Marlins prospect appreciates life ’10 times more’ after working in hospital during COVID-19
Miami Marlins pitching prospect Will Stewart witnessed the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic first hand last summer.
With no minor-league season, Stewart said he worked three jobs while back home in Huntsville, Alabama. The first two jobs — working at Dick’s Sporting Goods and giving pitching lessons — seemed apt for a pitcher such as Stewart.
The third? He spent six months working as a lab technician for a cardiologist at his local hospital despite having no experience in the medical field. The job paid $10 an hour.
“They needed all hands,” Stewart said, “and I was like ‘I have nothing else to do. I’m not training at all, I might as well go make some money.’”
The experience, Stewart said, was eye-opening. The 23-year-old recalled “seeing people my age getting really, really sick.”
“I watched people come in that couldn’t breathe,” Stewart said. “I watched people come in that had no control over their bodies. It was very scary there at the beginning. ... It was hard to separate real life from baseball life. That was tough.”
He continued: “It changes your perspective, and it makes you appreciate life 10 times more than anyone did. I mean, if you run around this interview right now and ask everybody if they appreciate life more now than they did in 2019, I guarantee you everyone says yes. You change your whole way of life. It’s not the way we grew up, so going from that to this is, it’s a jump for sure.”
It makes Stewart even more grateful to be in his current position. He took part in big-league spring training this year for the first time in his six-year professional baseball career and had the opportunity to make an impression on the Marlins’ coaching staff and front-office members. He threw two-plus innings in an intrasquad scrimmage on the team’s off day Friday in front of general manager Kim Ng, vice president of player development and scouting Gary Denbo and other Marlins player development staff members.
Stewart was the third player the Marlins acquired from the Philadelphia Phillies in the J.T. Realmuto trade in February 2019 along with Jorge Alfaro and Sixto Sanchez.
Stewart showed flashes during his first season with the Marlins in 2019 despite a 6-12 record and a 5.43 ERA in 23 games (21 starts) all at the Class A Advanced level. His sinker is barely in the low-90s but has enough movement on the tail end to induce plenty of ground balls. He’s also still developing his slider and changeup.
But while he was at home in Alabama, he saw pitchers who were his rotation mates at various points in 2019 — Sixto Sanchez, Trevor Rogers, Braxton Garrett and Jordan Holloway among them — make their MLB debuts during the shortened 2020 season as Miami made its first playoff appearance since 2003.
While Stewart has not played in a Grapefruit League game, he wants to send a message that he can still be a valuable player for the team long-term.
“The biggest thing that I’m trying to do here in big-league camp — and I came in with this attitude from Day One — I want to scare people,” Stewart said. “I want to get out here and I want to make people afraid for their jobs. That’s how I feel like that’s what my goal was. I wanted to go out there and compete just as hard as Sandy [Alcantara], as Pablo [Lopez], as Trevor, as Braxton. ... Those are the guys that I wanted to get their attention because if you go out there and you’re doing your best and you’re outperforming people and everything like that, that makes teams notice you.”
This story was originally published March 19, 2021 at 2:35 PM.
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