Danny Farquhar is someone worth rooting for
Last season on April 20, after pitching for the Chicago White Sox in the sixth inning against the Astros, relief pitcher Danny Farquhar collapsed in the dugout. He vomited, lost consciousness, was rushed to the hospital and then doctors reveled that he suffered a brain hemorrhage.
This was caused by a ruptured brain aneurysm. The brain hemorrhage that he suffered from was life threatening and he has somewhat miraculously been able to recover fully to already be able to pitch in a spring training game for the Yankees.
He is lucky that he was able to have a very swift response after the brain aneurysm. It is very rare that something like this happens to a baseball player, and he is fortunate that this condition was not more serious than it ended up being.
He was able to leave the Rush University Medical Center on May 7, and even though he was ruled out for the rest of the regular season doctors he saw at the hospital expected him to be able to pitch again.
After being out of the hospital for only 25 days, Farquahar was in good enough condition to throw the ceremonial first pitch before the White Sox vs. Brewers game on June 1.
This was the first time he had thrown a pitch since April 20. The threw a strike with the whole team standing behind him in support, and the ceremonial first pitch was highlighted on Good Morning America.
He revealed in the Good Morning America interview that he did not remember the brain hemorrhage or anything that happened after he collapsed in the dugout. His first memory is not until four or five days after the surgery.
He spent 17 days in the Intensive Care Unit and underwent two surgeries.
He really did make a remarkable recovery. Good Morning American reported that according to the Brain Aneurysm Foundation, six million people every year have a brain aneurysm and 30,000 people experience a potentially deadly rupture every year. Only one third of the survivors are able to return to the life they had before.
Farquhar was able to throw a perfect strike one the first day he was cleared to attempt to throw again. He elected free agency when the 2018 season and the Yankees signed him to a minor league contract on January 21 to allow him to officially continue to pursue his dream.
The right handed Farquhar got one out and was charged with five runs in an 8–7 spring training loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates on March 2 in his first action in an official game since his life threatening brain aneurysm. He did not have success in that game but he succeeded in making to the mound and being able to compete.
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“I felt great out there,” Farquhar said. “I was happy to be back on the mound. Obviously, the results weren’t great but I call it a good day. I felt like a baseball player, again.”
This is actually the second time that he has been a member of the Yankees organization. He was only on the team briefly last time as he was claimed off waivers on June 26 of 2012 and optioned to the AA Trenton. He was put on waivers by the Yankees three days after he was signed and was included in the trade the Yankees made for Ichiro Suzuki.
Farquhar grew up in Florida and went to Archbishop Edward A. McCarthy High School in Southwest Ranches, Broward County. He was a pitcher and outfielder and as a senior he had a 0.89 ERA, which set a school record at that time.
He played on the baseball team at University of Louisiana at Lafayette and was a closer and a starting pitcher for the Rajin Cajuns during college. .
As a freshmen he had four saves, a 2.17 ERA and led his conference in ERA. As a sophomore he had a 3.08 ERA, 115 strikeouts and had the fourth best ERA in his conference after pitching 87.2 innings. His ERA went up to 4.95 as a junior but he was still drafted in the 10th round of the 2008 draft by the Toronto Blue Jays.
After being traded to the Oakland Athletics and then being traded back to the Blue Jays when he was in the minors, he made his Major League debut for the Blue Jays on September 13 of 2011 against the Red Sox. He would allow three runs on three hits while only recording two outs and after the game was sent back to Double A.
On June 2 of 2012 the Blue Jays designated him for assignment and then was claimed off of waivers on June 9 by the Athletics. He would spend the 2012 season in the minors and wouldn’t pitch in the majors until 2013.
He has had an up and down major league career as a relief pitcher. In seven total seasons including last season’s eight games pitched and his three games pitched in 2011 he has a solid 3.93 ERA, 1.259 WHIP, 3.60 FIP with 309 strikeouts and 106 walks.
After being traded by the Yankees to the Mariners, he spent the 2013, 2014 and 2015 seasons with Seattle. His best Major League season came in 2014 when he posted a 2.66 ERA in 66 games (71 innings) with a career best 1.127 WHIP. Non elite relief pitchers can be unpredictable and that showed in 2015 as he regressed with a 5.12 ERA.
Before the 2015 season, he was traded with Brad Miller and Logan Morrison to the Tampa Bay Rays for Nate Karns, C.J. Riefenhauser and Boog Powell. He went back and forth to Triple-A during the season but pitched well for the Rays this season as in 35 games he had a 3.06 ERA with 46 strikeouts and 11.7 strikeouts per nine innings.
In 2017, after pitching 37 games with the Rays and 15 games with the White Sox, he had a mediocre 4.20 ERA and 1.358 WHIP.
He has proven based on his 2014, 2016 and to a lesser extent 2017 that he can add value to the Yankees bullpen. He is also deserving of a chance because of what unfortunately happened to him last season to at least pitch another game in the majors.
According to Brooks Baseball, Farquhar threw 4,986 pitches that were tracked by the PITCHf/x system between 2010 and 2018. In 2018, before his hemorrhage, he relied on his fourseam fastball (93mph) and change (87mph) while also throwing a curve ball (76mph average). His scouting report says that his change generates a high amount of swings and misses compared to other pitchers’ changeups, and has natural sink to it.
