Byline: Max Offen Sichtlich
Off Topic
Injuries Tear At Shelton's Future
Nov 16, 2055
The story is, perhaps, as old as time. A trio of young pitchers come into an organization and gather glitz and fame, and pose for all the photos, and get all the girls, and … then one of them gets hurt—like with an ugly radial nerve decompression event, and then suffers elbow inflammation on the way back, and then—just when things are looking up—is hurt again, this time with a partially torn labrum that sets him aside
Nest thing you know, Rob Shelton sitting in the back of the room as Richard Graves and Roanld Jones move on through their reps and begin to look like the prospects they are.
And now, as the offseason gets underway in earnest and as Shelton has recovered, he finds himself facing the question of the moment. Is the career over? Baseball people are whispering that it might be. He’s lost too much. His approach is too scattered, and the stuff no longer looks good enough. And now he’s being faced with a new idea. Should he cut out three of his five pitches? Focus on generating velocity? Make the curveball bite a little more or the changeup changier? Rumors are he’s reached out to get advice from legendary Pope pitching coach Gabriel Campos. Word is that Campos has told him to breathe and focus, and not to worry about keeping up with the Graveses and the Joneses.
“The kid will be fine,” Campos said in a recent interview. “I believe in him.”