Dave McCarty

On September 27, 2004, the Boston Red Sox trailed the Tampa Bay Devil Rays 2-0 when Red Sox first baseman Dave McCarty led off the top of the fifth inning with a line-drive single to left-center field. He took second base on a walk and scored on a three-run home run by center fielder Johnny Damon. Boston tacked on two more runs to finish the top half of the fifth inning with a lead of 5-2. The Red Sox added two more runs in the eighth inning on solo home runs by McCarty and catcher Jason Varitek and went on to win the game 7-3, clinching a berth in the postseason for a second straight year.

McCarty arrived in Boston off waivers from the Oakland Athletics in August 2003. The Red Sox were his seventh major-league club since he debuted with the Minnesota Twins a decade earlier. McCarty had earned a reputation as a highly regarded defensive asset at first base and in the outfield and one of the more dependable right-handed pinch-hitters in the American League. He had enjoyed his best season three years before in Kansas City, when he batted .278 with 12 home runs in 270 at-bats. Shortly after his arrival in Boston, McCarty recognized that he had joined a club with a much loftier set of expectations than his previous teams.

“There were a lot of teams I had played on earlier in my career that were kind of rebuilding and you did not have that same mindset of hey, we are working towards a championship. Nobody cared what their individual numbers were but rather, did we win the game? Guys were really pulling for each other. Then in 2004 with the few changes they made, it was the best group of guys I ever played with.”1

The best three years of McCarty’s career were his last three, with the 2003-05 Red Sox, for whom he hit at a .286 pace. When he retired, he went out on top.

David Andrew McCarty was born to Dennis William and Joan Gush McCarty on November 23, 1969, in Harris County, Texas, which includes the city of Houston. Dennis worked as an electrical engineer and though Joan worked several different jobs over the years, she was mainly a stay-at-home mom looking after David and his younger sister.

As a boy, David played multiple sports, including football, but upon reaching Sharpstown High School in 1984, he chose to focus on baseball and basketball. On the diamond he pitched and played first base and the outfield. He batted right-handed and threw left-handed. He grew to become 6-feet-5 and was listed at 210 pounds, finishing his career at 243.2

Asked about his time on the mound at Sharpstown, McCarty recalled, “Like a lot of younger left-handed pitchers, I was kind of wild and did not really have the kind of arm strength I had when I grew into my body when I got older.”3 Wild or not, colleges around the country took notice, some viewing McCarty as a potential dual threat at the plate and on the mound. As he told ESPN in 2004, “Some colleges were recruiting me more to pitch than hit.”4 Under the guidance of longtime coach Dick Janse, Sharpstown was widely regarded as an annual high-school baseball powerhouse in Texas, having captured a state title in 1982 while boasting two future big-league hurlers in Rusty Richards and Greg Swindell.5 Like Richards and Swindell before him, McCarty always imagined he would wind up playing baseball at the University of Texas. But other schools sought him out. “When Stanford jumped in, I (went) out for a visit,” he said.6 Stanford had won back-to-back College World Series during his junior and senior years in high school, which McCarty said made an impression. “And then I got out to the Bay Area and saw the weather and the quality of education. Nobody else could match that, so it really forced me to change my mind.”7 His four years at Sharpstown yielded three first-team all-district and All-Houston selections, two district Player of the Year awards, and a spot on two all-state teams. He graduated from Sharpstown High School in 1988, and in May was named the Outstanding Male Scholar-Athlete at the 12th Annual Greater Houston High School Spring Sports Dinner.8

McCarty excelled at Stanford, starting 166 games at first base from 1989 through 1991, including a streak of 133 straight. During the summer of 1989, he played in Massachusetts with Cotuit of the Cape Cod Baseball League.9 As a sophomore in 1990, he batted .336 with 12 home runs and 69 RBIs and was selected to compete for the United States in the Goodwill Games and the World Championships, where he batted an astounding .445 across both tournaments.10 In 1991 McCarty enjoyed one of the finest seasons in Stanford University history. In 62 games he batted .420 with 24 home runs and 66 RBIs, and nearly half of his 100 hits went for extra bases.11 Across one 26-game stretch he hit .490 with 10 home runs and 32 RBIs. His .420 season batting mark was the second highest in school history. McCarty was rewarded for his effort by being chosen First Team All-American, First Team All-Pac-10, and Pac-10 Southern Division Player of the Year. Baseball America named him Player of the Year and he was viewed as a likely early first-round draft pick.

