One display case at the Joyce Center on Notre Dame’s campus features memorabilia from the baseball team’s improbable run to last season’s College World Series.
There’s the good-sized trophy given to all eight qualifiers who reach Omaha, along with scorecards from important postseason victories and pictures of postgame celebrations. At the bottom of the case sits a baseball signed by Grant Johnson, after he threw a one-hitter in a 25-1 regional thrashing of South Alabama.
As a freshman, the LaGrange native used his 97-m.p.h. fastball, nasty changeup and biting slider to emerge as the team’s No. 1 pitcher, playing a vital role in the 50-18 Fighting Irish’s first College World Series appearance in 45 years. But if there is to be a repeat trip for this talented squad, it will be accomplished without Johnson.
The former Lyons Township High School standout had surgery just before Christmas to repair cartilage tears in his right shoulder. Cubs team physician Michael Schafer performed the operation. Johnson initially expected to be sidelined one month, maybe two.
But when the surgery took three hours longer than expected, Johnson realized his sophomore season was done before it started.
“If I wasn’t a pitcher I probably could have made it through the season without the surgery,” he said. “But if I want to come back strong in 2004, I needed to have this procedure.”
Johnson was 9-5 with a 3.46 earned-run average in 2002 and was selected a freshman All-American. He struck out 84 in 101 1/3 innings, defeated No. 1 Florida State in the first game of the Super Regional in Tallahassee and started the first game of the College World Series against Stanford.
He fashioned a team-best 1.48 ERA pitching for Team USA during a world tour last summer, adding 30 innings of work to the highest total of his young career.
Johnson’s arm started to bother him in September, after a five-inning stint in an intrasquad game. By the next morning he couldn’t raise his arm. An MRI exam was inconclusive, and stretching exercises were prescribed. When the pain persisted, Johnson underwent a second MRI that indicated the cartilage tears. Surgery followed.
Notre Dame is not without replacements. Sophomore Chris Niesel, who was 4-0 his freshman year, will anchor the starting rotation, with Buffalo Grove’s Peter Ogilvie and Oak Park’s Ryan Kalita close behind.
Highly touted freshmen pitchers such as 7-foot-1-inch Ryan Doherty and Tom Thornton also could step up as Johnson and Niesel did last season.
The strength of the pitching staff becomes more important with the loss of starting outfielders Steve Stanley and Brian Stavisky and catcher Paul O’Toole (drafted by the Cubs) to minor-league baseball, and designated hitter Matt Bok and third baseman Andrew Bushey to graduation. Javier Sanchez, last year’s starting shortstop, has moved to catcher. Sophomore Matt Macri takes over at shortstop, and J.P. Gagne is back as the closer.
The season begins without Johnson on Friday against Dayton in Tempe, Ariz. The Fighting Irish will also face Arizona State twice before traveling to the Metrodome in Minneapolis for a three-game series and then seven games in Jacksonville, Fla.
Notre Dame plays a two-game series April 12-13 at Creighton in Omaha, so the Fighting Irish are guaranteed at least one return trip to Rosenblatt Stadium this season. But returning to the College World Series could be a bit more difficult.
“This has been an ongoing process for us, winning 40 games for 14 straight years, but we didn’t get the credibility until we started beating top teams such as South Alabama, Florida State and Rice,” said Notre Dame coach Paul Mainieri, who begins his ninth season in South Bend. “Grant is a huge loss for us, but I’m actually hoping it will be easier getting back there for a second time.”
