San Diego Player of the Week : Injury Slowed Evenson, but It Couldn’t Stop Him

Getting hit in the face by a pitch can do more than ruin a baseball player’s day. Sometimes a season or a career is lost. Sometimes worse.

In that sense, Pat Evenson was lucky.

Evenson, Point Loma High School’s catcher, missed only a week of baseball after he was hit by a fastball during the third week of the season.

Not only is it remarkable that Evenson has returned so quickly to the lineup, but he is hitting .491 for the season. He wears a plastic face protector that flips down over his helmet like a welder’s mask.

On Friday, Evenson, The Times’ Player of the Week, went 4 for 5 and drove in three runs in a 15-8 victory at Serra. Wednesday, he went 1 for 3 with two RBIs in an 11-1 victory over Morse. Last Wednesday, he drove in a run in a 5-2 victory at Patrick Henry.

With two games remaining, Point Loma (6-2 in league, 17-5 overall) leads the City Eastern League.

And Evenson thought his season was over after he was hit by Bonita Vista’s David Woodhouse. Scouts flock to see Woodhouse, whose fastball travels about 85 m.p.h.

Said Evenson: “The pitch glanced off my left eye, right around the eye socket in the bone area. The skin area was torn open and it required about 25 stitches. Doctors at Alvarado Hospital said it’s an injury common to boxers. For a whole week, I couldn’t open the eye, the whole area around it completely swelled.”

Doctors said there was no permanent damage and that the swelling would go down. Evenson was understandably concerned.

“As soon as it happened, I was wondering if I’d ever see the ball again,” said Evenson, a 5-foot 11-inch senior.

Coincidentally, Evenson was watching when Houston’s Dickie Thon was struck by a pitch thrown by New York’s Mike Torrez in 1984. Thon, who was hit in the same area as Evenson, missed the entire season with an inferior orbital rim fracture in his left temple.

Evenson does not think about that happening again. He has the face protector, which he says does more than just protect his face.

“With the protector,” Evenson said, “I concentrate more at the plate.”

In his first at-bat after returning to the lineup, Evenson hit a two-run triple. He went 9 for 12 and has been hot ever since.

Now that he knows his injury will not impair his future in baseball, he is hoping to attend a “prominent baseball school.” He has been accepted by the University of Arizona, but has yet to talk to Jerry Kendall, the baseball coach. Evenson’s immediate goal is to beat teammate J.J. Northam in their individual hitting dual.

Northam extended his lead in hits when Evenson was injured, but Evenson now trails by only two hits, 30-28.

“We kid each other and say ‘I have more hits than you’ a lot,” Evenson said. “It’s done for fun, though. It gives both of us an incentive.”