Tom Glavine – Life of Dad Champion

Tommy Riles
September 14, 2012

Tommy Riles

Lives in: Los Angeles
Occupation: Comedian & Audience Warm-up, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, Life of Dad Founder
Twitter: @tommyriles
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Tom Glavine was a Major League Baseball pitcher who played for the Atlanta Braves and the New York Mets.  In 1995 as a member of the Atlanta Braves, he helped the team win the World Series and was named the World Series MVP.  Glavine is part of a very elite group of pitchers to win 300 games over his career.  Glavine spoke to Life of Dad about baseball, fatherhood, retirement,  CURE Childhood Cancer, and much more.  Listen to Tom Glavine’s entire interview on ‘The Life of Dad Show’ podcast.

You won a World Series title in 1995, two Cy Young awards, and also over 300 games as a pitcher.  Is there one moment that stands out in your great career?

300 wins is probably the most significant simply because of what it represents.  It is one of the milestones in baseball… 300 wins, 3,000 hits, and for the longest time 500 home runs, which unfortunately is a little bit less attractive nowadays.  There are certain numbers out there that are associated with every sport and baseball is no different.  There is kind of that ‘Wow you have done this. You are in some really, really elite company in terms of the history of the game.’

So yes, from a career standpoint, it is hard to get much better than being in that 300 win club.  It is a very small group.  I think that there are 24 guys now and you think of how many guys have put on a baseball uniform, how many guys have pitched.  It is a very small club in terms of the percentage of guys that have pitched in major league baseball.  It represents a body of work that I am extremely proud of.

On that same note, it is a little bit different since 300 wins is an individual accomplishment.  Not to say that I did not have a lot of help along the way to get there.  I played on a lot of great teams that gave me a better opportunity to achieve 300 wins.  However, it is more of an individual honor whereas something like winning the World Series… it is hard to top that one moment in my career.

You set out every year as a team and that is your goal. There is something to be said for being able to achieve a goal with a group of people working together, and the satisfaction that goes along that achievement.  I don’t know what I would equate it to in the everyday world, but certainly in the terms of the sports world and in baseball in particular that clubhouse is somewhat of a fraternity.  We live and die with each other.  It is not like you have 25 guys that are best friends, but you have 25 guys that once we cross those white lines we always had each other’s back.

We always knew that we all had our own responsibilities to uphold in order to keep moving in the right direction and achieving goals.  For us, the Atlanta Braves, to have been close in ’91 and ’92 and ’93 and not been able to do it and then to finally win the World Series in ’95, there was a tremendous amount of joy that came with winning.  For the most part we had a lot of the same guys that were together during the three years that we lost.  We started out together in February, going through the mundane part of spring training.  We went through the bumps and bruises of the regular season. All of that comes together in that one moment where we got the last out and became the world champions.  It is really hard to explain the feeling of satisfaction, joy, and accomplishment that comes with winning the World Series.

To be out there in the middle of a baseball field with 25 other guys and more, when you add in the coaches and trainers and all.  A group of guys that have been at it together since early February then you get to go out in the field and run around like a bunch of 12 year olds.  It is a really cool feeling.  That is why it is different.  We accomplished the goal that we would set at the start of every season.  For that one time we were the best team in the world, and we did it with this group of guys, and we got to celebrate together.

How did it feel to have your number retired as a Brave?

It is really hard to be able to put into words.  You don’t set out in your career to have your number retired by an organization. You don’t even think of that.  All of a sudden you get further into your career and you start thinking well…maybe.  When ultimately I got the call, it was like ‘holy cow.’  Even leading up to that people would ask me how was it going to feel to have my number retired.

How do you feel about this whole thing?  I would say ‘I can tell you what I think I will feel,’ but I don’t know what I am going to feel like when that moment comes. I know that when I go into a stadium I look up and see the great numbers that the teams have retired, and I think ‘wow that is pretty cool.’  In Atlanta you see Dale Murphy, Hank Aaron, Eddie Matthews, and Warren Spahn, and I look up there and think ‘wow…what those guys meant to the organization.’  Then I start to think ‘wow, my number is going to be up there with those guys!’

Was it tough to be a dad when you were in the spotlight as a pitcher for the Braves and Mets?

