you tell me who flop who cop the new drive who jews got rocks who else making rap albums doing numbers like it's pop same old pam drake you know ain't it's been the breaking ball that has been almost impossible to get a piece up for the rangers hitters i'm with my whole set turning snatches at the crib that's why i could be serena when she playing with her [Music] [Music] because there are a lot of doubts about us a lot of doubts about what we have accomplished and you know if we deserve to accomplish them so uh i think a lot of people are just ready to um move on and just really show what we're about the important times i should let you know ahead i'm coming back on my worst behavior batter will be ballinger remember two strikes on the rookie ballinger and now three remember hold up hold my phone they used to never want to hear us judge goes down on the curb remember worse we hate you

Channel: Lance McCullers Jr.

Views: 12,949

Rating: 4.946785 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: 0eNWweHOEhg

Length: 10min 51sec (651 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 23 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/heavenlyhouseboat]

I’m hard.

[u/Markezzy]

He calling out Judge and Bellinger.

Let’s get it LMC. Gonna be our ace this year, calling it now.

[u/SpacedAlien]

Fuck yeah.

[u/Lukealloneword]

Cant watch it now but I'm gonna. Then im gonna edit this comment with all my excitement. Just you wait.

Edit: Bro I cant even right now

"I'm really just done talking. I'm really just done with the long talk and the back and forth with the people who I know deep down are...just scared."

Let's go to war.

[u/gurkeyturkey]

Who needs Cole we got CY Lance back LFG

[u/wbm20]

Me gusta

[u/allphilla]

Well I’m ready to run through a brick wall

[u/Jshare2]

I went from 6 to 12 within the first 10 seconds of the video!

[u/PluralRural4334]

Hellz yeah