Clayton Isherwood is travelling all over the world to play baseball, is on the junior national team and has pitched two innings against the Toronto Blue Jays and he’s only 16 years old.
Isherwood, a grade 11 student at Brooks Secondary School, lives on Texada Island but plays ball with the British Columbia Premier Baseball League team the Parksville Royals, the highest level Isherwood can play at at his age. Since October 2010, Isherwood has also been playing for the Canadian Junior National Team and the southpaw pitcher with a deadly fastball hopes that it’s just the beginning.
To get picked for the national team Isherwood played at a provincial team tournament in Saskatchewan, where the coach for Team Canada is known to watch and select players to try out. Since then Isherwood has travelled to Florida three times with the team to take part in training camps and play in exhibition games. This summer he will head to the Dominican Republic, Cuba and North Carolina to play ball and eventually hopes to head to South Korea for the World Junior Baseball Championships in 2012.
Exhibition games for the team typically sees them squaring off against professional and national teams, often against MLB (major league baseball) players. The team played the Toronto Blue Jays in an exhibition game, the first time ever that such a game has happened. They took the mound against the real deal team and Isherwood threw two innings, giving up three runs. The boys lost by a good margin but Isherwood said the thrill of playing against the team he grew up watching made it all worthwhile.
“It was a pretty cool experience,” said Isherwood. “It gave me a perspective on what it takes to be there, how much work it takes. A lot of dedication, hard work, got to give up a lot of stuff to spend hours and hours practicing.”
Isherwood said he learned everything he knows about baseball from his father, Terry. While raising his son, Terry, a baseball player himself and president of the Powell River league, taught him the game and threw ball with him.
“As soon as he could pick up a ball he was throwing it,” said Isherwood’s mother, Jenny. “Clayton was always at the ball park. He grew up knowing baseball and loving baseball so he never stopped playing.”
Jenny said it’s a challenge for Isherwood to live on Texada and travel to Vancouver Island every weekend, even further for the national events, but that it’s worth it to him. Free time is at a minimum. He misses weekday practices in Parksville but still has a training regimen and pitching practice with his dad and tires in the backyard.
Next for Isherwood is ideally a scholarship to a university or college to play ball and get an education at the same time, something his mother said she’s more concerned about than he is at this point. Isherwood has already been approached by schools in Houston, Washington State and Boston to talk about coming to play for them. Beyond that Isherwood has dreams of being drafted and playing professional baseball.
