PEORIA, Ariz. – Going with the theory that he can’t break what he doesn’t have, Chris Snelling made an important request of the surgeon before he lay down to sleep Friday.
“I told the doctor, if there’s any bones in there that I don’t need, just take them out,” Snelling said.
The 22-year-old is tired of breaking things and always being weeks, or months, from becoming the outfielder he knows he can be for the Seattle Mariners.
The latest break was to his hamate, a small bone near the base of his right palm that had pained him the last two weeks when he tried to swing a bat. The hook of the hamate was removed in surgery Friday and Snelling began a six-week recovery period on Saturday.
“I feel like I can’t contribute. You want to contribute to win and I haven’t done that for the last 2 1/2years,” he said. “I’m upset.”
Snelling can deal with the pain of an injury; he has broken things all his life.
“When I was a kid, I was always hurt,” he said. “I split my head open like five times. I ran into a brick wall. I had a toe chopped of. I broke my arm jumping into an empty swimming pool.”
On the safer confines of a baseball field, he hasn’t been any luckier. Snelling, who played an injury-free 1999 season for the Everett AquaSox in his pro debut, has been hurt every year since.
He had a broken left hand in 2000, a fractured ankle in 2001, torn knee ligament in 2002 and another knee problem in 2003. He rehabbed from his knee problems and believed he could finally have a healthy spring training.
Then two weeks ago while taking batting practice, he felt a pain in his right wrist but didn’t believe it was serious. He took a cortisone shot and continued to work.
“I’d hurt my left wrist before, so I knew what it felt like and I thought I could get over this,” he said. “I cut my swing down. I don’t think I over-did anything.”
The pain came back on Thursday in his first spring training workout, and he was in surgery Friday. On Saturday, Snelling returned to the clubhouse with little to do but ask “Why me?”
“It’s mental more than anything,” he said. “But it could be worse. I went on the Mariners caravan this offseason and I was thinking that all last night. I’ll take a broken hand over anything those kids have in the hospitals any day of the week. But it doesn’t mean that I can’t get upset.
“I’d rather be lucky than injury prone. I wish I could get an answer just for myself why this is happening. It would make it easier on my mind.”
Wake me when I’m rich: Mariners manager Bob Melvin said Snelling said some amusing things while he was still groggy after Friday’s surgery. At one point, it seemed clear Snelling was dreaming of playing poker.
“Don’t wake me up,” he said in the recovery area. “I’ve got a flush.”
Keeping up with Jones: Shortstop Adam Jones, the Mariners’ first-round draft pick who spent part of last summer with the Everett AquaSox, already has made an impression at spring training. Not all of his talents were evident on the field.
Jones shattered the team record in the treadmill stress test last week when position players took their physical exams, lasting nine minutes and running at 1/2mph on an incline that became steeper the longer he was on it.
“Every minute and a half it goes up two degrees,” Melvin said. “It gets to you right away. That’s running fast (while) climbing a hill.
“He’s a quiet kid, but I’ll tell you what, he’s a heck of an athlete.”
Looking ahead: The Mariners host the Arizona Diamondbacks on Friday in Peoria, but don’t look for a Seattle vs. Randy Johnson matchup.
“He’s supposed to start their first game (Thursday),” said Melvin, the Diamondbacks’ former bench coach. “That’s unless they’re pulling a fast one on me, and I would not put it past them.”
M’s fans can mark down one date: March 28.
Melvin said the Diamondbacks’ rotation would have Johnson pitching against the Mariners in Peoria that Sunday.
One is enough: Gil Meche will pitch two innings in Thursday’s exhibition opener against the Padres, but Ryan Franklin will follow with one inning.
Why just one?
“That’s just the way we had it plotted out,” Melvin said without revealing any other reason.
Franklin said he threw a bullpen session Friday and felt fine.
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