Yes and no.  For the most part my kids were a little bit younger when I was playing. I didn’t have some of the concerns of time or influence, as I did when the kids got a little bit older.  I think the bigger challenge at that point was we had four young kids and only my wife was taking care of them for a good portion of the time. When I was here in Atlanta I was home obviously for 81 games, but we were on the road for 80 more games each year.  There was a lot of traveling and that travel time meant that my wife was essentially a single mom when I wasn’t in town.  She had to do everything on her own.

It became more difficult when I was in New York playing full time up there.  Essentially, I was gone for nine months out of the year.  It made it a lot more difficult on her, but it was not easy on me either.  It is funny because we have a three year old now and I have been with him from day one and I do not have the interruptions from spring training or baseball or travel or any of that stuff.  I’ve gone through all of his firsts; first crawl, first walk, first words.  With some of my other kids I didn’t get those opportunities.  That is the hard part, missing some of those things.

In the grand scheme of things, I guess the way it all worked out, I’m happy that I am more of a constant in their life at this stage of the game.  I have a bigger influence now than I did when they were two, three, or four years old.

You and your family do a lot of work with helping out children with cancer. Please tell us about your work with raising money and awareness for the organization CURE Childhood Cancer.

It is a great organization.  We got involved because we knew someone with cancer.  Unfortunately, it is more and more prevalent in today’s society and among kids.  We were introduced through one of our kid’s classmates, who was diagnosed when he was nine years old.  Like a lot of families and a lot of people in the community, we volunteered to bring a meal to the family one night while their son was going through treatment.  We spent some time with the family and we knew them a little bit, but certainly didn’t know them all that well.  We got to know them a bit more, and over time we had more and more conversations with them.  More than anything else, we came to the realization and understanding of how little was being done for childhood cancer research.

There is a lot stuff being done for breast cancer, and prostate cancer, and those adult cancers are very different from children’s cancers.  We were like a lot of people who thought all this money is being raised for cancer research, certainly some of this money is finding its way to childhood cancer.  In reality it really was not.  Sadly, in large part, childhood cancer does not get research dollars that breast cancer and prostate cancer do.

My wife, Christine, was concerned by how little was being done and she wanted to do something about it.  She thought, ‘I know I am obviously not going to cure cancer or do anything like that, but there are a lot of moms in our community who have kids that have cancer. They are going to the hospital, living at the hospital, and dealing with this day in and day out.’

Christine had this idea and she wanted to do something for them.  She started a luncheon called ‘Cure Childhood Cancer.’  She brings in 250 moms every year.  Moms of kids who either have cancer or who have had cancer and have beaten it.  Sometimes the children have sadly passed away.

Christine brings those moms together and has created a day where for a couple of hours all these moms are in a room together and they are able to have conversations, comfort, and hugs from people that know what they are going through.  There is nothing quite like that bond of two moms who are going through the same thing.

You also try to make sure your kids and kids in general are active. You are working with a company called Pediped. Tell us a bit about your partnership with Team Pediped.

Pediped has been great. They approached me wanting to do something for CURE Childhood Cancer.  They wanted to get involved and try and be a part of what Christine was doing with her luncheon.  They brought this opportunity to me with their new shoe line for kids to see if it would be something I would be interested in.  They in turn would make a huge donation to CURE and my wife’s luncheon.

We are certainly appreciative of the fact that they were willing to help out and commit some dollars to CURE.  At the same time it gave me the opportunity to promote their shoes, which are really cool.  It is a new shoe line that Pediped has introduced primarily for young kids.  It helps them to be more active.  The shoes are comfortable.  They are lightweight.  They are easy to take care of, which all parents know is a big plus.  I don’t want to say that they are indestructible, but they are pretty close.  The kids like them and if you are in comfortable shoes, you are more likely to get up and start moving around.  We love them.  Our little guy loves them.  He is out running around in them all the time.

When the Braves make the playoffs this season, let’s do our best to get them in Pediped kids shoes for the first round.

Yeah, we’ll get them thinking ahead.  We’ll get Pediped to think about putting some spikes on them.

Photo courtesy of Jim Accordino

Transcription courtesy of Art Eddy of Yahoo! Voices

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