McCarty graduated from Stanford with an economics degree in 1992 and was inducted into the Stanford University Athletics Hall of Fame in 2008.12

On June 3, 1991, the Minnesota Twins selected McCarty with the third pick in the first round of the amateur draft, making him the second-highest pick in school history. He signed his first professional contract 12 days later and received a reported $390,000 signing bonus.13 McCarty was sent to the Visalia Oaks in the high Class-A California League, where he responded by batting .380 in 15 games with 3 home runs and 8 RBIs. His performance was rewarded with a promotion to the Orlando Sun Rays in the Double-A Southern League. In 28 games in the outfield, he recorded four assists while batting .261 with extra-base power and a knack for getting on base.

McCarty began the 1992 season rated by Baseball America as the number-22 prospect in the game. He opened the season once again in Orlando, and in 129 games he split time between the outfield and first base. He registered a strong offensive showing that included 18 home runs and 79 RBIs, and earned a late-season promotion to Portland in the Triple-A Pacific Coast League. In just seven-regular season games at Portland, he batted .500 with a home run, 8 RBIs, and a 1.286 OPS. In the first three games of the first round of the PCL playoffs against the Vancouver Canadians, he erupted for four home runs and a near .500 batting average.14 Vancouver won the matchup three games to two, but the Twins front office was taking notice of McCarty’s performance.

McCarty entered spring training in 1993 as Baseball America’s 16th rated prospect in the game. As the spring got underway, McCarty swung the bat in a way that suggested the rating might be far too low. On March 19 he had a three-hit day and scored three runs in a 10-6 victory over the Texas Rangers that pushed his preseason average to .345 with a team-best 3 home runs and 11 RBIs.15 In March The Sporting News reported that despite his torrid spring, he held out little expectation of making the big-league roster to begin the season. The Twins had signed future Hall of Famer Dave Winfield the previous December and McCarty acknowledged that. “It hurt (my chances) a lot, but a team can’t pass on a player like Winfield. It would sound ridiculous if I said, ‘Poor me. I’m playing behind Dave Winfield. Yes. Of course, I am.”16 At the end of spring training, McCarty was sent to Minnesota’s minor-league camp for reassignment. He found his way back to Triple-A Portland, where began the season by recording a .398 average and a .637 slugging percentage in 31 games.17

In mid-May Minnesota outfielder Shane Mack went on the disabled list with soreness from a separated shoulder. The Twins purchased outfielder-first baseman McCarty’s contract from Portland and the 23-year-old found himself in the starting lineup on May 17 in Minnesota against the New York Yankees. He wasted little time securing his first big-league hit with a sixth-inning single off starter Jimmy Key; indeed, he hit safely in 18 of his first 20 games.

McCarty hit his first big-league home run on June 2 in Minnesota off Texas Rangers starter Roger Pavlik. But he began to struggle and his average fell to .256 by the end of July. With just 52 games under his belt, he was optioned back to Portland. Recalled August 14, he remained with the Twins for the rest of the season. With few exceptions, including a four-hit, two-double day in a 9-5 win over Texas in early September, McCarty’s difficulties at the plate persisted. Despite a home run in the final game of the season, against the Seattle Mariners, his batting average sat at .214 with just two home runs in 350 at-bats. Noting that there was pressure to produce with power at the plate, McCarty in an interview with the author cited changes to his swing as one of the primary culprits for his struggles. As he recalled, “We started making changes to my swing and it really got kind of screwed up. It got longer, slower, and so it just did not work out at all.”18 Ultimately it contributed to McCarty’s placing additional pressure on himself.

“But then when things did not work out well that first year, I struggled after having been messed around with my swing, it really kind of affected my confidence. And that I think caused me to struggle some. And then in 1994 I just could never seem to get enough at-bats to really get going.”19

Although he was expected to start the 1994 season in Triple A, McCarty broke spring training with the Twins. He started at first base against the California Angels on April 7 and was 2-for-3 with a walk and a stolen base. But as the season progressed, concern grew over McCarty’s lack of production, as well as uncharacteristic miscues in the field. The Sporting News observed that although McCarty “was supposed to be a power threat, (he) had one RBI in his first 37 at-bats this season and 22 RBI in 387 big-league at-bats.”20 After playing in just 44 games through the end of June and batting .260, McCarty was sent to the Salt Lake City Buzz in the Pacific Coast League. His hitting did not improve even at the lower level.21 Reflecting on a difficult 1994 season, McCarty commented to the author, “What comes first, the chicken or the egg? If you are not hitting well enough you are not going to get the at-bats. But if you do not get the at-bats, you are not going to hit well enough. From then on in my career, I had a tough time getting at-bats in the big leagues.”22

