Second Halves (One Sixty-Two: Day 84)

Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.

Day Eighty-Four: Adam Lind, Toronto Blue Jays

As I inch ever closer to age 40, it has come to my attention that I may be in the All-Star Break of my life. That is, the first half of my own season may be in the books, with a second half just getting under way. It’s kind of a frightening prospect, but one that I can’t deny. After all, the average life expectancy for American males is 75, and I have definitely passed the halfway point toward that number.

As my generation chugs into its collective All-Star Break, I see and hear a lot of folks taking stock of their past – attending reunions, playing their favorite ‘80s pop songs, and spending time with family. But conspicuous as the gray hairs may be for some of us, this is no time to despair over the passing of time. The season is long, and second halves can be even better than the first.

Take Rosa Parks, for instance. She was 42 when she changed the world, then spent the next 50 years furthering the movement she’d helped to start. Or how about Frank McCourt: Rather than kicking back after retiring from a fabulous teaching career, McCourt won a Pulitzer Prize for Angela’s Ashes at age 67. Morgan Freeman was an actor best known for theater, a soap opera and a kids’ show until he picked up an Oscar nomination for Driving Miss Daisy at age 52; he earned his most recent nomination last year, at 73. And Joe Torre had an excellent, if not Hall-of-Fame-worthy playing career until he took a job managing the New York Yankees at age 56. Fourteen years, four championships and 13 playoff appearances later, Torre is a sure-fire Hall of Famer now.

Second halves can make all the difference. In the smaller time frame of a baseball season, some players post extraordinary first-half numbers, only to fade in the dog days of summer. Others struggle in the first half, only to kick their games into another gear as summer begins its second month.

Adam Lind turned the baseball world on its head last year. He had known modest success as a part-time player from 2006-08, delivering a total of 22 homers and 94 runs batted in over that time frame. Last year, in his first season as a full-time player for the Blue Jays, Lind became one of the American League’s premier hitters: He hit 35 home runs, drove in 114 runs, and posted a .305 batting average. Few people saw it coming, but everyone took note of Lind’s tremendous improvement.

This season, however, has been a different story. After 86 games, Lind is hitting just .214, with 12 homers and 40 RBI. Lind is on his way to one of the highest strikeout totals in major-league history. And yet, Toronto’s manager, Cito Gaston, keeps putting the left-handed designated hitter into his lineup each day. This shows confidence, and I’m sure it means a lot to Lind. As the second half of the 2010 season begins, Adam Lind is clearly looking for a return to last year’s success.

It’s a long season, and sometimes three or four days off in the middle of July can make all the difference. Players clear their heads, rest their aches and pains, and get some sleep in their own beds. They return to the diamond feeling new again, and they look to the second half with optimism. In some cases, they do deliver tremendous second halves, and all of those early woes are forgotten.

Adam Lind is looking for that kind of change as he gets re-started tomorrow. And on Saturday, Lind turns 27 – still well into his own life’s first half, one would hope. But for the game he plays for a living, Lind is looking to pull a Frank McCourt, a Morgan Freeman, and a Joe Torre all in one. There’s plenty of time to craft a second half to remember. Now’s the time to start.