“I’m a little sore and a little tired, but it will be good to see these guys,” Stephen Holland said with a faint smile and a bit of sweat glistening on his forehead. “A lot of them called me beforehand and said they were praying for me.”
When the sophomore pitcher walked through the door, he was spotted first by big third baseman Matt Sullivan, who led the joyous rush toward him, opened his arms for a hearty bear hug and, at the last second, heard another teammate warn, “Easy! …Easy!”
This was the first time the Tartan players had seen Holland since his surgery six days earlier. There was less of him now – he was minus one kidney – but there was a lot more to him, too, both in their eyes and those of so many other people.
In the past few days his Facebook account “has just blown up,” Stephen said.
“I really couldn’t believe the stuff people put on there,” he said quietly. “They told me they were proud of me, that they were inspired by me. Some of them even called me a hero.”
Sinclair coach Steve Dintaman saw it that way, too:
“It’s a very, very selfless act and we’re proud of him. It’s just a great story.”
On this Valentine’s Day, it’s a true story of love.
Last year Dintaman shared a YouTube video with his players that told the story of Wake Forest baseball coach Tom Walters, who donated a kidney to Kevin Jordan, a seriously ill, incoming freshman player.
“Whenever I come upon motivational stuff, things that give a real positive message, I try to pass it on to the players,” Dintaman said. “When I watched that video I was in tears and I wanted our guys to see it. Afterward, Stephen told me, ‘That may be me.’”
Steve Holland – a 54-year-old plant manager for Inx International in Blue Ash, a guy who fished and hunted with his son, Stephen, and taught the boy baseball – was in serious trouble. He had been diagnosed with polycystic kidney disease 26 years ago, but had endured with minimal problems for more than two decades.
“I’d lost some kidney function, but even in 2011 – when I went for my yearly check-up – my kidneys were operating at 40-something percent and that was plenty,” Steve said.
“But when I went in in 2012 – for whatever reason – my kidneys were down to 17 percent. Once it gets to that point you have to do something. And I knew that. I didn’t have the energy I had had. I’d get tired easy and thought I didn’t see it on me, it seems like everybody else did. They said I had no color, that I looked washed out and tired.
He would need a kidney transplant and until then he would have to undergo dialysis.
Much of the extended family was tested and Steve and his wife Shirley’s two children – 33-year-old April and 20-year-old Stephen – both were matches. April, though, had a blood pressure problem that concerned doctors and that – and the fact his sister is a mother with four young children – made Stephen step to the forefront.
“She’s got her hands full with her kids,” Stephen said. “I told her I wanted to do it.”
Steve, though, was initially against his son’s donation.
“He’s only 20 years old, he’s got his whole life ahead of him and I didn’t want him or April to have to face that,” said Steve, who had some additional worries about his son.
Stephen had finally solidified his status as student-athlete in college and this coming season would be important for him as a showcase to lure a scholarship offer from an NCAA Division I program for his final two years of school.
And then there’s the fact that his disease is hereditary and there would be a 50-50 chance that his boy could inherit it.
“In the back of your mind,” Steve said, “you’re thinking, ‘What if something down the road happens? What will he do?’”
Sports, outdoors bond father to son
Steve said his son began throwing around a ball as soon as he could stand.
By the time he was five, Stephen said he’d regularly be out in the yard of their home in Trenton – or maybe at his grandmother’s place in New Miami – playing pitch and catch with his dad. Over the years he said they’d go to Cincinnati Reds games and go fishing, including on an annual trip with his grandpa and other family members and friends to Lake Erie for walleye.
And every Thanksgiving morning – it’s a family tradition – they would go pheasant and rabbit hunting with an uncle up in Preble County.
Once he got to Edgewood High, Stephen was on the mound – a sturdy right-hander with good control – and his folks were in the stands. After his sophomore season, he visited the University of Dayton and later the University of Cincinnati took an interest, too.
But a low test score – “I needed an 18 on my ACT and I got a 17 all three times I took it,” Stephen said with a shrug – detoured his NCAA plans and made him a junior college prospect.
Louisburg College, a private, two-year school in North Carolina was interested, but too expensive, while Carl Albert State College in Poteau, Okla., offered him a full ride, but was too far away he said.
Although Sinclair had made overtures Stephen admits he initially “kind of blew them off.”
He didn’t realize what the school had to offer, how good the baseball program was and the support system Dintaman and the players have for each other away from the game.
Sinclair has won the Ohio Community College Athletic Conference title four years straight now and Dintaman, in his sixth year with the Tartans, has been named the OCCAC Coach of the Year five times. Some 50 of his players have gone on to four-year schools.
Finally, with his options dwindling, Stephen did his homework and contacted Dintaman, who had moved on to other recruits, but, as luck would have it, had an opening when another player didn’t pan out.
Stephen joined the Tartans last season and was one of the top pitchers on a 44-14 team until elbow tendinitis sidelined him the second part of the year. Over the summer he played for the Dayton Docs in the Great Lakes Summer Collegiate League and this fall he again was a stalwart for the Tartans.
“I love being a pitcher because you’re in control of the game,” he said. “You can make it slow down. You can speed it up. You really feel like you’re making a difference because the game is in your hands.”
And it was that same mindset he tapped into when his dad needed help.
‘He needs his dad’
As she sat in the living room of their Trenton home Tuesday afternoon, Shirley Holland looked over at her husband of 35 years and then thought about their boy, who – though back on the Sinclair campus — had just sent another text message that asked:
“How’s Dad?”
“I didn’t have any doubt Stephen would give the kidney,” she said softly, her voice beginning to break. “He needs his dad.”
The transplant was done 10 days ago at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center. Early that morning Dintaman showed up at the hospital before his star pitcher was wheeled to the operating room for what ended up being a successful 3 1/2 hour surgery, followed by a lengthy stint in recovery for both father and son.
The next day Stephen was brought by wheelchair to his dad’s bedside. Both of them had eyes brimming with tears.
“I love you,” Stephen finally said. “I love you.”
Steve said almost as soon as he awoke from the surgery he started feeling better and he and his boy say the folks at UC have marveled at their recovery.
“The doctors and all the nurses said we’re probably the best transplant patients they’ve seen,” Stephen said. “They never heard of anybody up so quick and doing as well as me and my dad. They said if they were going to make a model for this, they’d put us up there and tell other people ‘that’s how we want you to be.’”
UC’s Dr. Steve Woodle told the family that a living donor kidney can last twice as long as another transplant – up to 20 years – and that a perfectly matched one can function for possibly 30 years.
Stephen spent two days in the hospital, four more at home and then Monday he returned to classes as best he could and began staying part time in the Dayton apartment near the University of Dayton that he shares with a teammate.
As he sat in the Sinclair library after class, Stephen reflected on what he had just gone through: “I’m happy I saved my dad’s life, but this was also for my family. They were so worried about my dad and now they know he’ll have a healthy life.”
Although Stephen said doctors told him it would be six weeks or so until he can start up his baseball again, he’s trying to go to practice when he can. His teammates are good medicine.
“I really missed the guys a lot,” he said. “I basically live with these guys all day, every day. And they have really pulled for me through this.”
The team begins the spring portion of its schedule this weekend in Morristown, Tenn. It has a double header Saturday with the University of South Carolina-Salkehatchie and plays Walters State on Sunday.
Stephen figures he’ll be able to return to the mound late next month, about the time the Tartans begin conference play.
“When he does come back, we’ll have to get his arm stronger again, so maybe we’ll start with him coming out of the bullpen,” Dintaman said. “I think he could do pretty well coming in in relief.”
Her certainly could.
As he showed last week, Stephen Holland can handle a save.
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