Former Newport Greyound keeps MLB dream alive

Grant Black has undergone rehabilitation following two major surgeries and has set his sights, once again, on playing Major League Baseball. His first step to that end has been to join the University of Arkansas at Monticello’s baseball team.
Grant Black has undergone rehabilitation following two major surgeries and has set his sights, once again, on playing Major League Baseball. His first step to that end has been to join the University of Arkansas at Monticello’s baseball team.

— Hard work and determination can take one a long way. Newport High School graduate Grant Black is living proof of that. After suffering two major injuries since his senior year as a Greyhound, he is closer than ever to his dream of playing baseball in the major leagues. Black plans to finish his college career at the University of Arkansas at Monticello.

“It feels great to finally be 100 percent, and I still have so much to prove,” Black said. “This is actually the first time that I have been healthy in almost three years. I finally feel like when I go to the ballpark that I can compete at a very high level. It’s been a long recovery, but I feel like I can see the light at the end of the tunnel in the recovery process.”

Black was being recruited to play football by the University of Central Arkansas in Conway before tearing his anterior cruciate ligament in October 2011, in the sixth game of that season. Black had a great season going, with 28 catches for 375 yards and seven touchdowns. He also had nine sacks on the defensive side of the ball.

Somehow, he pitched his first game just four months after having surgery to repair his injury.

Ironically, only UAM offered Black a football scholarship after his injury. He wanted to follow his baseball dream and had very few offers to play either baseball or football. Arkansas State University-Jonesboro was somewhat interested in him for baseball and wanted Black to go to junior college for a year to get healthy and have rehabilitation for his knee injury.

He signed to play baseball with Arkansas Baptist College in Little Rock for fall 2012 and pitched in spring 2013. Then, however, he injured his elbow in his first conference start midway through the season. His doctor and trainer ordered him to rest the remainder of the year, and he eventually had to quit throwing until the fall of his sophomore year. Black returned to Arkansas Baptist, throwing just one inning in March 2012 and went back to the doctor, eventually having Tommy John surgery in October 2013.

“The road to recovery was tough and grueling, but it was not anything that I wasn’t used to anyway,” Black said. “I was going to train at that pace, whether I was healthy or rehabbing. I never gave it a second thought about giving up. The process of working hard was the same. Rewards come to those people that work.”

Rehab following Tommy John surgery was grueling for Black as he worked five days a week with former major-leaguer Dustin Moseley, who was recovering from shoulder surgery and needed a throwing partner. The pairing formed in January 2014, and both players trained exceptionally hard.

Moseley was trying to rehab to return to pitching in the major leagues. Black just hoped to get a chance to play ball. Moseley signed with the Miami Marlins in June of this year, and Black signed with Northwest Mississippi Community College for fall 2014, less than a year after his arm surgery.

“Dustin has seen it all in the big leagues,” Black said. “He knows what it takes to make it. It makes me feel great to know that he believes in me. He went through a couple of different injuries himself that eventually cut his career short. His leadership and confidence in me motivate me daily. He talks to me all of the time about not only how to pitch, but how to carry myself as a man. We both know that God has a plan for both of us.”

Moseley has a thriving business, Proformance Sports Academy, with a brand new state-of-the-art training facility in Little Rock. While Black received help from Moseley, it was the support from Moseley and many others that put him on his path to recovery.

Zac Bottoms, an assistant coach from Arkansas Baptist, recruited Black and took him on, even though he was injured. Coach Bottoms knew Grant might not be able to pitch his sophomore year but still honored his scholarship commitment to Black upon the former Greyhound’s return to Arkansas Baptist.

Black is finally healthy and is playing for the Mississippi Dukes summer-league team. With that club, he has been outstanding both on the mound and as an everyday player. He has 34 at-bats and has reached in 28 of those plate appearances and is currently hitting above .600. Last week, playing at the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, he was 8 for 10 with one home run, three doubles and four stolen bases. He has pitched three games, going 3-0 in 14 innings of work and allowing only three runs and three walks while striking out 15 batters.

“My fastball usually is 88-92 [mph] and has been as high as 94,” Black said. “My curveball has always been my best pitch, and that is the pitch that I have had to work the hardest on because it just took longer to relearn my pitching mechanics.”

Black has spent the summer with his parents in Newport and drives to Little Rock three days a week to continue his work with Moseley. When Black gets home in the afternoons, he goes to the local baseball field, and his father sets up a pitching machine, where Black will hit 150 to 200 balls. Sometimes, his mother comes out and is the only fielder.

Black said God been good to his family, and his family and friends have been good to him. Black still has a dream to play professional baseball, and he’s finally healthy and thankful to have a chance to play for the one school that offered him a scholarship out of high school in football, not baseball.

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