Texas school shooting hits ‘close to home’ for Rays pitcher

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) — The mass college capturing in Uvalde, Texas, was specially disturbing for Tampa Bay Rays pitcher Brooks Raley.

The little group of about 16,000 people west of San Antonio is the still left-hander’s hometown. He attended school in the building where the shooting happened, and his parents and a brother even now reside there.

“It’s a quite little town,” Raley reported Wednesday. “News travels quickly. My spouse and children is even now there, my brother lives there, and his wife and daughter. So it hits near to residence.”

Raley, 33, was in the Rays’ clubhouse at Tropicana Area less than an hour in advance of a match in opposition to the Miami Marlins when he figured out 19 young children and two older people experienced been gunned down at his previous college.

When generating it distinct he did not want to talk about any political implications of Tuesday’s shooting, Raley acknowledged the news is tricky to digest.

“I was just sitting down in here and read anything and did not really stick to up mainly because we had been about 40 minutes ahead of the sport. I bought to converse to my mothers and fathers, just to get a minimal bit of track record and get as a lot details as you can,” he claimed.

“I did go to that school. I walked these halls, so I can envision what they knowledge just about every day, and I’m feeling for that community,” Raley extra. “It’s little and a close-knit community, so it’s certainly tricky. I don’t know if there is anything at all I can do. It’s going to just take time.”

Raley, a two-sport star at Uvalde Superior School, has not lived in his hometown considering the fact that heading off to college or university at Texas A&M, exactly where he was drafted by the Chicago Cubs in 2009. He at the moment resides in Faculty Station, Texas, with his spouse, Rachel, and their three daughters.

“It’s the largest town west of San Antonio,” he said of his hometown. “I mean, we’ve got an HEB and a Walmart and a few quick-food items joints. Not a complete great deal there.”

His hesitancy to go over the tragedy publicly is partly thanks to all the unanswered issues, Raley explained.

“It’s just a tragedy. Of course increasing up there and heading to that college, it kind of hits house,” the pitcher reported. “Having youthful kids myself, you just sense for all those families, and you pray for them and your ideas are with them.”

Raley is in his very first season with the Rays. The remaining-handed reliever was 1- with a 2.25 Period and 3 saves in 14 appearances coming into Thursday night’s match from the New York Yankees. He built his significant league debut with the Cubs in 2012 and has also pitched for the Cincinnati Reds and Houston Astros throughout his occupation.

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