If I ever have a son there's a good reason why you'll see him with his right arm tied behind his back until his 18th birthday. That reason is Tim Byrdak. Or Mike Myers. Or Alan Embree, Jamie Walker, Steve Kline or most of the lefthanded relievers that've donned sanitary socks in the last two decades, really. For today, though, we'll focus on Byrdak. He washed out after parts of three seasons with the Royals in the late 90's and ended up pitching in the Independent Leagues while his pregnant wife worked two jobs to help support the one kid they already had together. He eventually worked his way back to the big leagues in 2005 with the Orioles at the age of 31 but his odyssey took him far beyond even the lowly Northern League.
"Her sacrifice is the only reason I'm here. I guarantee you if I hadn't been called up by Baltimore a couple of years ago, we would have filed for bankruptcy. It took more than a year to pay off the bills that piled up when I was playing independent ball. I know what it's like to have gone from pitching in the majors to working overnight at Target and doing insulation jobs with my father-in-law."
Byrdak appeared in 41 games with the Orioles that year and 16 more last summer before joining the Tiger organization in the offseason. He was recalled and made his 2007 debut this weekend. Byrdak is clearly a hard-working and affable fellow and I wish him well, but with a 7.06 career ERA and his sojourns in the baseball hinterlands it's pretty obvious he's also a poster boy for the livelihood of even the most mediocre lefty hurler.
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