Carson Kelly’s T-shirt was a gift from Cubs broadcaster Boog Sciambi, who went to his pals at Obvious Shirts with a request for a custom design.
Kelly chose the message: Everything Hurts.
When you’re a big-league catcher, that comes with the territory.
‘‘There’s never a time I feel like, ‘Oh, everything is great,’ ’’ Kelly said Sunday. ‘‘There’s a reason why I wear a shirt that says Everything Hurts. Usually, as a catcher, there’s always something going on.’’
How soon after reporting to spring training does he start to hurt?
‘‘I think you come to camp hurt,’’ he said. ‘‘But I think what catchers need to do is post, no matter what is going on. When you’re a catcher, you’ve gotta want to be back there and understand it’s part of the game.’’
We’re not breaking new ground here. A catcher’s equipment should come with the same warning label they attach to a pack of cigarettes. The position is designed to be hazardous to your health. You squat 150 or so times behind home plate, inches away from a man wielding a club who at any moment may hit a ball that, if not struck squarely, will come back at you with frightening speed and inflict pain on some part of your anatomy.
What is new is this: There is considerable anecdotal evidence that because catchers have changed the way they set up, with one knee down, they are at greater risk than ever of being hit in the one place that can cause even the strongest man to crumple in agony.
The Athletic, in a recent story on the topic, whimsically referred to it as, ‘‘Groin, groin, gone.’’ We suspect the fraternity of catchers reacted to that through clenched teeth.
They have yet to invent a protective cup strong enough to fully absorb the waves of pain that result from a direct hit to the groin, although some catchers now are using more supportive cups favored by MMA fighters. The shots to the inner thigh aren’t much better.
‘‘They seem to come in bunches, like home runs come in bunches,’’ Kelly said. ‘‘I had a stretch a couple of weeks ago where I got hit in the leg four games in a row in the same spot, inner thigh. It’s more of a sting the first time. If it happens multiple times in the same spot, it really hurts.
‘‘It just takes awhile for the swelling to go down, and if you keep getting impact, then it continues to just stay swollen. I think you just hope for the next couple of days you don’t get one off the leg.’’
For as long as they’ve been playing baseball, catchers were taught to crouch, neither knee making contact with the ground. If catchers dropped to one knee, the old-school thinking went, their mobility would suffer and they would have a tougher time blocking pitches in the dirt.
While catchers such as Tony Pena and Benito Santiago would stretch out one leg from a crouched position, it was a White Sox catcher, Tyler Flowers, who was the first to adopt the one-knee stance on a regular basis. That was in 2015, according to The Athletic. He found that by dropping one knee, he could lower his center of gravity, which helped in blocking pitches and receiving and framing in general.
The traditionalists continued to balk. In 2020, according to The Athletic, only 23% of pitches were caught with one knee down, which, of course, relieves considerable stress that catchers place on their backs and knees. That percentage is up to 96% in 2026.
The first time Kelly put on the catcher’s gear, his father asked him to.
‘‘My dad wanted me to play every position,’’ he said. ‘‘I would have every type of glove in my bag.’’
Kelly was drafted as a third baseman. After two years in the Cardinals’ system, the organization asked him to consider a switch to catching, He went to the instructional league in four successive autumns to learn the position.
And now he’s learning new ways to protect himself.
‘‘There’s a company that offers sliding shorts with pads,’’ he said. ‘‘We’re looking a little into that. And there’s a lot of companies out there with good cups.
‘‘Yeah, but maybe we need to change our positioning a little bit, too.’’