”The Kid” is still a kid. Ken Griffey Jr. just can`t get enough baseball. You`ll usually find him playing centerfield for the Seattle Mariners. But he also enjoys a good game of Whiffle ball with the neighborhood kids. Baseball comes naturally to the 22-year-old. His dad, Ken Sr., played for the Cincinnati Reds, and as a kid, Junior loved to hang out at the ballpark with the sons of other ballplayers – among them Pete Rose Jr.
The Griffeys eventually did something no other father and son have ever done in major league baseball: They played on the same team (the Mariners in 1990 and `91). They even hit back-to-back home runs in one game.
Junior`s road to the majors started when he was selected first in baseball`s draft when he was 17. He played his first major league game at 19. And while many 22-year-olds are still struggling in the minors, Junior won the most valuable player trophy in the 1992 All Star Game.
Seattle manager Bill Plummer says Junior was better equipped to break into the bigs at a younger age because of his environment while growing up.
”He`s been involved with baseball, in and out of major league clubhouses, on the field and around players, since he was small. This is kind of a second home to him, and I think that`s why he`s done so well,” Plummer said.
But the road to the majors has had a lot of pressure.
He had never liked it when his dad was on the road, and they would bicker when they did see each other. When he went into baseball himself, he struggled with being away from home, making curfew and racial slurs.
”It seemed like everyone was yelling at me in baseball, then I came home and everyone was yelling at me there. I got depressed. I got angry. I didn`t want to live,” Junior told the Seattle Times.
Following his first minor league season, he swallowed 277 aspirin tablets and wound up in a hospital. Junior revealed his secret, hoping to stop kids from making the same mistake. He does not discuss it anymore.
What he will discuss, with a smile, is how he spends his off-field time. When he`s not hanging out with the local kids, he spends time with his fiancee and plays with his five dogs. Junior says he wants to have kids of his own someday. And he learned one big lesson from his parents: Kids should be able to come to their parents with any problem.
And you can watch him play ball all you want, but don`t go making him a role model. ”I don`t think any professional athlete, or anybody other than the mother or father, should be a role model,” Junior says.
