Young pitcher fighting back from head injury

His grin was unmistakable. So was the delight in his blue eyes.

What was missing were the words.

With family and friends gathered around him, Matt Cook opened a package from his aunt on Tuesday, his 15th birthday, that held a baseball autographed by one of his favorite players, Seattle Mariners centerfielder Ichiro Suzuki. Thrilled with his present, the lanky teen tried several times to say something, but the words seemed to evaporate before he could get them out.

Cook's passion for baseball is unwavering, though his will to play the game is being sorely tested. Three weeks ago, a ball slammed into the left side of his head as the freshman pitched varsity batting practice at Hamilton-Wenham Regional High School. The March 30 accident fractured his skull, caused substantial bleeding and swelling in his brain, dulled sensation down his right side, and severely impaired his ability to speak.

The prognosis is for a full recovery, according to his parents, although many months of intense physical, occupational, and speech therapy are ahead. The frightening ordeal has prompted Cook's parents to advocate that schools switch from aluminum to wooden bats -- echoing a debate that has long simmered among high school baseball teams and in Little League, where aluminum bats predominate.

"How many more Matt Cooks will there be before they make a change?" asked Matt's mom, Ann Cook.

There is no definitive study comparing the safety of metal versus wood, but opponents of metal bats say they increase the chances of serious injury. Aluminum's defenders say science just does not back up the premise that wood is safer.

As the debate continues, the Cooks are focusing first on Matt's recovery. Doctors have told them that Matt's brain will need at least six months to heal, and that he should not play any contact sports until then. This seems like an eternity to the teen.

"We're just grateful that he's still alive," said Ann Cook.

There have been many agonizing hours. The first three days after the accident were critical, as the Cook family waited for the swelling in Matt's brain to subside. He spent two days in intensive care at Children's Hospital in Boston, then five more in the facility's neurological unit before being transferred to the pediatric unit of Boston's Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital.

Since then, the Cook's Hamilton homestead has extended to Spaulding, where doctors say Matt will remain until May 2. Ann, 46, and her husband, Tom, 49, alternate nights sleeping by Matt's side. Their two daughters, Jennifer, 12, and Carolyn, 10, have also logged so many hours there that they can deftly navigate the maze-like corridors of the hospital to lead a visitor back to the parking lot.

Their big brother has come a long way since March 30, when a line drive left him so dazed that he could not tell the team's trainer, and later doctors, what year it was or where he lived. Today he can speak in halting sentences, often looking to one of his parents for help when he forgets a word.

And yet, on his first day in intensive care, his zeal for baseball was so strong that he tried to ask his mother whether he would be able to play in that day's scheduled scrimmage. He couldn't remember the words or pronounce the sounds, so he held up one finger, then another, trying to signal 11 a.m., the game's scheduled start time, then made a swinging motion.

"It was heartbreaking," said Ann Cook, recalling the image of her oldest child struggling to speak.

Baseball is in the family's genes. Tom Cook, a left-handed pitcher, was drafted by the Cleveland Indians out of Hamilton-Wenham High School, but turned down a chance at the big leagues to attend college. He had planned to take another crack at major league ball after graduation, but a college injury ended that dream. Since then, he has coached his son in Little League, and more recently on his Swampscott-based Amateur Athletic Union team.

Both parents say they have seen players get injured in the more competitive AAU league, which uses metal bats, but neither had advocated for a switch to wooden bats until their son's accident.

"We've seen nasty hits, but nothing like this," said Tom Cook.

Matt Cook's injury, however, is unlikely to prompt Hamilton-Wenham's varsity baseball team to switch to wooden bats, said School Committee vice chairman Richard Boroff. While the School Committee sets school policy, Boroff said that if it "unilaterally" decided to switch to wooden bats, the decision would likely get the school district kicked out of the Cape Ann League, which uses metal bats. And even if the team wasn't expelled, competitors would be using metal bats, so Hamilton-Wenham's players would still be exposed to them, he said.

"Obviously, there is no way to completely protect anyone in a baseball realm," Boroff said.

While the school district does use a safety screen for its pitchers during batting practice, the National Center for Catastrophic Sport Injury Research, based at the University of North Carolina, also recommends that pitchers "always" wear a helmet during practice -- something the Hamilton-Wenham players do not do. Asked about that, Boroff said he would discuss the helmet issue with the district's athletic director, but would leave the decision to the AD.

Still, Matt Cook can't wait to get back to the game. With his doctors' permission, Cook was cleared for a brief home visit this weekend. To no one's surprise, Cook's first request was to watch his team play ball at Masconomet Regional High School.

Cook also is anxious to go back to school. But that is not likely to happen soon. Doctors have advised that the noise and crowded hallways may be too much stimulation for his healing brain, so he will initially be tutored at home and then return for half-days, his parents said.

The teen, who endured headaches that were so excruciating in the first week after his accident that he mouthed the words "I die" to his mother, is also determined to go to college.

And though his speech is still halting, there is no pause when he is asked whether he plans to play baseball again.

"Definitely," he said.