Interview #62: Shane Tucker
Recently graduated college pitcher and now mental health advocate
Shane Tucker is a recent college grad and pitcher who’s had an eventful career. As a senior in 2020, his final high school baseball season was cancelled by COVID lockdowns. He kept sharp with bullpen sessions and off-field training, but then the school he committed to play college baseball cut all of their athletic programs due to budget issues. He transferred to another school where he struggled with upheaval in his personal life, anxiety, and adapting to a new level of competition on the field. After getting help and achieving a better mental health state, he was then hit with a torn UCL in his throwing elbow in 2023. The Tommy John surgery and rehab kept him off the mound until 2025, which came at another new school.
Shane got back on the mound for Florida International University this season after nearly two years of rehab where he posted a 1.93 ERA in 7 outings with 7 strikeouts for his team that went 31-27, their most wins in a season since 2014. He made a post on Twitter that got attention. including from me, and I reached out to talk about it. In his college career for Long Island University and FIU, he went 7-4 with a 5.53 ERA and 62 strikeouts in 42 1/3 innings.
I was excited to talk to him and hear from someone his age about the effects things like COVID, max-effort pitching, and stress and anxiety have had on players from this generation. Pressure to perform is not new or unique to kids born after 2000, but the sheer number of eyeballs on their stats, mechanics, physiques and personalities have to add a new layer to that anxiety. Instead of a few scouts making judgements about you as a player, you can get thousands, in some cases millions, of views, comments and reactions from around the world and by people you’ve never heard of, met or will ever know.
We talked about baseball, Tommy John recovery, mental health and how he learned to overcome life’s challenges one hurdle at a time. You can follow him on Twitter: @Shanebt02. The interview was conducted May 29, 2025.
How do you feel now that you’re done?
So let me tell you, as someone who went through Tommy John surgery, I experienced baseball death once before. I really had to find a life outside of baseball before baseball was even done for me. I actually found a sense of peace in the fact that there was more to me than just baseball. After posting, I feel like my original intention was just to share a story about human experience, not even about baseball. And it happened to go viral, and now I'm in a place where I feel like I can do more to help people realize their full potential. So I'm actually at a great spot now because baseball, even though, sure my personal baseball career may be over, I can still live through the thousands of experiences of other people.
When did you have Tommy John?
I had Tommy John in May of 2023.
And you got back to pitch a bit this year?
So I did pitch this year. Not much, but I was successful in all my outings. And I had not pitched at all last year, so I hadn't really been on a college mound in a year and eight months.
Only gave up one run all season. That's not bad.
Yeah. It's interesting because after posting, I actually had a lot of DMs that were like, you didn't include how many innings you pitched, so does it really matter? And I was like, absolutely. Because the whole point is that I found my own process and my own happiness, despite the fact that I didn't technically have an innings amount or a number.
Two years ago, what motivated you to get back on the mound?
I have a much different answer now than I would have during the process. During the process, I was thinking big picture. I was thinking, I'm going to get back, I'm going to be throwing… like everybody who gets Tommy John, because we're sold this facade that you get Tommy John and you come back throwing harder. And so my biggest goal and motivation was essentially, I'm gonna go hit a number when I come back.
And then it didn't really happen. I then had the motivation of, well, if I don't know if I'm gonna pitch as well as I have before, there's got to be a way that I can still love the game the same. During the TJ process I started celebrating all my little goals and my little accomplishments. You know, the first time I could get to full flexion again and the first time I could experience that happiness of just throwing a ball again. It’s such a long, long, long recovery process and so many people are told about all these successful stories of people coming back, and not necessarily the stories of those who get heavily affected by the Tommy John.
You did make it back.
I did come back. I came back and I came back in a way that was different than before. That actually showed me a lot of things about myself. There's no linear way to success.
Before Tommy John, what were your goals with baseball?
