The Game I Lost

Some grief doesn't come with a funeral, flowers, or speeches about what was lost. It's the grief of a life that almost was—a fleeting, vivid version of yourself that vanished before anyone could see it. You can't mourn it openly, nor can you explain it to people without sounding bitter, petty, or ungrateful. As a result, you mostly bear it alone.

I have carried mine for twelve years.

His name is Danny, and he is everything I was supposed to be—a professional baseball player. 

I occasionally watch him on TV — more often than I probably should, to be honest. Last Sunday, I was sitting on my couch with a bowl of cereal going soggy in my lap when I watched him handle a ground ball in the seventh inning, bare-hand a dribbler with his bare hand, and throw to first with a relaxed, natural confidence that seems effortless from the stands. The crowd roared in the background, and the commentator mentioned his name with a special reverence for players who make difficult plays look graceful.

I turned the volume down and sat in the quiet for a long time after.

Danny is twenty-four, and I am twenty-eight. We grew up in the same house, sharing the backyard, swinging from the same batting cage our father attached to the oak tree when I was seven and Danny was three. We ate the same cereal, wore hand-me-down cleats, and watched baseball games religiously. 

However, we were not raised the same way. That subtle, invisible difference to outsiders became the fault line that fractured both my athletic career and my life.  

My father loved baseball passionately, as if he had never quite moved on from missed opportunities. He coached Little League until political conflicts pushed him away, argued with TVs, and studied box scores with the dedication of a scholar analyzing sacred texts. When I displayed genuine talent — the kind that made coaches pull my father aside to say "keep an eye on this one — something shifted in him. He looked at me differently. I had become more than just a son; I was now a second chance for him to reach the big leagues.

And second chances, in my father's hands, were not gentle things.

The expectations came before I was prepared. Extra practice while other kids left. Film sessions in the living room, where he paused, rewound, and pointed out every flaw with a patience that felt more like prosecution than teaching. If I went two-for-four, he asked about the two misses. If I made a perfect play in the field, he'd point out the one step I took late. Wins were quickly acknowledged, but failures were dissected in detail.

It was neuroticism in its purest form.

I remember being eleven and crying in the car after a game where I struck out with the bases loaded. My father didn't say anything for twenty minutes—no comforting words, no harsh ones—just silence, which felt worse than either. When he finally broke the silence, he said, 'You choked. We'll work on it this week,' then launched into a rant about discipline and focus that I tuned out. When he saw I wasn’t listening, he turned on the radio and drove home angrily. When I asked to stop for food, he looked at me with disgust and told me I didn’t deserve it. 

I don't believe he intended to hurt me, and as an adult, I genuinely want to hold onto that belief. For years, I've tried to extend grace because he's my father, and I know he wasn't cruel in the traditional sense. He didn't hit me or belittle me in front of my teammates. Instead, his approach was more subtle and, in some ways, more difficult to identify — he made the game conditional. My worth was tied to whether I made mistakes, feeling like I was always just one error away from losing it. Most importantly, he instilled fear in me and fostered resentment towards the game I once loved. 

And fear, in an athlete, is a kind of death.

By fifteen, I had developed what I now recognize as an anxiety disorder, though at the time I simply called it the freeze or the yips. It would strike unpredictably—before at-bats, while waiting in the field, or during the car ride to games. I would suddenly freeze, feeling as if every circuit in my body had tripped. My hands would turn cold, my vision would narrow, and instead of clarity, my mind would spiral into worst-case scenarios—like a strikeout, my father's silence, or the look on his face that said, 'You almost had it.' Ironically, these episodes often occurred during the most critical moments of the game. 

I stopped focusing on power and average, and my once fluid mechanics became stiff, making me move more like a robot than a human. The tools and talent were still there, but talent needs a foundation of freedom to thrive. Mine had been gradually stifled by anxiety, dread, and the exhausting effort of playing not to lose rather than playing to win.

After finishing high school, I stopped playing baseball and told my father I had lost interest. I let him think it was a straightforward decision because the reality — that he had taken away what I loved and made me afraid of it — felt overwhelming and too painful to admit. Additionally, I wanted to avoid the consequences of revealing my true feelings. 

He seemed surprised but more disappointed. Then, eventually, he turned his attention to Danny.

Here is the part that cuts deepest, the part I have never said to anyone in these exact words:

My father was different with Danny.

I'm unsure whether he learned something from watching me fade or if his gentleness was simply the natural softenng of a man five years older and slightly less hungry. However, the father who coached Danny was not the same as the one who coached me. With Danny, he embraced failures as much as successes. I've overheard him recount Danny's worst Little League game— three errors, two strikeouts, a wild throw nearly hitting the umpire — as if it were a cherished comedy. Everyone would laugh. Danny would laugh. My father would pat him on the shoulder and say, That was the day I saw he had grit, because he returned the following week ready to play.

I excused myself to the bathroom and stood at the sink until the feeling passed. If I had done that, I would have probably been sent to bed without dinner.

It wasn't the cruelty itself that mattered, but its absence—extended to my brother and denied to me. Danny was permitted to fail without repercussions, so failure ceased to be frightening. He could take risks because there was no disaster lurking behind a mistake. As a result, he cultivated a key trait that distinguishes good athletes from great ones: the capacity to move past a bad moment.

I never had that because my father never granted me that wish. I love my brother. I want to be clear about that, because what I am about to say lives alongside that love and does not cancel it, even though I wish it did.

There are moments — shameful, small, selfish moments that I would never speak into existence in his presence — when I wish he hadn't made it.

Not because I want him to suffer or resenting his genuine achievements, which are earned through years of hard work despite the advantages I never received. Rather, his success serves as a reflection I can't avoid, constantly reminding me of what could have been mine. The crowds cheering for him — those cheers could have been for me. The scouts, the contracts, his effortless navigation through life with baseball as his guide — that whole life was meant for me. I was the one they first talked about. I was the one with the arm, the instincts, and the potential that coaches looked at and said was sky-high.

And I lost it not due to injury, lack of talent, or random fate's cruelty — but because of fear. Fear that was gradually instilled in me over many years by the man who was meant to be my strongest supporter.

That is the grief I carry now alone.

I've been in therapy for two years now, which is later than I needed, but earlier than I might have started without hitting a specific wall at twenty-six — the depression that didn't arrive with a bang but gradually dimmed like a slowly failing light. I see Dr. Osei, who has a unique gift for listening in a way that makes you feel truly heard without revealing too much. She's helped me realize that my father's actions, regardless of his intentions, caused real harm. She's also helped me identify aspects of myself I spent years avoiding.

She has also gently, persistently asked me to consider what healing looks like when the reminder of your wound is on television daily for seven to eight months out of the year.

Admittedly, I don't have a clean answer yet.

Here's what I experience: a slow-growing ability to watch Danny play without completely detaching from myself. I can feel both grief and pride at the same time, without allowing the grief to overpower the pride. I call him after a good game and sincerely say, 'you were incredible'—because he was, my pain is not his fault, and he is my brother whom I love, even when that love hurts.

But I will not pretend I am healed, nor will I perform a peace I haven't earned.

Some nights I close my eyes and pick up an invisible bat in the quiet of my apartment, and take a slow, perfect swing — the swing I had at fifteen, before the freeze, before the fear — and I let myself feel, just for a moment, what it was to love baseball before someone taught me to be afraid of it.

Then I open my eyes, put the bat down, and carry on with my life.