McCarty began the 1995 season in Minnesota, at first base, where the recently retired Kent Hrbek’s departure left a big hole to fill.23 As the season got underway, McCarty never seemed to find his groove, and after 25 games at first base and in the outfield, his average sat at .218 with no home runs and only 4 RBIs in 55 at-bats. On June 8 he was traded to the Cincinnati Reds for John Courtright, a pitcher notable for a big-league career that spanned a single inning.

The Reds sent McCarty to Triple-A Indianapolis (American Association). He drove in 32 runs in just 37 games, batting .336 and once again found his slugging power. He was traded again, to the San Francisco Giants as part of an eight-player deal on July 21.

The Giants optioned McCarty to the Phoenix Firebirds in the PCL, and he picked up where he had left off in Indianapolis. In 37 games for the Firebirds, he batted .351 with nearly half of his 53 hits going for extra bases. His performance brought him a call-up to the Giants in September and he delivered a ninth-inning game-winning single against the Montreal Expos in his second game (and first start) as a Giant. In limited playing time in 12 games, McCarty batted .250 with 2 RBIs.

In 1996 McCarty made the Giants out of spring training.24 His first hit came on April 22 in his seventh at-bat of the young season, a three-run home run as a late-inning replacement for Barry Bonds in an 11-8 loss to the Houston Astros. In early June McCarty found his way to the 15-day disabled list after he sprained his right ankle by tripping on his shoes on the way to the bathroom.25 The 1996 season saw McCarty receive more opportunities to pinch-hit than in any other season. And he responded with two home runs and nine RBIs in the role. McCarty recalled, “At that point in my career, I really did not know how to do it. It is one thing to go up there and pinch-hit if you have been rotting on the bench versus getting regular at-bats and on days you are not starting you are the go-to pinch-hitter. It is just a whole different animal.”26 The 1996 Giants finished in fourth place in the National League West Division. McCarty hit 6 home runs in 175 at-bats to go with a .217 batting average.

Despite a strong showing at Giants camp in the spring of 1997, McCarty was reassigned to the minor-league camp. Before the move, he had hit safely in eight of 10 games, going 9-for-16 with 3 doubles, 6 RBIs, and 5 runs scored. He spent all of the 1997 season back at Phoenix, where he put up some of the best offensive totals of his career. McCarty batted .353 and slugged 22 home runs. His 92 RBIs were the eighth-highest in the PCL and his OPS of 1.009 ranked him fifth.

The Seattle Mariners traded for McCarty in late January of 1998. He saw limited action in the majors – four games in late May and four in early June – but spent most of the season with the Tacoma Rainiers, his fourth Coast League team. In 108 games, he batted .317 and got on base at a clip of .411.

After the season McCarty opted for free agency rather than accept a return to Tacoma.27 He signed a minor-league contract with the Detroit Tigers on December 18 that included an invitation to spring training.28 But he spent all of the 1999 season at Toledo in the Triple-A International League. His 31 home runs were a career high and second-best in the league.29 He spent all of 2000 and 2001 in the majors. After the 1999 season, he had signed as a free agent with Oakland. He swung the bat exceptionally well the A’s 2000 spring training, The Sporting News noting that McCarty “has made superb plays in the field, has a strong throwing arm, and bashed two homers in one inning of a game.”30 But near the end of spring training, Oakland sold his contract to the Kansas City Royals.31

McCarty found a good match in Kansas City and played in 103 games for the Royals in 2000. He batted .278 with 12 home runs in 270 at-bats. He had four hits in a 13-11 win over Boston on June 1, and his sixth-inning grand slam off Cleveland starter Chuck Finley contributed to a 10-5 win for the Royals on July 19. On August 16, he snapped a 15-at-bat hitless streak by driving in three runs on three hits in a 9-3 win over Minnesota and followed that up with a two-run double and a run the following day. Of his arrival in Kansas City, McCarty said, “Oh yeah. I got a chance to play and then, all the sudden, I put up good numbers. I led the American League in pinch-hitting and just really blossomed, I thought. Once I got to Kansas City, I really knew what I needed to do, and I was also getting the at-bats I needed to stay fresh.”32 In 23 pinch-hit at-bats in 2000, McCarty had nine hits for a .391 average with a home run and 9 RBIs.

