Darryl Strawberry: From Baseball Greatness to Personal Redemption Journey | 162
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Every team, every topic, everywhere. This is Believe. This is Becoming Undone.
I did not because I've grown up in a very dysfunctional home. I broke in. family with a father being an alcoholic. And there was a lot of just dysfunction night after night, you know, him coming home drunk again. And then for the final time, when I was about 14 years old, he comes home and pulls out a shotgun drunk and says he's going to kill the whole family. So me and my brothers went into action and it could have been a tragedy that night had it not been for my mother getting us out of the house.
And
You know, I always tell people brokenness is real. Trying to figure out life on its own as a man, what it is to be a man. What most of the time none of us really know until we actually overcome a lot of things. But I had to go through this whole journey believing in myself to be successful, to play Major League Baseball. Having a dream when I was, after my father was out of the house and saying this is what I wanted to do.
How did Darryl Strawberry’s traumatic childhood shape his early identity and drive toward baseball?
I would say my pain led me to my greatness. See, pain is real. It can lead you into doing great things. My greatness would eventually lead me to my destructive behavior. Because of accumulating all this stuff, people think, well, it makes you well. Living behind community gates, having money, cars, homes. You would think all that would make you well. That cannot make you well. It just makes you feel good for the moment. But being well is something that has to be delivered from on the inside. Hey, this is Daryl Strawberry, and I am undone.
Hey friend, I'm glad you're here. Welcome to yet another episode of Becoming Undone, the podcast for those who dare bravely, risk mightily, and grow relentlessly. Toby Brooks, a speaker, author, professor, and performance scientist. I spent much of the last two decades working as an athletic trainer and a strength coach in the professional, collegiate, and high school sports settings. And over the years, I've grown more and more fascinated with what sets high achievers apart and how failures that can suck in the moment can end up being exactly the push we needed to propel us on our path to success. Each week on Becoming Undone, I invite new guests to examine how high achievers can transform from falling apart to falling into place.
I'd like to emphasize that this show is entirely separate from my role at Baylor University, but it's my attempt to apply what I've learned and what I'm learning and to share with others about the mindsets of high achievers. Welcome back. It's a hot one in Waco, Texas today, and I'm excited to bring you a new episode. This one's been a long time coming, but I'm thrilled to bring it to you today. You know, there are some people whose accomplishments are so extraordinary that their names become inseparable from what they've achieved. Darryl Strawberry is one of those people. He was the first overall pick in the Major League Baseball draft, an eight-time MLB All-Star, and a four-time World Series champion, one of the most feared and electrifying power hitters of his entire generation.
From the outside, he had reached the place so many spend their entire lives chasing, but achievement can change your circumstances without healing your wounds. Behind all the home runs and the championships, the magazine covers, the roaring crowds, was a young man still carrying the pain of a violent and dysfunctional childhood. And as his fame grew, so too did his addiction, his broken relationships, legal troubles, illness, and questions about who he really was when the uniform came off. Daryl told me that his pain led him to greatness, but that his greatness eventually led him toward destruction. That's a powerful warning for every high achiever who's ever believed that the next accomplishment might finally make us whole.
But this is not ultimately a story about destruction. It's a story about redemption. Today, Daryl is no longer most passionate about discussing what he accomplished on the baseball field. Alongside his wife, Tracy, he travels the country sharing a message of faith, recovery, reconciliation, and hope to people in churches, prisons, treatment centers, and communities that are desperate to believe another life is still possible.
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Chapters
3 chaptersSpeakers
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