Stepping up to the plate in February 2009, Luke Padgett knew he had been through a lot.
It has been nearly two years since the last time he played baseball in a Virginia Tech uniform. It was all behind him — almost. A scar constantly reminds him of the accident every time he opens his eyes. Thoughts of leaving baseball had been going, going, gone.
Staring at the pitcher and waiting for the delivery, Padgett dug in and took a swing.
Solid contact. The ball traveled in the air, and Padgett ran for first base – it wasn’t good enough. The ball found its way into the center fielder’s baseball mitt: one out.
“He threw me a curveball,” Padgett said, “and I hit it and it made me feel good about myself. It was good. I enjoyed it.”
Trotting back to the dugout, Padgett, a redshirt junior at the time, was greeted by his teammates and congratulated.
He wasn’t supposed to play baseball again.
“Keep your eye on the ball” resonates as the most important rule in the game, and while Padgett can certainly keep his left eye on that rubber, cork and leather sphere, it’s a bit more difficult with his right eye.
A year prior to his fly-out to center field, Padgett suffered a major injury that few baseball players ever suffer.
“It was Feb. 2, 2008,” Padgett said. “It was the first practice we had on the field and was probably 50 or 60 degrees — not usual Blacksburg weather. It was so nice, and I just wanted to get out there. I was in the first batting practice group. I wasn’t even supposed to be swinging. I always hit last in my batting practice group for some reason. It was me, Sean O’Brien and two freshmen in our group. They didn’t jump in to hit, so I jumped in behind Sean. I fouled the ball up, and it hit me in the eye.”
The pitch headed toward Padgett’s thigh, but instead of dodging the ball, he attempted to take a swing. Baseball would never be the same for him.
“I fell to the ground, and was just holding my face,” he said. “I had tears pouring out of my eye because it hit me directly in the eye. I thought it was blood so of course I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m bleeding. I cut my eye open.’ The trainer took me to the dugout and was like, ‘Can you see anything?’ I remember the last thing I saw was the bottom of his feet probably a minute or two after it happened.”
“I’ve never coached a kid who’s lost vision through baseball,” said head coach Pete Hughes, “so I thought maybe he had a black eye or a little fracture in the orbital bone. Unfortunately it was a lot worse.”
The trainer couldn’t do much, and the school doctors were not present at the time. Padgett waited, all the while his situation deteriorated.
“At that point, I couldn’t see anything at all — not a flashlight, not a hand in front of my face, not anything,” Padgett said. “I was completely blind.”
When doctors finally reached Padgett, they drove him to the emergency room. On the way, doctors told him that he might not see out of his eye again. Tests were done to analyze the damage, but without a broken orbital bone, Padgett was sent to an eye specialist in Roanoke.
By that time, night had fallen and the eye specialist’s office was closed. But the eye doctor came on his own time to meet Padgett. The inside of his eyeball tore, and blood filled the eye, rendering him blind. The prognosis wasn’t looking good. Playing baseball again seemed like a miracle.
“When I first got hurt I asked, ‘Am I going to be able to play again?’ and he said, ‘I’m not going to tell you yes or no, but it doesn’t look like it,’” Padgett said.
There was no time to mull over a future in baseball, however. For the next week following the accident, Padgett was trapped in bed. Constantly sedated, unable to watch television or walk around, he struggled with the first part of rehabilitation. Friends and roommates gathered to watch the Super Bowl while Padgett lay in his box-spring prison.
“It was probably two months before I could do anything ‘strenuous’ is what they called it,” Padgett said. “After that I got to work out on the elliptical machine. I still couldn’t lift weights. Then probably three months after it happened, I could lift weights again.”
Springtime came and another visit to the eye doctor yielded another “no” to playing baseball. Padgett had been through enough already, so giving up didn’t seem like an option.
“I didn’t want to believe him, so I decided to get a second opinion,” Padgett said. “So I went to Duke Eye Center. They told me they couldn’t do anything to help me. I asked if I could have surgery or if there was anything they could do. They put ink in my system and watched it flow through my eye. They said there was nothing they could do to help my vision, so it’s just going to be this way forever. They didn’t tell me that I couldn’t play. They told me that if I was going to play that I had to use protective eyewear.”
Finally a breakthrough happened. Padgett’s vision was returning — although not entirely. His pupil remains misshapen and dilated more than normal. A scar that will never go away took its place in the center of his eye.
Perpetual blurriness in his right eye will haunt him for the rest of his life.
Seven months after the accident, Padgett returned to the baseball diamond. Much like the trees in September, Padgett wanted to turn over a new leaf. He sported a complete face shield like Little Leaguers use.
“It was hard,” Padgett said. “It was real hard. I’m not sure what my vision was, but my depth perception was off in the outfield and when hitting. It took a while to get used to.”
It took another month for him to lose the facemask and convert to custom-made lenses.
Taking that first pitch with no protection didn’t scare Padgett. He had confronted this whole travesty with a sense of optimism, but optimism wasn’t producing desired results.
“It was different,” Padgett said. “I was terrible when I first came back in the fall. I might have gotten one hit in 60 at-bats. It was rough. It was harder on me emotionally more than anything. I could take the failing part physically. I didn’t let it bother me to where people would see, but I almost quit a few times. I talked about it with a couple teammates — first, Matt Hacker. He went to the doctor and picked up my medicine for me. I talked about it with him. Randy Buffington — he’s gone too. Sean Ryan — he’s still here. They were all like, ‘Don’t give up, don’t quit,’ even when I said I was going to.”
“I didn’t think (quitting) was a good idea because it’s been a part of his life forever,” Hughes said. “Selfishly I wanted him around because he’s a such a good kid and he believes in the same things I believe in. He’s a good person, he’s a great leader, he’s a great competitor, and he’s fun to be around. Those are all qualities we like in our dugout and our program.”
It was a long process regaining his old form. Padgett played in 68 games in his freshman and sophomore campaigns. He hit .261 and knocked in 36 runs. At the end of last season, Padgett said he finally felt like he was playing halfway decent. Although he only had 23 at-bats, Padgett hit .304 last year — not bad for coming off such a severe injury.
“He was not even going to apply for his redshirt last year,” Ryan said. “Then I got hurt and had to redshirt, and I was like ‘Dude we got to do this together. You know we came in together, and we got to go out and stick this through.’ He was true to his word, and he’s been working his butt off since.”
Now in his fifth year, Padgett continues to contribute with an even higher .364 average in 11 games played. The success might not ever go to his head, though. He stays humble every day by looking through his eyes and seeing that scar.
“It really has changed me about taking things for granted,” Padgett said. “I took baseball for granted every day. Sometimes I wasn’t doing the right thing socially. I’d be out there practicing and be like, ‘God, I just want to go home. I don’t want to be out here.’ Looking back on it now, I’d do anything to be doing the 30 minutes of conditioning to where you’re about to pass out and throw up, doing all the drills, hitting, playing doubleheaders on a Saturday in both games, being so tired afterwards that all you want to do is go to sleep. I miss that a lot.”
Padgett may never have a chance to pursue his dream of playing baseball professionally because of his injury. It’s a hard pill to swallow. So, the best piece of advice Padgett can give his teammates and other athletes is to play every game like it’s your last.
“Whoever said that is a smart person,” Padgett added, “because you never know when it might be.”