In 2001 McCarty played in 98 games, 68 of them at first base. He got two hits on Opening Day against the New York Yankees. But his average hovered in the low .200s for much of the season, resulting in fewer and fewer at-bats. He recovered slightly in August and September to finish at .250 for the season with 7 home runs.

McCarty was in the starting lineup on April 3, 2002, and doubled in three at-bats in a 1-0 Royals loss to the Minnesota Twins. But he managed only two more hits in his next 29 at-bats, and with a batting average sitting at .094, he was released by Kansas City on May 15. Six days later he signed as a free agent with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. He split the remainder of the season at Triple-A Durham, where he batted .325 in 29 games, and with the Devil Rays, batting just .176 in 12 games. After suffering a knee injury, he had surgery and spent the rest of the year rehabbing it at home.33 On August 7, 2002, he was released by Tampa Bay and on November 27 he again signed with the Athletics.

Despite a strong spring camp. McCarty spent most of the 2003 season with Triple-A Sacramento. In 91 games he batted .270 with 15 home and 72 RBIs. He was called up on July 7 to fill a roster spot created when Jermaine Dye went on the disabled list.34 Splitting time between the outfield and first base, he batted .269 in eight games.

On August 4, 2003, the Red Sox selected McCarty off waivers from Oakland. Boston needed a right-handed bat off the bench, but as The Sporting News noted, “What the team likes about him most is his glove at first base.”35 He played in 18 games between August 5 and September 28, going 11-for-27. The Red Sox were in a pennant race that went down to Game Seven of the American League Championship Series. McCarty played in only 16 games, but his .407 batting average made a sufficiently good impression that he was kept on the postseason roster. He got into just two games and struck out in his one plate appearance, against the Yankees in the ALCS. And the Red Sox signed him again for 2004.36

Expectations were exceptionally high for the Red Sox in 2004. They had acquired starting pitcher Curt Schilling in a trade with the Arizona Diamondbacks in November, and signed free agent closer Keith Foulke in January. On December 4, former Philadelphia manager Terry Francona was hired to replace Grady Little as Boston’s manager. Players arrived for spring training in high spirits, ready for another run at the Yankees.

McCarty had a strong spring at the plate in 2004. He homered and drove in two runs against Baltimore on March 21 in Fort Lauderdale, and hit a three-run home run against the Yankees in Tampa three days later.37

First baseman-outfielder Dave McCarty – who played 11 seasons in the major leagues – pitched in three games, all during the 2004 season. He pitched in the home opener at Fenway Park and the final game of the regular season, as well as an inning on June 12. They were the only three pitching appearances of his big-league career, but he acquitted himself well and can look back on a 2.45 career earned-run average.38

McCarty connected for his first hit of the 2004 season on April 19, an eighth-inning double that put him in position to score the go-ahead run in a 5-4 win over the Yankees.

The 2004 team was full of team players. McCarty played in 89 games, 10th on the team in games played. He played first base: 67 games (20 of them complete games), left field in 10, and right field, in 7, and was the designated hitter in 3. McCarty was a very solid first baseman: His career fielding percentage in 368 major-league games stands at .990.

McCarty was a reserve as the postseason began but didn’t get into any games. The team went with Bill Mueller and Kevin Youkilis at first base.

In January 2005, the Red Sox re-signed McCarty as a free agent. He opened the season with Boston and appeared in 13 games as a late-inning defensive replacement, mostly at first base, but Kevin Millar had a hold on the starting slot there and – with a .500 batting average (two singles in four at-bats, with two RBIs) – he was released on May 2, “granted free agency” in baseball parlance.

At this point, the 35-year-old McCarty chose to retire. He told an interviewer in 2013 that the Red Sox had actually had a deal in place to trade him to the Baltimore Orioles, but the Orioles had averaged more than 30 games out of first place for the four preceding years and the prospect didn’t appeal to him. He said to himself, “I’ve been on enough bad teams, I can’t go back to that. I’d rather go out on top, I’m done. Boston was a special place to play. And it was a special group of guys, too. … That’s why I retired when I did.”39

McCarty worked as a part-time baseball analyst on the New England Sports Network (NESN) from 2006 to 2008. He became a principal with Lee & Associates of Oakland, buying, leasing, and selling office, industrial, and investment properties in the East Bay. McCarty and his wife, Monica, lived in Piedmont, California, with their two children. Monica was very successful in her own career, described by her husband as “a successful Scottish historical romance novelist [who has] hit both the New York Times and USA Today best-seller lists.”40

