Atlanta Braves: Powerful Story of “El Oso Blanco” Evan Gattis
The former Atlanta Braves slugger has announced that he is done with baseball. We take a look back at his run with the Braves.
Former Atlanta Braves and Houston Astros slugger Evan Gattis has officially announced his career as a Major League Baseball player is finished.
Some using this as an opportunity to joke about being unable to hit anymore without the sound of a banging trash can, but that’s not happening here.
Today we will remember the legendary road he took to get to the majors. We will reflect and respect the battles he has fought and won.
The only mention of banging will come along with the thunderous echo that reverberated throughout the stadium when El Oso Blanco struck.
The road to Evan Gattis’ 2013 debut with the Atlanta Braves is just the beginning of the legend of El Oso Blanco.
In 2004, Gattis found himself consistently playing on high school traveling teams with other future major leaguers. Some of the players he shared dugouts with in high school included Clayton Kershaw, Austin Jackson, Homer Bailey, Billy Butler, and his future teammate on the 2013 Braves, Justin Upton.
Gattis was projected to go in the first eight rounds of the 2004 MLB draft, but he made it clear that he planned on going to college. He received a scholarship to Texas A&M and then ended up in rehab.
Gattis began abusing alcohol and marijuana during his senior year of high school and was still struggling with the divorce of his parents from when he was eight.
His mental health and substance abuse issues drove him into rehab across the country and away from the game of baseball altogether.
Baseball began as an outlet, an escape from the hardships of reality. Only, the better he got, the more the pressure mounted. His escape from anxiety became one of the primary sources of it.
Gattis told USA Today in a 2013 interview,
“I was terrified,” Gattis softly says, “of being a failure.”
His father, Jo Gattis, told ABC13 in Houston that his son had completely forsaken the game.
“He looked me in the eye and he said ‘I don’t want to talk baseball anymore, I’m done,'”
Through the Valley
Over the next four years, Gattis stayed away from baseball. We all remember the stories about him going from being a janitor to crushing homers for the Braves in 2013, but his resume boasts so much more than janitorial services.
Below is a list of some of the professions he tried his hand in before finding his way back to baseball.
- Car Valet
- Ski Lift Operator, Eldorado Mountain Resort
- Pizza Cook, Nick-N-Willy’s, Boulder, CO
- Housekeeper, Abominable Snowmansion – This one’s funny because he looks like he could be the mascot without even dressing up in costume.
- Machinery Operator in Garland, Texas
- Golf Cart Attendant
- Custodial Arts at Jan-Pro Cleaning in Plano, Texas
The job as a janitor is commemorated by Gattis himself on his twitter profile.
He was aimless, career-less, homeless, and still unhappy. He was broke and begging for food. In 2007 he hadn’t slept for about a week and was admitted to a mental hospital.
“I wanted to kill myself for a long time.”
He was officially diagnosed with clinical depression and anxiety. He drove to California in search of spiritual enlightenment. He discusses his journey in depth with David O’Brien in his podcast 755 is Real (Explicit Language). Whatever it was he was looking for, he must have found.
He called his dad and surprised him with two messages. One, he was in San Francisco…He was hard to keep track of back then. Two, he’s coming home.
Gattis goes into more detail with O’Brien, discussing details such as when he paid a homeless guy with a six-pack of beer to help him push-start his truck.
Gattis stopped at a Golden Corrall and called his stepbrother Drew Kendrick, who was pitching at UT-Permian Basin, a D-II college team, and told him he was ready to play baseball again. Luckily the coach recalled Gattis’ high school days and said there was a place for him on the team.
The slugger showed up after four years out of the game. He discussed in the podcast how out of shape he was when he returned. He was “dead” after running on the first day of practice and even considered quitting again.
Not only was he out of shape, but he told O’Brien that the first time he caught after his four-year absence that he was completely lost.
So let me recap, he was so out of shape he felt like he was going to die and wanted to quit. His first time catching he felt completely lost. He had essentially been a vagabond for four years…and he stepped back on the diamond that season and hit .403 with 11 homers.
So, when are they making the movie? Please discuss in the comments who should play Evan Gattis.
The Braves remembered his pedigree coming out of high school and liked what he did in college four years later. Atlanta drafted Evan Gattis in the 23rd round of the 2010 draft.
It’s a different sound off his bat
Evan Gattis began his professional baseball career in Danville playing Rookie-Ball. He received a $1,000 signing bonus, which doesn’t seem like much relatively speaking, but do you know how many homeless guys he could hire to help him push-start his truck now?
Gattis struggled in his first shot at pro-ball. He managed to put up pretty good statistics but he only slugged .387.
In 2011 at the age of 24, Gattis evidently adjusted to professional pitching. He hit .322 with 22 homers and 24 doubles in just 88 games. He slugged .601 in Rome that season. To say the least, some important ears heard the sound off of his bat in Rome.
The next season, he worked his way up to AA-Mississippi where he continued to destroy the baseball. In 49 games in Double-A, Gattis mashed 13 doubles and nine homers in just 182 at-bats. He finished with a .522 slugging percentage.
Next stop: Venezuelan Fall League. There, Gattis hit 15 homers in just 195 at-bats and again flirted with a .600 slugging percentage.
Keep in mind, only 10.5% of division-one seniors go on to play professional baseball. It’s really hard… or it’s supposed to be.
El Oso Blanco
While in Venezuela, Gattis’ teammates gave him the nickname of El Oso Blanco, Spanish for “the White Bear.” He would be anointed with the nickname just in time. Despite getting a late start to his minor-league career, he would get an opportunity to hit the fast-forward button the following spring.
The Power of the White Bear
Gattis came into spring camp without ever having played higher than Double-A. That didn’t stop the Braves from putting him on the Opening Day Roster.
You have to do this several times throughout his story, but let’s recap.
Evan Gattis, the custodial artist, the ski-lift operator, the mental-health warrior, the hobo, the inspiration, had made the Opening Day roster. He and veteran Gerald Laird would take over catching duties while Brian McCann recovered from off-season shoulder surgery.
Gattis made his major-league debut on April 3 and in his second at-bat of the game against the legendary Roy Halladay, the magic continued.
Now that you’ve watched it once, make a note that his father was being interviewed during the at-bat. It’s always cool to see them interview the parents when the player gets their first hit. It’s easy to stay focused on the game rather than let your mind wander off into everything that moment means to those involved. The commitment from both the player and the parents from little league, high school, and travel ball.
Knowing the journey this family had been on the past several years makes this moment mean even more, in retrospect.
At this point, we all know the rest of the story. Gattis would go on to smash homers with the Braves. His bat was so valuable that upon McCann’s return they put his 280-pound butt in left field and even tried him at first a few times.
I can’t speak for you all, but I recall being pleased to see him lumbering along out in the left. I wanted that bat in the lineup any time I tuned in, and I tuned in almost every game in 2013.
I’m happy he won a championship and I’m unhappy he won it with another team. I’m happy we got Mike Foltynewicz by trading him, but it took me a while to accept that the White Bear was gone.
Please enjoy a couple of prodigious power shots before we wrap this up.
One of the longest homers in Philadelphia ever hit. Also, it hit a Phillies fan.
Next. Revisiting the Adam Wainwright Trade. dark
We wish the best of luck to Evan Gattis in his next adventure. May it be as legendary as this one. Thanks for all of the homers!