Colton Faubion, a right-handed pitcher at Green Mountain, felt a sharp pain in his abdomen during his second start of the 2015 season. The team was finishing its annual road trip to Phoenix, Arizona, and Faubion was out to prove that there was reason he was the only non-senior starter in a talented Rams rotation.
That day, he struggled to find his usual consistency.
The discomfort was obviously affecting him --; he figured it was just a bad cramp, probably from the change in temperatures from Colorado to Arizona. But to his credit, he still managed to go four innings, allowing just one run for his second win in as many starts.
That pain went to excruciating hours later: He keeled over during the long drive home with his mother, and was soon after rushed to the emergency room in Gallup, New Mexio. There, his appendix was removed, forcing him to miss the rest of the year.
Faubion could only watch, two months after the surgery, as the Rams knocked off Lewis-Palmer 4-0 to win their second straight Class 4A title.
He knows a potential three-peat in 2016 will depend a lot on him. And of course, on how well a young and unproven pitching rotation can perform behind him.
"We lost seven everyday players and pretty much all of our pitching," seventh-year coach Brad Madden said. "We have a lot of good players, but we'll need guys to step up for us."
A lot of them. From everywhere.
The Rams lost six of their top seven run producers and return only 25 1/3 innings of pitching experience from 2015.
Wyatt Featherston, the best returning bat for Green Mountain, who hit .351 with 18 RBIs and five home runs last year, will obviously need another big season to give the Rams any chance at another deep run in the postseason.
He's a realist, though. He said he's played the game long enough to know where games are won and lost.
Pitching.
"It's been ingrained that the pitching needs to set the tone for us," said Featherston, who will play for Western Kentucky next year. "I'll help with whatever they need, because we go as they go."
So far, Madden says, eight pitchers are vying for time on the hill.
A lot of them have used the team's top hitter as a resource for answers. What would you pitch in this count? Where should I locate this? Can you hit that?
"I am enjoying it," Featherston said of mentoring his younger teammates. "I kind of think we all enjoy being a bit of an underdog this season. I know I love proving people wrong."
He's not alone. Nobody more than Faubion will have things to prove in 2016.
Because if coming off appendicitis wasn't hard enough, the senior will have to prove he can be effective on the mound after a snow blowing accident mangled his pitching hand and put his baseball career in jeopardy in late January.
"It nearly cut my fingertips completely off," Faubion said. "When it happened, I thought (my season) was over."
But luckily, no.
Back in Phoenix for his first start in nearly a year, Faubion went seven innings and allowed three earned runs in a 12-5 win over Grant on March 23.
"My middle finger was bleeding some through it, but I felt pretty good out there," he said.
And if anything, a bloody-good performance is never a bad omen to start things off on.
from Lakewood Sentinel - Latest Stories http://lakewoodsentinel.comhttp://lakewoodsentinel.com/stories/Green-Mountain-needs-pitching-to-step-up,211018?branding=15
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