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Against All Odds, Seward County's Katelyn Craker's Story

Against All Odds, Seward County's Katelyn Craker's Story

While watching Seward County lefthander Katelyn Craker dominate in the circle this season for the Lady Saints, most fans and opponents probably thought that the sophomore pitcher was just another gifted athlete succeeding at the college level.  Few knew what the southpaw had really overcome earlier in her career, something that would seem nearly impossible to most. 

 

Craker grew up like any other young softball playing girl in the Southern California area, dreaming to one day be a star on the diamond for the UCLA Bruins.  She was nine years old and a top player for her little league softball team when the right handed pitcher started feeling pain in her throwing shoulder.  Coaches told Craker the  classic line of 'put some ice on it', but that wasn't working. She went to the doctor and was told that she had bursitis and tendinitis in the shoulder but again, traditional methods of healing those problems weren't working. 

 

A short time later, Craker and her parents Bennett and Kristen noticed that a lump was developing in the affected area.  The family took Katelyn to a physical therapist who ordered an MRI and notified the Craker's that the results should be in in two weeks or so.  The next day, Kristen was surprised at her school, where she worked as a teacher, when she got a call from the pediatrician's nurse saying that the family needed to meet at the doctor's office at 3:00 that day.  Kristen told the nurse that that wouldn't be possible because of her teaching schedule, and the nurse replied that due to the circumstances, she needed to find a way to make it work.  Because of the sternness of the nurse's voice, Kristen, Bennett, Katelyn, and Katelyn's little sister Kortney made their way to the doctor's office immediately where they could never be prepared for what they would hear next.  Just two weeks after Katelyn's 10th birthday, the family was informed that she had cancer.  After a biopsy, the family learned that it was a rare soft tissue cancer called synovial sarcoma. Craker's mom, Kristen, immediately broke down crying while 10 year old Katelyn didn't understand the severity of the grim news yet. 

 

Craker started chemotherapy sessions and as doctor's tried to insert a PICC line into her arm at session number one, she poignantly exclaimed that she did not want to do this, a point in time where she says she was still in denial of the cancer.  Bennett eventually calmed his eldest daughter down with what she called "bribes" and her treatments began.  After complications with the PICC line, Craker was forced to have surgery to insert a portacath into her chest cavity so that she could undergo further treatments. 

 

Following weeks of treatment in which Craker says she doesn't remember being too bad, her first realization moment of the true scope of her issue came on Halloween when she was washing costume dye out of her hair and was shocked when her long blonde locks began coming out by the clumps.  "It was the first time where it really hit me what was actually happening to my body and how serious it really was" Craker said.  The next day, she went and got the rest of her hair cut down from 16 inches to one inch and the battle was officially on. 

 

Craker was only able to go to school for occasional special events during her treatments and remembers having to wear a mask and sit in the back of the classroom to avoid picking up any sicknesses going around the class.  She fondly remembers her 5th grade teacher, Mrs. Benson coming to the hospital to teach her when she was done teaching her normal schedule.  Craker would have to stay in the hospital in four or five day stints, but Mrs. Benson was always there to catch her up on all of the work that her classmates were doing in school during the day.  With her, Mrs. Benson would bring cards of encouragement from Craker's classmates, cards that Craker says she still has to this day nearly 10 years later. 

 

As Craker prepared for her surgery to remove the tumor, she was dealt another bit of bad news as the tumor which originally measured at five inches in diameter and was expected to shrink by 90% during the treatments, had only shrunken by 5%.  Katelyn was told that amputation of her arm was possible during her surgery, but says she was relieved when she "came out of surgery and still had an arm".  The surgery was a serious one as surgeons were forced to scrape down to her bone to remove the tumor as it had entangled itself into Craker's shoulder muscles.  Surgeons were forced to detach and reattach the heads of her bicep, remove the front third of her deltoid as well as half of her pectoral muscle leaving her with limited strength in that shoulder even to today.  The surgeon told the family that because of the lack of strength that would be left in Katelyn's shoulder muscles and bones after the surgery and radiation treatments, she would never be able to play softball again.  Knowing how much softball meant to Katelyn, Craker's father Bennett and grandfather John, a former University of California pitcher, asked the surgeon if it would be possible for Katelyn to become a left handed pitcher.  Surprised with the suggestion, the surgeon paused for a moment and said that if she was determined enough, that could be a possibility in the future.  With that, Craker began hurling wadded up socks around the house with her left arm with the dream of one day returning to the circle in a game.   

