A COMEBACK BASEBALL STORY
From a distance, Cade Webber looks like just another high school baseball player getting in a weekday workout. But what he’s overcome to get to this point is truly remarkable. “It was touch and go,” explains his father Will Webber. “He was born healthy but came home jaundice and at eight months he had a liver transplant, which is crazy.”
Cade was diagnosed with biliary atresia, a blockage of the tubes that carry bile from the liver. “I think back to how sick he was back then and thinking this was going to be a lifelong thing, they were talking about potential brain damage and muscular issues, but he came out just fine,” said Will. “For 15 years it was just great, everything was sailing along just fine and the last few years things unraveled a little bit. His freshman year, it got serious there.”
“There was a huge buildup of bile and made me super sick,” said Cade.
An artery feeding the liver was about to burst. Cade went through three major surgeries over seven trips back and forth to California. “There were some long days in Palo Alto where we didn’t know what the future had for him,” said Will.
“They put in these things called bio drains to get out all of that crap that was in my stomach,” said Cade. “They attached these big old bags (to his abdomen), so that sucked.”
“When I had those bio salts in my skin, I got really itchy,” described Cade. “There’s nothing you can do about it because it’s constantly in your blood. I still have scars on my feet and on my hands from it. That was by far the worst part of it.”
“To wake up every day and that poor kid was scratching, he looked like he had gotten into a fight with a cactus,” said his father. “He had scars all over his body.”
With few people knowing about his condition and what he was going through, Cade found a way to work his way back onto the field. But having bio bags attached to his abdomen was sometimes a challenge. “It was one of my first games back,” Cade recalled. “They tried to pick me off at second. I slid and ended up pulling part of it out and I had to have a whole new procuedure to put it back in. It was pretty painful. But I was safe, so it didn’t matter,” Cade said with a smile.
Cade’s gained weight, works out every day, and for the first time in his life is perfectly healthy. “I’m good, I’m perfectly healthy,” said Cade. “I have to take some medications to prevent it from happening in the future. I go to the gym every day, I’m out here every day, everything is fine.”
“He’s a tough kid,” said Volcano Vista baseball coach Todd Flores. “You never want to see any kid go through that, and he’s worked his tail off to work his way back. He goes out there and does his business and I can’t ask for anything more or be more proud for a kid like that.”
“To see him out here and run around and be healthy and happy, it means the world to me and my family,” said Will.
As if just being back on the field isn’t enough, the story gets even better. Eastern New Mexico University extended Cade an offer as a preferred walk on with their baseball team.
“To have Eastern New Mexico offer him a spot as a walk on is just an incredible moment,” said Will. “It’s such an emotional thing for him. To see it’s an opportunity for him to further his education and get a chance to play baseball at the next level is a dream come true.”
“People go through a lot worse, I’m one of the fortunate ones,” said Cade. “It definitely could have gone a lot worse, I’m just happy to be where I am today, nice and healthy. Not a lot of people can end up like that.”
