Jamie Moyer - Baseball’s Ageless Wonder Makes History

Many dream, few attain, and fewer still surpass. By one very important metric, Jamie Moyer has surpassed them all and, in the process, has made a powerful statement about the limitations of judging people solely by the number of birthdays they have had.

Moyer, who will turn 50 this November, entered his 25th Major League season in 2012. And as baseball fans all over the Pacific Northwest fondly recall, he spent ten of those seasons in Seattle, becoming one of the Mariners’ most popular players. In fact, he still has a strong presence in town – six years after he threw his last pitch at Safeco Field – helping children in distress through his enormously successful charity, The Moyer Foundation, still located in Seattle’s Magnolia neighborhood.

However, it is Moyer’s enduring baseball journey that has captured the imagination of the sports world as he continues to defy Father Time and the athletic Darwinism that has consumed players much younger than he for decades.

On April 17, he started and won a game for the Colorado Rockies, becoming the oldest player in big league history to be credited with a victory. And he did so in spectacular fashion, allowing just two runs in seven innings against the San Diego Padres.

To his credit, it isn’t the first time that Moyer has turned conventional baseball thinking and expectation on its ear.

“I’ve had people tell me for years, you know, ‘You’re too old, you don’t throw hard enough, you can’t do this, you can’t do that,’ ” said Moyer. In professional sports, an athlete’s career peaks by the mid-20’s. Retirement beckons before the age of 40. Perhaps, that fleeting notoriety also contributes to the degree of narcissism in which many players indulge. Better to soak up as much of the spotlight as quickly as possible then to be left in the dark wanting more.

Conversely, when Moyer turned 40 in 2003, he had his greatest season. He won 21 games for the Mariners and made his first All-Star team. And he not only aged with profound grace, he channeled what the game gave to him and shared it with as many others as he could.

As proof, he made a clean sweep of Major League Baseball’s most prestigious humanitarian and character awards that off-season: the Lou Gehrig Memorial Award, the Roberto Clemente award, and the Hutch Award.

It was especially fitting that he won the Hutch, since the award was named after Seattle native Fred Hutchinson, a beloved local icon who first starred for the hometown Rainiers of the Pacific Coast League before becoming an All-Star pitcher and respected manager in the majors. As an ongoing tribute, the Hutch is annually given to the big league player who best embodies Hutchinson’s passion for the sport and his courage and honor away from it.

That Moyer won the award while pitching brilliantly for the Mariners only underscored his dedication to the game and to the city of Seattle and would have made Hutch proud. click for more...

Unlike some players, whose relationships with the cities in which they play extend no further than wearing a uniform and maintaining a local mailing address, Moyer fully immersed himself in the Seattle community while he was with the Mariners.

In 2000, he and his wife Karen started The Moyer Foundation with a mission to help children in distress. The Moyer Foundation created and funds Camp Erin™, the largest network of free bereavement camps in the country for grieving children and teens; and Camp Mariposa™, a free camp program for children living with addiction in their families with locations in Washington, Indiana, Pennsylvania and Florida.

Moyer’s foundation partnered with Providence Hospice and Home Care in Snohomish County to create Camp Erin. The first Camp Erin was held in Everett in 2002 and was the first of five such camps established in Washington State with nearly 40 locations across the country, including one in every Major League Baseball city.

A year later, as if to cement his connection with the city and one of its favorite sons even further, Moyer’s organization started the Gregory Fund to directly benefit early cancer detection research at the world-renowned Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center on South Lake Union.

“In sports, it’s more than just how you throw the ball. It’s about what kind of life you live off field as well,” said Moyer. “I think being an athlete and an advocate helps send a great message to teammates, opponents and beyond.”

On the field, Moyer won 145 games for Seattle from 1996 to 2006. But it never came easily. Well into his 40’s, he had to train relentlessly and continually find new ways to baffle hitters as his velocity and power ebbed. He had to outthink hitters and believe in his wealth of experience as the great equalizer to keep them continuously off balance and guessing. And Moyer’s resolve to stay ahead of the competition – to not let doubt consume him – was remarkable.

Even a trade from Seattle to Philadelphia late in the 2006 season, did not seem to faze him. In 2008, at the age of 45, he was a key member of the Phillies’ World Championship team, winning 16 games. It looked as if he could go on pitching forever - like a metronome perpetually in synch with the pulse of the game.

However, the human body is a mercurial thing.

Two seasons later, something gave way in his elbow. He had damaged ligaments which ended his year. That winter, he tried to pitch again in the Dominican Republic, and the elbow seemingly went for good.

At the age of 48, his injury required major surgery that would sideline him for the entire 2011 season. If retirement hadn’t claimed him through the conventional aging arc, his tattered elbow certainly would claim him now.

However, a funny thing happened on the way to a gold watch and pension forms. Moyer refused to quit. His extraordinary drive would not allow it.

His grueling rehabilitation pointed toward a single moment – a return to a big league pitcher’s mound. Even after his endless physical climb back, his prospects weren’t particularly good. After all, what Major League team would be willing to take a chance on a 49-year-old pitcher with a surgically reconstructed elbow who hadn’t pitched in 17 months? click for more...

It turned out that the Colorado Rockies wanted a steadying presence to help their talented but woefully inexperienced pitching staff. And if there is a description that fits Moyer’s playing style perfectly, “steady” would be it. The rest, as they say, is history – literally.

“It has always been important to me to give back off the field. We have succeeded with our mission at The Moyer Foundation of helping children in distress coast to coast through the support of so many individuals and corporations,” Moyer said after his historic game at Coors Field in Denver. “Our greatest accomplishment in 12 years has been Camp Erin which we now proudly have in every MLB city. It’s a legacy Karen and I wanted to give back to baseball which has blessed us in so many ways.”

Many dream, few attain, and fewer still surpass.

Baseball’s ageless wonder has truly surpassed them all in so many ways - on and off the field.

Rob Nishihara is a lifelong baseball fan and freelance sports writer living in Seattle. Some of his additional baseball writing can be found on his blog, "Shadows and Light," which is located at www.rnishi.wordpress.com

This article appeared in the June 2012 issue of Northwest Prime Time, the Puget Sound region’s monthly publication celebrating life after 50.

UPDATE - Author’s Note: After the publication of this article, the Colorado Rockies released Jamie Moyer on June 4. Although the veteran pitcher had a difficult stretch of starts leading up to the team’s decision, management’s choice to pare him from the roster entirely seemed unduly abrupt.

Still, the resonance of Moyer’s remarkable record-setting comeback remains unchanged. His extraordinary dedication to the game and to helping others is and will continue to be an admirable legacy. In fact, Moyer’s trademark perseverance has shone through yet again.

After his dismissal from the Rockies , his hiatus from the sport lasted all of 48 hours. On June 6, he signed a minor league contract with the Baltimore Orioles. Three days later, he started a game for Baltimore ’s Triple-A team in Norfolk and pitched five scoreless innings, allowing only a single hit while striking out five.

So, Jamie Moyer’s fascinating baseball journey continues. After all, we should know by now that the game’s ageless wonder wouldn’t have any other way.