By Ed Piper
I worked with a former member of Jack McDowell's family the other day. "Black Jack" McDowell was a right-handed pitcher who was roughly on a Hall of Fame trajectory at mid-career when he suffered an arm injury and never was the same again.
I was aware of the hurler, who played for a long time with the Chicago White Sox and Cleveland Indians, but didn't know specifics about him. I read up on him, and saw that in the early 90's, he was very effective, taking the ball every fifth day and racking up some outstanding years.
In 1990 for the Pale Hose, he went 14-9 and topped 200 innings for the first of five of the next six seasons (the last after he was traded to the Yankees). "Black Jack" (I had not known him as such; his former relative brought up the moniker) recorded win-loss records of 20-10, 22-10 (his best), then 15-10 for los Yanquis two years later.
After he hurt his arm, he was bitter, as baseball pitching drove him and was the only thing that he was really good at. He ended up with a 127-87 record over 12 years, with a 3.85 ERA. Not bad, but Father Time limits careers in a young man's sport--unless you're ageless Satchel Paige, who pitched for the Indians at 57 years old--and McDowell had nothing to replace it during that time.
He later tried his hand at coaching. When he suffered the arm injury, he apparently tried different medications to try to treat the arm, and some of them helped turn him into a crazy man, doing things he had never done before. It is a sad story of woe and warning for others.
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