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The statistics indicate Jesse Carlson came of age this season as a dependable reliever with the Toronto Blue Jays.
But the maturation process truly began eight years ago, when Carlson was a carefree 20-year-old plying his trade in a Connecticut wooden-bat collegiate summer league.
Carlson's girlfriend gave birth, three months premature, to a girl they christened Jaelyn B. Carlson.
Jaelyn's date of birth was May 27, 2000. She died 18 days later.
Toronto Blue Jays relief pitcher Jesse Carlson, shown here in this July file photo, has quietly crafted a 6-1 record in his rookie campaign, appearing in 63 games, with a sparkling 1.82 ERA and two saves. (Joe Giza/Reuters)
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"Not many people know about it," Carlson, 27, said quietly last week as he stood in front of his cubicle in the visitors' clubhouse at U.S. Cellular Field in Chicago. "It's not something I really talk about."
Carlson has come out of nowhere this season to be a solid bullpen performer for manager Cito Gaston, whose relievers boast a combined earned-run-average of 2.99, the best in all of baseball.
A 6-foot-1, 160-pound beanpole, Carlson has quietly crafted a 6-1 record in his rookie campaign, appearing in 63 games, with a sparkling 1.82 ERA and two saves over 54 1/3 innings.
Carlson has given up a single run in just nine of his games this season and in his past 11 appearances has held the opposition runless.
"He's done it all," Gaston said of Carlson's performance this season. "He's come in and been the setup guy for us, he also came in the other day in Toronto and was the closer.
"Just wherever you put him, there's never any problem with him."
Things did not appear so promising for Carlson in 2000, when he was a freshman at the University of Connecticut and had just learned his girlfriend was pregnant.
A gnawing sense of unease gripped Carlson, who was trying to come to grips with the prospect of becoming a father.
And he began to steel himself for that dreaded conversation he knew he had to have with his parents, Richard and Paula, who are both schoolteachers.
"It was crazy," Carlson said. "When it first happened, when I found out that my girlfriend was pregnant … I immediately sat down with my mom and my dad. They were supportive of it, which was great."
His girlfriend's pregnancy was normal until June of that year, when she gave birth three months premature. Jaelyn weighed less than three pounds and was about 16 inches long.
Despite Jaelyn's premature birth, Carlson said, the hospital was confident of her chances for survival, and he couldn't wait to hold her.
"She was doing well the first 17 days," Carlson said. "I was there, I went up to the hospital when I could. I was busy with playing, but I got up there as much as I could and I had a few chances to hold her.
"They didn't really want a lot of people being around, just because of the state she was in."
On the day Jaelyn died, Carlson was getting ready to start in a game for the Middletown Giants of the New England Collegiate Baseball League.
"I was about to go out to pitch and my dad came over to the dugout and he said, 'The hospital had just called, your daughter's sick, they don't think she's going to make it,'" Carlson recalled. "I rushed to the hospital and I didn't get there in time.
"They brought her out into the waiting area and she had already passed."
Jaelyn's tiny body was covered with bruises caused by the desperate attempts of the hospital's doctors to keep her alive, Carlson said, adding he is not exactly certain what the cause of death was.
"She just got sick and basically couldn't fight it off," he said. "They didn't specifically say what [caused her death]. Things started getting complicated, and you know, being that small …"
Carlson's voice trailed off at that point as he struggled to recall the circumstances.
"Obviously, I was really young," he said. "It's just an unfortunate situation, you know.
"I think about her now to this day and it's kind of crazy to think that I could have an eight-year-old daughter right now."
Carlson and Jaelyn's mother are no longer together. Stuff happens, Carlson said with a shrug.
To help honour Jaelyn's memory, Carlson had her name tattooed on his right arm shortly after her death.
"It was just a short span that she was alive, but I'll always remember it," he said.