 

After the surgery, Craker continued her chemotherapy treatments, but unlike before the surgery, she began to get sick during her post therapy sessions.  She remembers her strength being next to nothing as she was unable to eat for days at a time.  A Disneyland trip had to be postponed due to a dangerous drop in her blood count, but after Katelyn 'the lawyer' as tabbed by her doctors, convinced them of releasing her to go to the park, she was told she would have to wear a mask and take her dreaded medications before making the trip.  Craker says that while things were obviously tough on her throughout the process, things were also hard on her younger sister Kortney, who was eight at the time and had to take a back seat from being the baby of the family to allow the family to focus more time on her big sister Katelyn. 

 

Craker continued her physical therapy and by the end of the school year she returned to her class and graduated with the other 5th grade students.  She once again began practicing pitching with her left arm by throwing socks around the Craker household.  Katelyn began playing softball again at the age of 11, not pitching, but at 1st base.  After moving her way up from pitching socks, to pitching a softball with her left hand, Craker was given the opportunity to pitch in a game when she was 12 and remembers distinctly that her first left handed pitch nailed the batter she was throwing to.  She pitched sparingly that year and it wasn't until her freshman year at Mission Hills High School in North San Diego, that she began pitching full time.  She was the starting pitcher on the freshman team that season and worked her way up the ranks before making the varsity team as a senior.  Craker began the season as an afterthought in the circle for the Grizzlies, but after getting a chance and doing well a couple of weeks into the year, she was a mainstay in the Mission Hills rotation.  She pitched her way to 1st Team All-League and 2nd Team All-Conference honors, but still wasn't garnering a ton of interest from college coaches. 

 

Craker played the summer following her senior year with then Lady Saint catcher Rachel Shockley who put the Seward County bug into the lefties ear.  Lady Saints Head Coach Andrea Gustafson watched Craker pitch in a tournament in Las Vegas and talked with the southpaws parents Bennett and Kristen at the event.  It wasn't until a few weeks later at the Sparkler Tournament in Colorado that Gustafson and Craker talked face to face, and Craker did enough on the field to warrant a scholarship offer from Gustafson on the spot, to which Craker verbally committed to, to the joy of Shockley.  When she got home from the trip, Craker had a letter of intent waiting for her and she signed on the dotted line to become a Lady Saint. 

 

Craker pitched in 26 games as a freshman for Seward, going 8-9 with a 4.40 ERA in 90 2/3 innings pitched.  She had her finest outing of her rookie year in the Region VI Championship game, hurling a complete game against #1 ranked Butler, holding the Grizzlies to just 4 hits and 1 run in a tough 1-0 Seward County loss. 

 

She carried the momentum from the final game of her freshman year, right into her sophomore year with the Lady Saints where she had a spectacular season, going 22-6 with a 2.78 ERA in 181 innings pitched while striking out 154 opposing hitters en route to 2nd Team All-Conference and 2nd Team All-Region accolades. 

 

Her 30 career wins for Seward are 6th most in school history and her 224 strikeouts are 4th most.  The 22 wins during her sophomore season rank 7th best in Lady Saints history and her 154 strikeouts as a sophomore are 6th most by a pitcher in a single season.   

 

Craker is continuing to weigh her options for next season with a number of schools in on the recruiting of the lefty.  She expects to make a decision on her future college choice in the next month or so. 

 

Through it all, the nine year old right handed pitcher who was told that she would never play again because of a diagnoses of cancer, battled, against all odds, to become a left handed pitcher who Monday received All-Conference honors and Saturday received her diploma at Seward County Community College.