His birthday is tomorrow, but Tom Shearn came up from AAA and celebrated early yesterday. Here at Redleg Nation, we just wanted to take a quick moment to give some kudos to Shearn on the fine game he pitched to close out the sweep of the Miami Fish. Good work, Shearn; was it worth the 12 year wait?
While we’re on the topic, Trent Rosecrans has a pretty good piece on Shearn in today’s post:
Life in the minor leagues is hardly glamorous. Shearn spent much of the last month living in the Bats’ groundskeeper’s trailer beyond center field to help save rent money during the final month of the minor league season that was filled with road games. In the trailer is where Shearn finally got the call Saturday night from Bats manager Rick Sweet wanting to know where he was. He certainly wasn’t here in the big leagues.
“I’ll just walk across the field. I’ve got something to tell you,” Sweet told Shearn.
Sweet told him, “Congratulations.” Pitching coach Ted Power gave him a hug.
“It was emotional in there,” Shearn said.
After his visitors left the camper, Shearn packed his bag and decided to drive up to Cincinnati, even though the team’s hotel was booked.
Shearn called up Reds reliever Gary Majewski and asked if he could stay on his couch. When Shearn showed up at Majewski’s place about 12:30 Sunday morning, the two went over the Marlins batters and Shearn finally got to sleep at about 3 a.m.
“I would have slept in my car to come up and pitch in the big leagues right now,” Shearn said.
Great story, and I’m extremely happy for this guy. Whether he ever pitches in the big leagues again, or not, he’s earned a pretty good memory.