With many setbacks through injuries, Senior Garret Gillum has persevered, coming back stronger and faster, ready to play, showing the many younger generations what a great player with great dedication looks like.
Playing baseball since age five, Gillum has come a long way playing the sport he loves, moving to the next level with great hard work and dedication. “I always played many sports growing up, but I was always the best at baseball. I liked the team aspect of it all. It’s what made me stick with the sport,” said Gillum. Not only has he played baseball at UC High, but he played on the Boy’s Basketball Team during his sophomore year. “I did play basketball here at UC, but I joined the team just for the one year of fun,” said Gillum.
He has played on the Varsity Team for all four years of his UC High career. In those four years, he has significantly improved his skills. “He’s improved tremendously from his freshman year to his senior year. He’s gotten stronger and is throwing harder; the speed of the game picks up, and he has kept up with that, working hard outside of our practices and games on his own time,” said Head Varsity Coach Richard Frink.
Coming into his last year at the high school level, Gillum had a setback injury in his junior year season, tearing his labrum. According to the University of Michigan Health, a shoulder labrum tear, also known as a SLAP (superior labral tear from anterior to posterior) tear, is an injury in the ring of cartilage inside the shoulder joint (uofmhealth.org). Depending on the degree of intensity of the injury, there can be cases in which a person can fix the tear through lots of physical activity working out the shoulder. In Gillum’s case, he pushed himself to overcome this injury and worked harder to achieve his goal of becoming a healthy player once more.
Frink said, “He had a setback last year where he had an injury, and the way he rebounded to where he is at is phenomenal, and that is attributed to the work he puts in and how much he cares about the game and how much he wants to help us as a team.”
Becoming team captain two years in a row has shown how much the other players value Gillum’s great qualities as an upperclassman. “Typically, our team captains are chosen by our players. Guys will tend to follow him because he is an upperclassman who does the right things and asks the right questions. He leads by example through not screwing around and focusing on our end goal. It is very natural for someone to follow him and his actions,” said Frink.
Gillum said, “Leading by example is my big thing. If they need to do something different, you tell them so that they can fix it, because I feel like accountability is also a big thing, especially in high school when you are old enough not to be a baby and can perform at a higher level.”
Not only has he gained many achievements in sports, but Gillum also does very well in his academics and school life, making sure to perform as strongly as he can and have time outside of school to have fun with his friends while maintaining a stellar GPA. “I don’t even need to speak on behalf of his academics. He does a great job in school as well. I’m very proud of him for that,” said Frink. “I get stuff done. I go to practice and do my homework to do other things. I’m not a big procrastinator,” said Gillum.
Playing baseball is a very mental sport. You have to have a great mentality when competing. Even though excellent team morale is needed, one overcomes many obstacles as an individual player. “I’m pretty good mentally at making the adjustments I need in order to improve,” said Gillum.
Wearing his favorite numbers, 5 and 8, Gillum shows his skills no matter what number he wears on his back, playing to the best of his abilities.