All it took was one pitch. One pitch to end Kide Adetuyi’s freshman baseball season at Florida Atlantic University. 

On Adetuyi’s first live ball in the fall of 2023, he threw a curveball and heard a pop. The pop was his ulnar collateral ligament (UCL) tearing. The UCL is located on the inner side of the elbow and helps to stabilize the elbow joint, especially during a throw.

“When I first found out, I was obviously super sad,” Adetuyi said. “Me as a freshman last year just getting there, trying to prove my spot. Then it just happened…it was sad for me, it was super unexpected.” 

Adetuyi had to undergo Tommy John surgery to reconstruct the UCL. According to Major League Baseball (MLB), the surgery is a procedure where surgeons replace the UCL with a patient’s tendon from another part of their body or from a cadaver. A cadaver is a corpse used for medical practice. 

Adetuyi said that an athlete can take 12-14 months to recover from Tommy John surgery and potentially over a year until they can play competitive sports again.

Fellow pitcher Bryan Boully also suffered the same fate in the spring of 2024 shortly after. It was a midweek game against University of Central Florida  and, instead of a pop, Boully had gradually worn down the UCL over time until he felt a sharp pain in his elbow and knew he knew he couldn’t pitch.

Assistant athletic trainer Brandon Barnard said that getting an athlete seen by a doctor is the first step. FAU has a team of doctors that they work with to treat their athletes including Medical Director Dr. Alex Mafdali and Orthopaedic Surgeon James Ross.

After meeting with them, getting the imaging, and then the surgery, Barnard starts to “tackle the rehab.”

“Brandon [Barnard] came over, our athletic trainer put his arm on my shoulder and was like, ‘Hey man, you need surgery,’” Boully said. “I shed a few tears that night; it was a little emotional.”

For most fans, this would be the last time they think or see the injured athlete until they return to play. However, what fans don’t see is the behind-the-scenes of rehabilitation. These athletes have to undergo a repetitive, distressing process to recover from a surgery, facing new challenges and changes in their day-to-day life.

“I’m like ‘Lets start working now,’” Barnard said. “‘It’s gonna be a lot of work and we’re going to have to put the work in, but if you want to come back and do this, it’s gonna take the work.’” 

Florida Atlantic has different athletic trainers assigned to specific tasks. For example, Barnard is the only baseball athletic trainer and is the insurance coordinator. Barnard explains that most sports at FAU only have one athletic trainer besides football, which has three. 

After the Tommy John surgery, athletes wear a cast on their arm for a week or two. Then they would wear a brace for a little over a month. Adetuyi and Boully explain that because of this, they only moved their fingers during physical rehab. Gradually, as the cast is taken off and they gain more mobility, they start to work towards more strenuous actions. 

These actions included putting their hand or arm in a bucket of rice and moving it to build up forearm strength, or lifting up dumbbells with one hand while lying on your side. Adetuyi and Boully said their ultimate goal is to build up the muscles around their UCL to alleviate the pressure on it while pitching. 

“It’s a lot of basic exercises and I try not to do the same things every day because that gets boring,” Barnard said. “You’re already asking them to come in here and commit hours of their time each week to come in here and get better, which is important and they get that. But I try to mix it up.”

For the first couple of months after the surgery, Adetuyi and Boully struggled with everyday life. Doing basic necessities such as showering and school work became a challenge for them and they had to learn to adapt. 

“I was having to go meet with teachers and professors and take exams in person, answering face to face with them being able to write,” Boully said. “Then especially normal things that you don’t think about like showering and whatnot. Definitely required a lot of help from friends and family.”

Aside from the physical challenges, these injured athletes struggled mentally with the absence of sports. 

“It was the first time I had to step back and not play the game that I love and it was tough, honestly,” Adetuyi said. “You see your friends out there, your brothers, they’re playing, having the time of their life and you have to sit back.”

Boully agrees that it’s tough to see everyone else play the sport that they love without them, “but it makes it that much more exciting to come back.”

The relationships between the athletes and their trainers are a vital part of the recovery process. Barnard explained that being close with the athletes is important, but you have to keep the relationship professional. 

“I think that’s kind of a dynamic athletic trainers get kind of good at building,” Barnard said. “These guys feel very comfortable coming in and telling me everything, but they also don’t come in and walk all over me.”

With all of the mental and physical struggles occurring within an athlete, sometimes those emotions pour out during a rehab session. Barnard needs that close relationship with the athletes to help them recover not only physically but also emotionally.

“I’ll pull them aside occasionally and have a conversation with them,” Barnard said. “There’s times where we’ll definitely involve on campus health with, like, counseling and psychs. We’ll involve them if needed. That being said though…I always try to tell them ‘Look, this is tough, but we’re going to get back. Thousands of athletes a year have this and they get back from it…you’re going to get back.’”

Although the experience has been hard, Adetuyi and Boully ultimately appreciate the experience they have gone through. They feel like it was a “blessing in disguise” and that they have come out of this better. 

“We’ve had a year to get mentally straight. We’ve had a year to get stronger,” Adetuyi said. “Our arms, everything around it, it’s a lot stronger right now, so I think when we do get back on the mound, we are in a way better spot than we were before.” 

Barnard acknowledges that there is a “mindset” that pitchers come back throwing better after a UCL recovery. With a year of rest, re-learning the basics, getting stronger and revamping the mechanics,  Barnard said, “it kind of makes sense that you would come back throwing better because you’ve taken so much time and putting work into your body to get back optimal.”

With all of the time and effort put into the rehab process, Barnard can’t wait to see Adetuyi and Boully come back next season. Seeing the athletes recover and bounce back from an injury is the best part of the job for Barnard. 

“When Kide throws his first pitch, when Bryan throws his first pitch, that’s when I’m going to be the most pumped guy in the dugout,” Barnard said. “Just seeing guys get back…that’s the best part, man, seeing guys come back from the lowest moment in their athletic career to getting back to it and proving to themselves that they could get back.”

Adetuyi looks to be ready for opening day this upcoming baseball season while Boully will be back a few weeks into the season. Their first game is set for Feb. 14 at 6:30 p.m. against the University of Delaware in front of the Owls home crowd. 

Morgan Larkins is a Staff Writer for the University Press. Email him at [email protected] or DM him on Instagram or Twitter @mj_larkins for more information regarding this or other stories.