Dave and Monica later moved to Oakland, “having downsized after our now adult kids flew the coop.”41

“My main hobbies,” he said, “my wife and I like to travel, we golf quite a bit, we like hiking and swimming, just trying to live a healthy lifestyle. Trying to evade the inevitable decline.”42

McCarty said he kept in touch with some of his 2004 teammates and valued the chemistry that team had. When they held a 10-year reunion in 2014, “There were some of those guys I literally had not seen in 10 years. Because they went off to a different team after 2004 or whatever, and then here we are seeing each other 10 years later, and the whole group, it is like, it could have been two days. We did not skip a beat. We still had that connection together.”43

He added, “My wife always says, and it is true, really winning that World Series made all the kind of journeyman, up and down and getting traded and released all over the place, it made the whole baseball experience really worth it.”44

Just days after attending the 20th anniversary reunion of the team at Fenway Park, McCarty died at the age of 54 on April 19, 2024, in Oakland. The Red Sox announced that his death was caused by a “cardiac event.”

Notes

1 Interview with the author September 29. 2023. Hereafter, “McCarty interview.”

2 Email from David McCarty, December 5, 2023.

3 McCarty interview.

4 https://www.espn.com/mlb/spring2004/columns/story?columnist=stark_jayson&id=1754705.

5 https://www.uiltexas.org/baseball/all-tournament-team/1981-1982-5a-baseball-state-results; https://www.chron.com/sports/highschool/article/Dick-Janse-former-Sharpstown-coach-passes-at-81-12230848.php.

6 McCarty interview.

7 McCarty interview.

8 https://www.chron.com/sports/article/Local-players-among-list-of-top-scholar-athletes-1653847.php.

9 Jack Thomas, “A ‘Touching’ look at Cape League,” Boston Globe, July 19, 2004: B1.

10 United Press International, “Stanford’s McCarty Named Top Baseball Player,” Cape Girardeau (Missouri) Southwest Missourian, May 3,1990: 3B. https://books.google.com/books?id=0sQfAAAAIBAJ&pg=PA7&dq=McCarty+Stanford+baseball+1990&article_id=5271,3990483&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi69JvfyvSCAxURD1kFHU2sAWcQ6AF6BAgFEAI#v=onepage&q=McCarty%20Stanford%20baseball%201990&f=false.

11 https://www.thebaseballcube.com/content/player/727/.

12 McCarty left an indelible mark on the Stanford University record books. His 24 home runs in 1991 remain the second-highest single season total while his career average of .359 is still the second highest in program history. He ended his career sixth all-time in doubles (44) and seventh with 155 RBIs. https://gostanford.com/honors/stanford-athletics-hall-of-fame/david-mccarty/38.

13 https://www.baseball-almanac.com/players/trades.php?p=mccarda01. Kevin Murphy was the scout credited with his signing. In a 2023 email, McCarty said the bonus was just a bit higher, $395,000.

14 Jeff Lenihan, “Minnesota Twins,” The Sporting News, September 21, 1993: 34.

15 Associated Press, “McCarty Has Big Game for Twins,” Salina (Kansas) Journal, March 20, 1993: 20.

16 Jeff Lenihan, “Trombley Wonders Why He Isn’t Starting,” The Sporting News, April 5, 1993: S-30.

17 Associated Press, “Major Step Forward for McCarthy [sic],” Galveston (Texas) Daily News, June 12, 1993: 19.

18 McCarty interview.

19 McCarty interview.

20 Twins manager Tom Kelly suggested McCarty’s inconsistency on defense was somehow related to his lack of production at the plate. But McCarty disagreed, telling The Sporting News, “I don’t think one was related to the other, but the fielding surprised me. I’ve always taken that for granted. I don’t know what happened.” Jim Souhan, “Minnesota Twins,” The Sporting News, July 11, 1994: 36.

21 In 55 games for the Buzz, he hit .253 with 3 home runs in 228 plate appearances.

22 McCarty interview.

23 McCarty told the Associated Press that Hrbek was “such a mainstay in the clubhouse,” and credited him for his ability to “keep the mood very light and make it a lot of fun for everybody else.” Associated Press, ‘Twins Trying to Replace First Baseman Hrbek,” Greenwood (South Carolina) Index-Journal, April 17, 1995: 7.

