By Roger Grossman
News Now Warsaw
I have a very unique job, or should I say I have very unique jobs.
Every day is different, even though what I am doing is basically the same.
Occasionally, I get the opportunity to run into something really cool, and last Thursday was one of those days.
Darryl Strawberry visited Warsaw Community High School.
Yes, that Darryl Strawberry.
The guy who played for the Mets and Yankees. The guy who was on the 1986 Mets World Championship team and the 1996 and 1999 Yankees World Series winners.
The 8-time All Star, 2-time Silver Slugger Award winner who hit 335 career home runs and drove in an even 1,000 runs in his career.
That Darryl Strawberry.
That same guy who hit a ball higher and farther than any human I’ve seen with my own eyes. He hit a home run to the bleachers just below the scoreboard in center field at Wrigley Field.
He was one of baseball’s most feared hitters.
But he had two problems: first, he wasn’t happy; and second, he listened to the wrong people about what to do about his first problem.
He chose to turn to alcohol, cocaine and women.
And when he was diagnosed with cancer in 1998, he realized that those things were never going to satisfy him either.
When his playing days were over, he found the long-term solution he’d been searching for—in Jesus.
His journey after substance abuse led him to Warsaw Community High School, where he started the day by speaking to the corporation’s 5 th graders who crammed into the Performing Arts Center.
Remember, most of these kids had no idea who he was before they got off the bus at the PAC that day, and many of their parents weren’t alive when he played.
But you could have heard a pin drop in that room that day. Those 5th graders were locked into his every word.
Then he had lunch with WCHS athletes — mostly from the baseball and softball teams.
I’d like to share the core of the message he had for them today with you.
His moment of change came the day that his wife asked him “when are you going to take that uniform off?”
Her point was he was living like “Darryl Strawberry the living legend of a baseball player” long after his playing days had ended.
Where was his life headed?
Well, it took the strangest of turns.
Strawberry said that Jesus had taken hold of him, and in the middle of what he described as being “locked away in Bible study for seven years”, he realized that he’d not only found that peace he was searching for, but he’d found the path that he was supposed to take moving forward.
While gesturing with the hand that bore his 1998 World Series championship ring, he gave those listening in the various settings he was given to speak in some glorious advice that kids and adults alike can learn from.
“We can’t deal with the outside problems until we heal the inside problems,” he said. “The problem of his world is in the hearts of people.”
100 percent true.
“Don’t read bad information,” he told the 5th grade classes. “Fill yourselves with good information.”
Specifically, to the boys in the PAC, he said, “The man I am is all that matters.”
He also encouraged both the elementary and high school students to be resilient—to not give up or give in.
“Don’t be a victim,” he said, “because you can overcome.”
He reminded those whom he spoke to that he had fallen, and when he fell people pointed at him and stared. But
when he got back up, no one said a word.
Most of all, he said that who you listen to will determine the outcome of your life. He told the kids to just say “NO” to drugs and alcohol and everything else that is proven to lead people down a path to destruction.
He said his mom always told him to focus on school and stay away from drugs and alcohol and women, calling it a “dead end.”
He gave examples of the tragic early ends to the lives of people like Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston and Prince.
Strawberry said, “They all died because no one spoke up to them to stop them.”
And then he very honestly said, “That could have been me, but God saved me.”
Now the 63-year-old Strawberry says he’s been clean for 20 years, and he’s broken the curse that came with his former lifestyle.
And his mission is to share his story and his Savior with everyone he can.
I admit, I had a pretty sizable amount of “sports hate” for Darryl Strawberry when he was playing.
But this Darryl Strawberry — the one that I listened to for an hour in two different settings at Warsaw last week—that’s exactly the kind of person that young people need to listen to today.
He changed.
So can I.
So can you.
