Deaf Pitcher Ketchner Within Step Of Making Baseball History

Rochester, NY, United States (AHN) – Ryan Ketchner has waited eleven years for a promotion to Major League Baseball, but Major League Baseball has been waiting more than a century for Ryan Ketchner.

Ketchner, a starting pitcher for the Detroit Tigers AAA farm team, the Toledo Mud Hens, was born deaf. Hearing aids in each ear give him about 10 percent of an average person’s hearing.

They allow him to at least be aware someone is speaking and help with his outstanding lip-reading skills. Still, applause–and boos–from the crowd, calls of “I’ve got it,” on pop flies, and even the crack of the bat are lost on Ketchner.

“The only real problem we’ve seen, communication-wise, is him getting over to cover first on ground balls to the right side,” said Mud Hens manager Larry Parrish, a former big league All Star.

In Friday night’s start against the Rochester Red Wings, a Minnesota Twins affiliate, Ketchner didn’t get to first in time, colliding with the runner and the first baseman who had fielded the ball.

It was one of the few glitches, as Ketchner silenced the Wings bats over six shutout innings.

“He leads the league in tackles,” said Toledo pitching coach A.J. Sager of Ketchner’s late arrival to the bag. Both Parish and Sager list Ketchner’s inability to hear the crack of the bat as a possible reason that he’s a step late getting started.

Other than that, it’s business as usual for the hearing-impaired hurler. He gets no special treatment.

“The catcher has to take off his mask so I can read lips when he comes out to the mound to talk to me,” said Ketchner, “but he does that for everyone. And the pitching coach might need to talk a little slower for me.”

In fact, a Ketchner-pitched game looks like any other, with maybe fewer base runners than an average pitcher. Most fans in the stadium are unaware that they are seeing a baseball rarity.

Ketchner,28, is with his fourth organization since turning pro in 2000. He has made it to AAA with Seattle, Los Angeles, San Diego, and now Detroit.

A win Friday night moved him to 2-2 on the year with a 2.83 ERA. He was 2-0, 0.56 in a brief promotion to Toledo at the end of last season.

His Mud Hens tenure is the first time he has enjoyed sustained success at the AAA level, which puts him one step away from the majors.

Should Ketchner take that step, he’d be the first deaf big leaguer since 1908. Luther Taylor, who won 116 games for the Indians and Giants, was the last.

Showing just how long ago that was, Taylor’s nickname, like many deaf players at the start of the twentieth century, was “Dummy.”

One of the legends about Taylor’s big league tenure claims that his manager with the Giants learned sign language. One game, an umpire who was also fluent in sign realized that the pair were complaining about his calls and ejected both from the game.

Ketchner has never had a manager or pitching coach who could sign, although he looks forward to the possibility, saying that it would save them from having to take a trip to the mound to give advice.

Ketchner’s ability to read lips gives him another advantage, as well as a legend of his own. Supposedly, he can eavesdrop on conversations in opposing dugouts by reading lips across the diamond.

“Sometimes,” admitted Ketchner, breaking into a wide mischievous grin. “The dugouts are a little far apart at this level, but in the lower minors, I could do it. My teammates would crowd around me asking, ‘What are they saying.’”

Did he ever pick up anything he could use in a game? The grin got even wider, if that’s possible. “Sometimes,” he said.

Curtis Pride, an outfielder for the Tigers and five other teams from 1993 to 2006, is the only deaf position player (i.e. non-pitcher) in the last 60 years. Pride served as an inspiration to Ketchner.

“I never knew that there was someone like me in baseball,” said Ketchner. “Then someone at my father’s work told him, and we went to see him play in a spring training game. I was in eighth grade.”

The two didn’t meet until a few years later, when Ketchner was in high school. “He came to see me pitch,” said Ketchner, his chest swelling with pride even more than a decade later. “He told me it was up to me. I could do it.”

Ketchner has taken the torch from Pride and now serves as an athletic role model for thousands of hearing-impaired children around the country. Groups of deaf children frequently attend his games, and Ketchner makes several appearances to meet with them on off days.

Every player in AAA wants to make it to the majors, but Ketchner feels a responsibility to serve as an example for the deaf community. “I want to show them they can do anything. Hopefully it will happen someday.”

The trip has been slowed by injury. When Ketchner started in the minors, he had a fastball in the 90-92 mph range. However, he needed “Tommy John” surgery to replace a ligament in his elbow, which caused him to miss the entire 2005 season.

When he returned, his fastball was gone, and Ketchner had to learn to rely on his offspeed pitches.

“He throws a good curve and change-up,” said Parrish, “which gets the hitters off balance and makes that 86 mph fastball look that much faster when he comes with it.”

Just another hurdle for an athlete who has cleared far higher ones.

---