Cubs' Hill back in big leagues after harrowing injury

There were nights this past spring, when the temperature dipped into the 30s, that Koyie Hill said his fingers felt like "frozen carrots."

There were days, when he wasn't hitting well, that Hill thought seriously about asking the Cubs if they had a coaching job for him somewhere.

But Hill is still playing, and Monday's call-up from the minor leagues was gratifying on so many levels.

The 29-year-old Hill, a jourmeyman catcher, was making a wood window frame for his house last Oct. 16 when he suffered a horrific injury, one that nearly cost him four of the fingers on his right hand.

"I don't talk about it much," said Hill, the son of a master carpenter. "It's just an accident with a table saw, something I've done a million times before. I was using a saw that's really bad about grabbing, and grabbed, and there it went."

There went Hill's thumb, his pinkie finger, his ring finger and half of his middle finger. Although Hill said he didn't have to pick any of his fingers up off the floor, he said some were hanging by small pieces of skin.

"This one, this one and half of this one," he said, matter-of-factly, pointing at the mangled digits. "It cut my thumb off first, went through all the muscle in my thumb, and it went back this way and turned it and cut all four tendons and all four fingers and all four ligaments. They don't move anymore."

When it happened, Hill wasn't thinking about baseball. He was thinking about saving his fingers and his hand.

"October 16, and if I had stayed at the emergency room, I'd only have two fingers now," he said. "But my father-in-law wasn't going to settle for that, and we went to a specialist.

"The specialist actually works with the Cubs' hand doctor. and he got them (the fingers) all back on there, and he said he was proud of what he was able to do with the mess he got. And then my physical therapist, her name is Polly Sensaman.

"I went to emergency room at about 9:30 in the morning and probably had surgery around 11:30. The ER wanted to do surgery at 5 or 6 that evening, so I for sure would have lost them.

"Each doctor said the fingers were living. They were still living and still attached and the arteries and whatever and all that goes on. It was a long deal. We did three or four hours of therapy every day, and you battle a lot of nightmares and ups and downs emotionally as far as your career."

Hill began rehabbing right away, with the thought that he could play baseball again.

A bit player with the Dodgers and a part-timer with the Diamondbacks early in his career, Hill signed with the Cubs last year as a nonroster invitee to spring training and wound up playing in 36 games with the big club.

The Cubs went 17-8 in games he started as he stabilized a shaky situation behind the plate.

The organization had no qualms about bringing Hill back, and Hill went so far as to suggest having at least his little finger cut off if it were to help him play.

"That's what I was telling them to be ready for spring training," he said. "I wasn't going to be able to throw 'til the end of January, the doctors said. Of course, in November, I'm out there throwing tennis balls and trying to get everything right. I said if the rehab is going to be shorter and I'm going to be ready to go, fine. I'll just have them leave it off.

"The pinkie is the one that never worked because it doesn't have anything in it. It's just like the chair post there. It has nothing. It's just all bone. I told them I'll take it off if that's what it is. It wasn't like being macho, I just wanted to play. I didn't want to be hurt, so do whatever it takes."

The Cubs didn't waver about wanting Hill back. General manager Jim Hendry said he feels Hill could be a top backup catcher on many teams, but the Cubs have Henry Blanco in that role.

"We won a lot of games last year when he caught," Hendry said. "I really appreciate the way he handled himself last year when we sent him out. He didn't have to report (to the minor leagues). He could have chosen free agency.

"I don't know if we've had a guy in that situation since I've been GM who showed us he wanted to be here at the expense of going somewhere else and getting a call-up."

Hill reported to spring training this year, again as a nonroster man with no guarantees. At his request, the Cubs never told the media about his accident, and Hill went about his business quietly before being sent to Class AAA Iowa again.

Understandably, he got off to a slow start, batting .158 with no homers in April and .230 with 2 homers in May.

"The organization kept me in the lineup down there," Hill said. "The first couple of months, when it was 30 degrees, I felt like had frozen carrots for fingers. It didn't feel good to hold the bat, let alone swing it. To make contact was even worse."

Although the right hand is his throwing hand, Hill said it would have been worse had the left hand been mangled because of the pounding from pitches.

"Catching is easy," he said "They added enough bones to my middle finger to where it moves some. They had me hold a ball in my left hand to see where my finger was placed so when they sewed it back on, it was fixed in a position, so I could say it was actually built for playing baseball now, which is something a baseball player always wanted."

As the weather warmed up, so did Hill. He finished his season at Iowa with a career-best 17 home runs and a .350 on-base percentage in 113 games.

"When you are hitting .150 or something in the middle of April and low-2s in the middle of May - my wife talked me out of calling Hendry a couple of times and asking if there was a managing or coaching job or roving catching job because I just didn't know if it was going to work," he said. "She kept reminding me how close out we were from surgery. It warmed up a little bit, and I kind of took off."

Hill credited Iowa hitting coach Von Joshua for helping him. On Monday, he showed reporters a bat handle taped up thick, to provide a notch for fingers that don't bend correctly anymore. (Hill said he may have at least one, if not more, fingers cut off after his playing days because of the pain of arthritis.)

After learning how to shake hands and give high-fives again, Hill had a dream season after all.

"Just to have a year at all, just to have a season to play, was the main focus, and I was fortunate enough to have that," he said. "I sat in the doctor's office here in Chicago in December, and he looked right at me and said he didn't think I was going to play again.

"And so, yeah, you got some of the best people (saying), 'I just don't know, I don't see it, but good luck.' In the back of mind I always knew if I got the opportunity to play - I knew I was going to be able to do it."