Working for Team USA all the medal he needs

Through pain you grow.

That's what they say.

Of course, the ones saying it usually aren't in pain.

John Fierro won't necessarily subscribe, though pain is his game, and few have known it better.

The former Cubs trainer has seen to some of the greatest athletes of this generation, and he's now charged with keeping the USA's Olympic baseball team healthy for just 10 more days.

But it was his absurd and agonizing firing in the winter of 1996-97, after 11 years in the Cubs' organization, that led him to where he is now, USA Baseball, after a journey that has seen him first through the worst, and now through the best.

"To say that was the low point of my professional life, when I got the call from the Cubs, is probably an understatement,'' said Fierro, in Beijing and prepping for the tourney. "But I've always had a firm belief that things happen for a reason.

"You don't know it until it happens, but I never had a doubt that something good would happen.

"Still, it was a blow, simply because I did a good job there and we had a very good thing going, medically, in Chicago.

"But like most pro sports, my opinion didn't count. The people there in charge (Andy MacPhail and Ed Lynch) never said why. They just said it was time for a change.

"Years later, Ed told me it was the worst decision he ever made. I never held a grudge. He did what he had to do.''

Fierro had contacts dating back to his time in the Phillies' organization, through his many colleagues in sports, and fiercely loyal players like Andre Dawson.

He had become friends with Wayne Gretzky, having worked the "Gretzky Tour'' through Europe during the NHL lockout in 1994.

He got calls from all over baseball, but Fierro decided he was done with that rat race, having had enough of both the race and the rats.

He hooked up with Accelerated Rehab Centers in the Phoenix area and continued to do what he did best, which was get injured athletes - both professional and amateur - back to work.

In the meantime, USA Baseball began calling, and Fierro had a difficult time turning down his country.

This Olympiad is his 10th international event. He's been around the world with Team USA, seen some amazing sights and some extraordinary victories under impossible circumstances, but nothing will match the gold medal win in Sydney in 2000.

"It's always an honor every time they ask you, because every time you walk out there with those three letters across your chest, it's different,'' Fierro gushed. "It's not a team, or a state, or a university. It's your country.

"The feeling that I got when we won the gold in 2000 was different than anything I had ever known, and the emotions of everything that ever happened to me all came out at once.

"It's hard to describe unless you're there in that situation, but I've been to the World Series and playoffs, and that's fun, but when you see the USA flag go up there, and it's the highest one, and they play the anthem, that's another world.

"So like I said, when they call, I go. I consider it a honor.''

After winning at the IBAF Baseball World Cup in Taiwan, taking home the gold last November for the first time in 33 years when the U.S. defeated Cuba, Team USA begins play today in a preliminary bout with Korea, in what is scheduled to be the final Olympic baseball tournament.

At an IOC meeting in July 2005, baseball and softball were voted out beginning with the 2012 London Games, in what was viewed around the world as an anti-American vote.

But there is much discussion that baseball will return in time for the 2016 Olympics, which might take place right here in Chicago, and that would be some kind of sweet homecoming for Fierro.

"I hope I'm around that long, believe me,'' Fierro joked. "I would love it, but I love this work no matter where it is.

"The people are phenomenal. There's great management and coaching staff - Davey Johnson is terrific - and everything is done right, even when the conditions are bad.

"The travel is very difficult and you're working in some awful conditions, medically speaking, in countries and at fields where there's no clubhouse and the dugout's dirty. You're in places like Cuba or Taiwan or Panama or China, where you just don't have the facilities, and it's filthy.

"But they look for people who can put that aside and look at what you're trying to accomplish, and that's what I love about it.''

When he returns to Phoenix in a few weeks, Fierro will go back to his clinics, and perhaps working for Gretzky's Coyotes in a part-time role, having been an assistant trainer there the last five years while resisting the urge to make it a full-time gig.

And he hopes to come home having witnessed another golden performance.

"The competition is strong and the world has caught up with us. There's no denying that,'' Fierro said. "But I can't wait to see what happens because you know the potential.

"And, you know, I'd sure like to hear that song one more time.''

brozner@dailyherald.com