M's Veteran Starter Has Leiter Outlook On Baseball

PEORIA, Ariz. - Mark Leiter kisses his children frequently, for what often seems to be no apparent reason. Not apparent to the outside world, at least. When he sees one of his five brothers, they greet with a hug. And the Leiters, growing up, weren't a hugging family.

Leiter savors the nuances and subtleties of life with a keen sense of celebration that, before April 4, 1994, was not in his makeup. Or maybe it was always there but lay dormant until that terrible day and its eternal aftermath.

It was then that his 9-month-old son, Ryan, died in the arms of Leiter's wife, Allison, in an Anaheim hotel room. Ryan had spinal muscular atrophy, a childhood form of Lou Gehrig's disease. The Leiters spent the final seven months of Ryan's life knowing that his death at an early age was inevitable.

To try to reduce such a monumental tragedy to a single lesson, one ironclad verity, is an insult to the depth of the family's suffering. But Leiter, in his first Mariner camp after last November's trade from the Philadelphia Phillies, can't deny that he is a changed person in his big-picture outlook.

"I'm thankful my son (Mark Jr.) turned 8 the other day," he said. "He's a happy kid, he loves life, he loves baseball. My daughter (Kaley) is beautiful. She's 4. I'm thankful for that. I know I love my kids more than anything, and I appreciate the fact they're blessed to be healthy."

This blessing was not a given. Before Kaley was born, doctors told Mark and Allison that they had a one-in-four chance of delivering another child with spinal muscular atrophy, which is caused by a genetic defect in the fifth chromosome of both parents. Symptoms include severe weakness of many muscles, including those that control breathing. Leiter has established the Ryan Leiter Fund to benefit families touched by the disease, which strikes one in 20,000 babies born in America.

"Yeah, I miss my son," Leiter says softly. "I still cry about him all the time. I wonder what he would have been like right now with Marky. But it happened. You try to deal with it."

Leiter's younger brother, Al, the fine pitcher for the New York Mets, said earlier this spring in Port St. Lucie, Fla., that Ryan's death made Mark "a little harder. . . . maybe thinking, `How does this happen, and why?' (and) asking a lot of questions."

But it can also be seen that it made him softer, more yearning, more grounded.

"I appreciate life more now," he said. "First of all, I don't think anyone is going to go through life unscathed. Everyone is going to have some tragedy that's going to affect them. Whether it happens when you're 5, 20 or 70 years old, something's going to happen to make you one miserable person and really think about life.

"To go through losing Ryan just kind of woke me up. I thought I was pretty appreciative as it was, but now I try not to sweat the small things. Enjoy what we get, whether it's raining out or sunny out. The stars at night, man. Green grass. The smell of it. Just sitting on a patio when it's windy with a hooded sweatshirt on, and enjoying that. And I do."

There's a flip side to such a rarefied perspective, and that's Leiter's fierce impatience with what he perceives as petty negativity. If a teammate complains about the clubhouse food or whines about shagging flies in the outfield, Leiter will walk away.

"I don't listen to that," he said. "I can't be around someone who complains all the time. I won't tolerate other people who are negative. And I stick up for myself. I don't care if it's the general manager, the manager . . . I don't keep quiet if I believe in something."

Nor will he stomach divisiveness or small-mindedness. "I don't want to be around people like that, and that's because of my son dying. I can get aggravated with people quick. It may have hardened me a little bit in that sense."

The five Leiter brothers talk frequently, though Al is still uncomfortable broaching the subject of Ryan with Mark, who at 35 is two years older than Al. He wants to be caring and available, and yet he doesn't want to open wounds.

"You know, Mark doesn't say a whole lot," Al said. "He's private about that. The way he handled it was to internalize it. It was a slow death for his child, so it was something that we all knew as family members and loved ones was inevitable.

"The few times we were with him and his son, what do you say? What do you do? It's such an awkward, uncomfortable thing."

Meanwhile, baseball has gone on for the Leiters, who will both reach the 10-year mark in major-league service. That's a source of tremendous pride for them, considering that Mark nearly quit in 1988 after sitting out three seasons with arm problems (three shoulder surgeries in 17 months), and Al was plagued with arm problems and inconsistency early in his career.

"It just took the old Leiter boys a few too many years to figure it out," Al said. "We're a little slow."

Said Mark, "It's been a fun road. It's been a crazy road with injuries to both of us, and things that have happened in our life. It's been crazy, but I wouldn't trade it for anything.

"We've got to experience so much just playing ball. It's amazing. When Al and I are together, we just kind of look at each other, especially when we play against each other. It's just like, `Can you believe we're still doing this?' "

It's one of those good things in life that Mark Leiter has learned to savor.