How Good Am I? The Journey of Former Pitcher Casey Weathers
In the spring of 2007, Vanderbilt pitcher Casey Weathers was on fire. The former junior college transfer out of Sacramento City College took the SEC and college baseball world by storm with his electric fastball, intense competitive drive, and full repertoire of difficult offspeed pitches.
That season he helped lead Vanderbilt to a 54-13 record and an SEC championship, going 12-2 with a 2.37 ERA while striking out 75 in 49 innings. Shortly after, Weathers was selected in the first round of the Major League Baseball draft, eighth overall by the Colorado Rockies.
Colorado’s Vice President of Scouting Bill Schmidt said, “Casey has a powerful arm with a lot of upside. He has a fresh arm and we are looking forward to bringing him into our system.”
Some of the other notable picks in that year’s draft included fellow Vanderbilt ace David Price, a future Cy Young Award winner and five-time All-Star; Mike Moustakas, a three-time All-Star and World Series champion; and Madison Bumgarner, a three-time World Series champion and four-time All-Star. Former MVP Josh Donaldson was selected forty picks after Weathers by the Chicago Cubs.
Nine of the top ten picks from that 2007 draft reached the major leagues. Casey Weathers was not one of them.
The distance between expectation and reality is where every performer eventually finds out what they’re made of.
Early Success, Sudden Breakdown
The early goings of professional baseball seemed as smooth as a 1-2-3 ninth inning in the SEC for Casey Weathers. He rapidly ascended through the minor leagues and finished his second season at the Double-A level, just two steps from the majors. But in late 2008, Weathers’ career spiraled when he tore his Ulnar Collateral Ligament and required Tommy John surgery. The recovery sidelined him for 20 months, costing him the entire 2009 season.
When he returned in 2010, still with the Colorado Rockies, his command never came back. He couldn’t control the baseball or find the same form. In 2011, the team that drafted him traded him to the Chicago Cubs, and one year later, after continued struggles to stay healthy and throw with velocity, he was released.
The once highly touted prospect had now been traded from one organization and released from another. His journey was at an apparent dead end. He was officially a MLB draft bust.
Ego Response vs Mastery Response
There’s a litany of former stars whose careers hit turbulence. It could be the high school star transitioning to college, or the college star unable to make the move to professional. When adversity hits, especially when it feels out of our control, we’re presented with career-defining choices.
One choice is an ego-driven response, where we deflect, blame, protect our ego, and play the victim. The other is a mastery-driven response, where we turn inward, sit with discomfort, process how we got here, accept reality, and carve a path forward.
Casey Weathers chose the mastery-driven response.
“Somewhere along the way I lost the ability to make myself a better player. At that moment I wanted to crash and burn rather than leave with a small whimper. My inability to get healthy was deteriorating my skill by a steep decline in both command and velocity.
If I walked away then my ego would have a huge cozy blanket to sleep with at night. But I couldn’t walk away like that. Because in the back of your mind.. you know if your career is just one elaborate lie you tell your family and friends to save yourself from the admission of failure.”
Hard Work Doesn’t Guarantee You Results, It Guarantees You Honesty
After yet another surgery to remove a bone spur at the site of his first elbow surgery, Casey Weathers spent an entire year rehabbing as a free agent. In that time away, he rebuilt his body by studying biomechanics and neuromuscular retraining, rebuilding his throwing motion through his own study and search for answers.
As a former top-ten pick with two surgeries in seven years, his days were spent studying and training in isolation. With no offers or opportunities in affiliated baseball, he turned to independent league baseball, signing with the Fargo-Moorhead RedHawks. In 2014, Weathers was pitching in front of fewer than 4,000 fans in Fargo, North Dakota, while his former first-round counterparts, David Price, Madison Bumgarner, and Mike Moustakas, were either all-stars, Cy Young Award winners, or World Series Champions.
His two-year stint in Fargo supercharged his comeback. In three straight offseasons, he earned spring training invites from the Tampa Bay Rays, Cleveland Indians, and San Francisco Giants, each time released before the season but kept returning to the lab to keep improving.
Ten years after being drafted eighth overall, Casey Weathers retired from professional baseball after another stint in Fargo. Ten years of ups and downs, devotion and resilience.
We love the stories of triumph and achievement, but not every story ends that way.
Peace of Mind and the Honest Evaluation
Was Casey Weathers’ baseball career a success? A narrow view might say no, he never reached the major leagues. But a more broad view says absolutely. I would argue his career was as successful as an athlete can get. Why?
Because how you go through things determines the success of a journey, not just what you achieve on that journey. More than stats, trophies, or records, obtaining peace of mind may be the best indicator of success.
Casey Weathers’ story is a success because he walked away with one invaluable thing, peace of mind. He had this to say at the end of his career.
“I’ve worked. I’ve rehabbed. I did as much as I could do that was within my control and I took away every excuse that I could give myself. Hard work doesn’t guarantee results, it guarantees honesty.
Now I’m grateful for everything. The trades. The injuries. Everything. I wouldn’t trade one day of my journey for one day in the major leagues, because I know I wouldn’t have earned it.
It gives me the most honest evaluation of myself that I could possibly get. And that is the point.”
How Good Are You?
When you reach the end of a chapter, do you have the peace of mind from giving something your full focus and effort? Or is it riddled with sulking and blaming others, and excuses.
Casey Weathers seems to have found what all high performers are searching for, honesty.
What is my best?
What am I capable of?
Where is my ceiling?
These answers only come when we choose mastery-driven responses again and again. Our ego would much rather have us compare and complain. Find some reason for why things didn’t work out that absolves us from any real responsibility. Point the finger and share stories of how we got screwed.
The vast majority of people never get honest answers to these questions due to their own insecurity protecting their ego.
Talking to a group of young players, Casey shared a reminder for anyone chasing greatness.
“Remember this, it will be impossible to lie at the end of your playing career when asked this question, ‘How Good Am I?’”
Sending you off this week with, Five Mastery Driven Questions to ask yourself the next time you face adversity:
What truth am I avoiding about myself by blaming the outcome on something out of my control?
If no one ever noticed or admired me, would I still love doing the work?
What can I learn from this challenge, that success would never teach me?
Am I measuring progress by comparison, or by growth?
When this journey ends, will I be at peace knowing I gave my absolute full effort, regardless of the result?
Stay The Course,
