Against All Oddsall Odds

From: Orlando Sentinel - Orlando,FL,USA - Jun 1, 2006

CFCA pitcher Jake Brigham blossomed late and now looms as a high MLB draft choice.

Andrew Carter
Sentinel Staff Writer

June 1, 2006

There were about 50 people, all deaf, sitting with their Bibles, watching Brother Earl Brigham spread the word through sign language.

Sometimes the preacher contorted his face to make a point. Or ran from one side of the pulpit to the other, with hands clenched and raised toward the sky.

Brigham is a man who has never spoken or heard a word. Yet every Sunday morning, he tries to send a loud message to his congregation at the First Baptist Church of Central Florida's Deaf Church in Ocoee.

Faith is one of the reasons why Jake Brigham admires his father.

Before last summer, Jake was an unknown high school baseball player at Central Florida Christian Academy in Ocoee. He cut grass for spending money. He went to church on Wednesday nights and Sundays. He rooted for the Red Sox and dreamed of playing in Fenway Park. Life was ordinary.

In less than a week, though, on Tuesday, Jake likely will be picked somewhere among the first five rounds of the Major League Baseball draft. He already has committed to play for UCF next season, but if Jake is picked high enough, he'll begin a professional career.

He has dreams about what he might do with the money if he is a high pick. He'd repay his parents. Give back to his siblings. Just the thought of being able to do those things makes Jake smile and shake his head.

Jake does the same thing -- smile and shake his head -- when thinking about his father. He means so much to him. They've both overcome odds.

Jake overcame playing at a small school to become a prospect. Earl overcame being born deaf.

The world labels those like Earl as handicapped. Yet for the past 40 years, Earl has cut hair. For the past 12, he has preached. Earl is the owner of Earl Brigham's Barber Shop in Winter Garden and runs it by himself. He's a father to seven children, a man who puts his family second, just behind his Lord.

"You can be called disabled, handicapped, they can tell you that you're never going to succeed," Jake says. "But if you work hard, you can accomplish anything. That just shows me with the little bit of talent that I have, I can go a long way if I work hard."

His father likes the way Jake plays -- hard and competitive. It reminds him of how he used to play football at the Florida School for the Deaf and the Blind in St. Augustine, where Earl still holds records.

"He listens to his coach and works hard," Earl says through his wife and interpreter, Robin. "Probably more than anything, though, I'm proud that Jake is a Christian."

The Brighams are believers. Robin, Earl and their seven children believe God has given them gifts.

Earl is a gifted preacher and barber. He claims that he's the only deaf preacher in Central Florida.

Robin is a gifted-students teacher who home-schooled all her children. And then there are the desserts she made for all the scouts who have come to the house during the past several months. Her specialty is chocolate eclairs.

And Jake -- his gift is evident to anyone who has seen him pitch. It's his right arm.

Sports were always big in the Brigham home. The children used to put pillows around the living room, for bases, and Earl umpired indoor "baseball games."

On Wednesdays, years ago, Earl took off from the barbershop, loaded all the children in the family Bronco and drove to a nearby park.

They played baseball. Earl was always the pitcher.

"He thought he was Roger Clemens," Jake says. "And that's the truth . . . He'd throw probably 30 balls before he ever threw a ball you could hit. He thought he was the hardest thrower ever. Those were good times."

It was against his wild-throwing father that Jake learned a little about how to play ball.

And it was through watching his father that Jake learned a lot about how to live right.

Earl was always demanding. He never knew any different.

"I've fought and fought and fought to succeed," Earl says through Robin. "I didn't want to take advantage of the government. I knew that if I didn't give up, I could do it."

Once, years ago, a deaf man wandered into the barbershop. The man didn't know that Earl also was deaf. The man handed Earl a card explaining his disability and asking for money.

Earl, in sign language, told the man to get a job, that being deaf is no excuse for anything.

As much as the Brighams believe in God's gifts, they also believe in miracles -- both Biblical and the ones that have happened to them.

The doctors, for instance, always told Robin she could never have children.

Before she and Earl were married 21 years ago, Robin had an adopted son and Earl was a father of four, left to parent alone after his wife died.

Robin and Earl wanted children of their own.

"We just prayed and prayed," Robin says. "Even though we had five, we just felt like God had more for us."

Robin had Jake when she was 37. Four years later, she gave birth to another son, Luke.

Jake's rise from unknown high school player to draft prospect is hard to explain also.

Growing up, Jake -- who was able to play at CFCA because the FHSAA allows home-schooled athletes to compete -- rarely pitched. He beaned the first batter he ever faced in Little League. He was wild and prone to load the bases on 12 straight balls.

But Greg Fulmer, the coach at CFCA, saw something he liked the first time he saw Jake during practice.

"He threw the ball across the infield," Fulmer says. "And I remember looking to my other coach and saying, 'He's going to the bullpen.' "

By Jake's junior year, something had clicked.

Jake, who began playing at CFCA his seventh-grade year, doesn't remember exactly what changed. He remembers the difference after a session with Jason Motto, the CFCA pitching coach.

"I don't even think it was an actual fundamental thing," Brigham says. "I think it was just a mindset. He taught me for about 10 minutes and he said, 'Do this.' "

During his senior season, Jake led CFCA to its first Class 1A state final four. He was 10-3 with a 0.75 ERA and 146 strikeouts.

Last summer Jake and his family were invited to Wilmington, N.C., for the East Coast Professional Showcase, a made-for-scouts event for seniors.

When he went into his first windup, 100 radar guns pointed toward him.

"I just looked at the guns and went straight into the screen," Jake says. "It went 12 feet high. It was crazy."

Jake settled. A few times, he hit 95 mph on the guns.

The scouts were impressed, and he left Wilmington ranked the No. 10 prospect attending, according to Baseball America.

Before Jake left, one scout told Jake that things were about to get crazy for him.

The scout was right -- Jake, a player from a tiny school who had only been pitching a year, became a prospect.

"We never dreamed," Robin says.

Robin says Jake gets his athletic ability from Earl, not her.

Jake is fast, like Earl. And competitive, like Earl.

And Robin says they're personalities are the same, too. She uses words like "funny," "charismatic" and "engaging" to describe both.

"[Jake] has that natural leadership quality," Robin says. "And it is totally his father. It is nothing of me."

They a look a lot alike, too, with similar smiles, and ears that stick out just a little.

Both played similar roles on their teams. Earl always tried to get his teammates to work together and be relentless.

"I see the same thing in [Jake]," Earl says.

All of Earl's children learned sign language from birth. It was different, having a deaf father. For the kids, it meant that when Earl went out of town, they couldn't talk to him on the phone. He could never hear their laughter. But having a deaf father, Jake says, was never tough or burdensome.

Jake sees a lot of things in his dad. He sees a business owner, a spiritual leader and man who never did give up.

He sees someone who taught him the most about life without every saying a word.

"He's the father I was meant to have," Jake says.

Andrew Carter can be reached at acarterb@olrandosentinel.com.

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