24 “McGwire Sure Isn’t Hurting for Power,” San Francisco Examiner, printed in the Santa Cruz (California) Sentinel, March 31, 1996: 19.

25 Sacramento Bee, “Giants Rained Out; Suffer Injury,” Santa Cruz Sentinel, June 7, 1996: 13.

26 McCarty interview.

27 Jim Street, “Seattle,” The Sporting News, October 12, 1998: 76.

28 “Transactions,” Indiana (Pennsylvania) Gazette, December 19, 1998: 17.

29 It was increasingly clear that the now 29-year-old McCarty could more than handle the pitching in the highest of minor leagues. He also found other ways to contribute at Toledo, including two innings in two games on the mound. He spent significant time during the season at first base and at all three outfield positions.

30 Susan Slusser, “Oakland,” The Sporting News, May 13, 2000: 54.

31 The Royals needed a viable defensive upgrade at first base over Matt Sweeney, who had struggled to make even the routine plays in camp. Steve Rock, “Kansas City,” The Sporting News, April 3, 2000: 39. Sweeney came through in the regular season, playing in 159 games and driving in 144 runs, with a .991 fielding percentage.

32 McCarty interview.

33 McCarty interview.

34 “Transactions,” Salina Journal, July 9, 2003: 26.

35 “Boston Red Sox,” The Sporting News, August 18, 2003: 36.

36 McCarty’s lone opportunity in the Series was as a pinch-hitter in the eighth inning of Game One, but in response to a pitching change he was removed for a different hitter before making an actual plate appearance. Boston advanced to the American League Championship Series against the New York Yankees, losing in seven games. McCarty had one at-bat, striking out in a pinch-hit appearance in the eighth inning of a 6-2 loss in Game Two.

37 “Linescores,” Greenwood Index-Journal, March 22, 2004: 12; Associated Press, “A-Rod Hurt Against Boston,” Ukiah (California) Daily Journal, March 25, 2004: 7.

38 For an article detailing McCarty’s pitching, see Bill Nowlin, “First Baseman Dave Mccarty Pitches Three Times During the Magical 2004 Red Sox Season,” SABR Games Project. In his September 2023 interview, McCarty said he had “kind of messed around with [pitching] for years” and had thrown a bullpen for the Red Sox coaching staff in 2003 and was invited to work out with pitchers and catchers in 2004 spring training. In early 2004, there had been word that “the Red Sox have backed off McCarty’s pitching experiment but [his agent, and former ballplayer Joe Sambito was] “hoping the team would continue to allow McCarty to pitch.” Nick Cafardo, Exercising Caution on Nixon,” Boston Globe, March 18, 2004: C2. After McCarty’s Opening Day outing, catcher Kevin Cash said, “He had some good stuff, first-pitch slider and a couple of sinkers. He knows what he’s doing up there.” Joe Burris, “Blue Jays Come Out Swinging,” Boston Globe, April 10, 2004: F5. Cafardo said that Sambito was said to have been McCarty’s boyhood hero, now his agent. He devoted a full column to McCarty’s mound debut. “McCarty Isn’t King of the Hill,” Boston Globe, April 10, 2004: F8.

39 Regarding the Red Sox teams he’d been on, he said, “There wasn’t any of that selfishness that you see on every team, where some guys are just worried about their stats, and putting up their numbers. It was completely different. Guys were, from 1 to 25, everybody was pulling to win. It didn’t matter if I was 0 for 4, but we won. Everybody was happy. Nobody was skulking around.” Interview with Allan Wood on April 29, 2013.

40 Todd Civin, “Through the Eyes of … David McCarty, World Champion Human Being,” Bleacher Report, March 31, 2009. https://bleacherreport.com/articles/147987-through-the-eyes-ofdavid-mccarty-world-champion-human-being. Monica McCarty has a website available at https://www.monicamccarty.com/index.php.

41 McCarty email, December 5, 2021.

42 He added: “One thing they never tell you about playing professional sports is that the bill comes due. You beat the crap put of your body for all those years. From the time I was 50, I could not run because my left knee was so shot. I finally got a partial replacement when I was 51 and I wish I had done it sooner. That is pretty young to be having that done. And even now, my back hurts, my neck hurts, my right hip is starting to hurt. My right knee is OK, but eventually that will go. That is the bill.”

43 McCarty interview.

44 McCarty interview.