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Yep. Except Purke at least was a college dude. Overall, people don't seem to acknowledge the injury risk in drafting 18-year-olds who throw in the upper 90s: a lot of those dudes break, but when they're doing it on a college roster, you haven't wasted a first round pick on them. It also makes the choice harder when Denaburg ages out of the MiLB control years, because he'll still be reasonably young.
He's the type of guy that could be out of the game 5 years then try a comeback like in the movies.
They have swapped stories and advice in West Palm Beach, hanging in the trainer’s room, the weight room or the outfield grass. And Irvin and Barrett have seen a notable change in Denaburg.“When you come out of high school, you may not know adversity in the same way as college guys,” said Irvin, who pitched three years at Oklahoma, in a recent phone interview. “You have only ever dominated, you’re a first-round pick, you get the big bonus. So when Mason first got hurt, with his shoulder, there was more feeling sorry for himself, more asking, ‘Why me?’ Like maybe he didn’t understand why he had to go through this and others didn’t. But that’s stopped now. He is in a really good head space.”“No one wants to start their career the way he has,” Barrett explained in a phone interview. “I mean, no one. But he has gone from being antsy, maybe, to understanding that this is a one-day-at-a time thing. I know it sounds cliche. But with my injuries, I have always tried to go Friday to Friday. Then days become weeks, weeks become months, months become years, and you’re back to where you want to be.“It’s far from easy. I just always tell Mason, ‘You’ll have a chance to tell this story one day, and it’s going to be a great one.’ ”
