Nagging injuries are a fact of life for hard-throwing starting pitchers, but for Okotoks Dawgs hurler Danny Britton-Foster the discomfort on the mound just makes him appreciate being close to full health.
The six-foot-two, 200-pound hurler has fought through shoulder issues since the end of his first season with the Dawgs in 2009. The nature of the injury is still a mystery to the right-hander.
“I can pinpoint the game where I was throwing hard and then the next one it just wasn’t there, but I don’t understand how bone spurs can happen in one day,” said Britton-Foster, reached on the phone in Saskatoon during a Dawgs road trip to Canada’s breadbasket. “It lasted for almost two years so I was throwing 79 to 81 (miles per hour) for about two years and it was a lot of pain and it wasn’t much fun.”
On the heels of two successful summer campaigns with the Dawgs, Britton-Foster begrudgingly took last summer off to rest his shoulder.
“I was working as a secretary actually last summer, the people were nice, but it’s not baseball, ” he said of the decision to stay off the diamond. “It was definitely tough to be away from the game.”
Britton-Foster was especially distressed about missing out on the opportunity to don the Dawgs uniform for the third Western Major League Baseball (WMBL) season.
“The people mostly, the managers, coaches and the players, and the fans,” he said of what makes his time with the WMBL team so special. “I missed everything about Okotoks,
really.”
On the field, the decision to rest paid dividends in his Senior year with the University of B.C. Thunderbirds and has carried into the summer season for Okotoks.
“It’s a lot easier to come to the park everyday when your arms not killing you,” he said.
Britton-Foster was encouraged with his performance in his final season pitching with the Thunderbirds. He finished with a team-high 82.1 innings pitched, posted a 5-4 record, a miniscule earned run average of 2.85 while holding batters he faced to an average of just .247.
“The start was a bit rocky, but I figured out my arm slot and got my change-up going in the second-half of the season and things just started working out,” Britton-Foster said. “My change-up was my best pitch during the school year, I got a lot of strikeouts with it.”
Coupled with a fastball that ran up to 86 mph, Foster was able to keep batters off balance. He’s continued the trend in Okotoks, with an even deeper arsenal of pitches at his disposal.
“My changeup has been my worst pitch because the baseballs are different (than at university) they have a lot smaller seems on them,” he said of his 2012 season with the Dawgs. “My slider moves more, I’ve got a knuckleball now and my fastball moves more.”
The numbers paint an analogous picture. He’s registered two wins in five appearances to go with a 2.18 earned run average with the Dawgs.
“Just being able to locate my fastball and getting ahead early in the count and then being able to throw my slider down and away to righties I’ve got a lot of strikeouts there,” he said of his keys to early season success.
Trusting his infielders to make plays on grounders hasn’t hurt either.
“Our guys can pick up the ball and throw it across the diamond so I’m not afraid to get ground balls to our guys,” Britton-Foster said.
The 22-year-old was a member of the Dawgs’ last championship roster, in 2009, and is eager to reach that peak again and break Okotoks’ two-year WMBL title mini-slump.
“Ultimately to win the championship,” he said of his goals. “Other than that just getting the team as many wins as I can.”
Away from the diamond, the Ladysmith, B.C. native plans to return to the picturesque Vancouver campus to complete his degree in kinesiology, despite the fact he has completed his eligibility for baseball.
Kinesiology is a highly competitive field at UBC and Britton-Foster said he’ll benefit from the time away from university ball to invest all of his energy into his studies and pursuit of the physiotherapy program.
“Right now I’m sitting at about a 75 average, I think playing the athlete card you might be able to get in with a 78, but most students you need an 80 average just to get in,” Britton-Foster said. “So we’ll so how it goes.”