I was fully convinced that I had a full career ahead of me of baseball, where I was going to be able to pitch in front of fans for a long, long, long time. Right before I got Tommy John I was throwing my hardest. I had come off of an appearance where I had gone 2 innings with 5 strikeouts, 0 walks, 0 runs. I was at the top of my game. I was at my highest confidence. We're kind of fed this idea that performance is our identity, but it shouldn't be.
I was at the Dbacks game yesterday and my friend’s friend is the father of Henry Davis, the Pirates catcher and former #1 pick. He's known him since he was a kid, and he was like, he was in private coaching, he's worked his ass off, etc. And now he's clinging to a roster spot. That's all that people write about is the stats.
That really happened, I think in the past 10 years, right? This huge focus on these quantifiable measures that determine how good you are at pitching; we talk about spin rate, we talk about velocity all the time, we talk about gyro, all these new terms to just describe things that we've had this entire time.
I saw the one picture with you in the pitching lab. It looks like you're getting fitted for golf clubs with all the cameras and turf and people.
What’s been your relationship with pitching and how has it changed over your life?
I'll give you a little background about myself. I am from Northern Virginia. And if you know anything about the baseball in Northern Virginia, it's either hit or miss. I was the best player on my high school team, which meant that I played shortstop. I didn't really pitch in high school. The only time I pitched was in a closed scenario, with all these numbers on me and all these objectives I was trying to reach. And it was so easy to have fun with it because I was constantly the best in my area. It's easy to have fun when you're above a lot of the other people around you.
I think that that is really the key difference between high school and college. You go from high school and you're the best player on your team. And now you go to college, and every single player was the best player on their high school team. Now, all those numbers that set you apart in high school are basically just reset. You have to find a way to stand out. A lot of those numbers cannot be changed in great values. You really are what you are. There's no science or data to basically tell us what creates spin rate of a baseball.
I had a very high spin rate on my fastball as a high schooler. I'm a 5’10” righty. I couldn't tell you how I spun the ball. I just threw it. But they put so much value on that, that I'd kind of gotten this arrogant view of myself that I was untouchable. I got to college and let me tell you, your ego gets killed really quick. I had a sense of pride that I no longer had because I'd seen that I wasn't the best. That is a hard realization for everybody. So I just shifted to having better motivation and helping the team win. The best way to help the team win is to be the best version of yourself.
You had your high school senior year cancelled? So from your junior year to your first year in college, you had no competition. How did that affect you?
I was only pitching bullpens. My facility, as most baseball players have a facility nowadays, because you have to if you want to advance. I trained at my facility, so I had so many bullpens. I threw in front of scouts at one point. I was pitching well, just not in actual games. Then when I was going into my freshman year, I was committed to a D-II, they called us on a Zoom and said, hey, we have some pretty devastating news. We're taking away all of our sports here at NYIT (New York Institute of Technology). Not only was I stuck at home again, but I was stuck without a team again.
I had two options, you can either keep going and trusting your process, or you can run away. Instead of running away, I said, where can I go right now? And that's how I mid-year transferred to LIU (Long Island University). Man, it was rough to start because I have not seen games at all. I remember getting into my first game and being like, wow, they can hit that pitch. Wow, my 91 doesn't blow up people anymore. It looks the same as everybody else's. It’s such a difficult realization, after not being on the mound for a year, which I've done twice now in my career, to come back and just produce, especially when that's all coaches want, is production.
Were you too focused on the numbers and metrics? What do you think caused your Tommy John injury?
Over-perfection, 1000%. I was always aiming for the most perfect pitch because that's what we're told brings us success. I think that what caused my Tommy John was a little bit of the fact that I had bought into trying to spin everything as hard as I could. Even though I'm succeeding right now, my arm can't take this. Sometimes the human aspect of a player gets lost when you're just looking at the numbers.
Looking back, did you notice any kind of red flags that you ignored? Like maybe your arm started barking a little bit or you just didn't feel natural and you were still forcing it?
That is one of the most difficult questions to answer. How do you tell the difference between normal soreness and real pain? I did it in a game, and I will tell you that felt different than anything I've ever experienced in my life. But leading up to it, I actually felt very loose and very good.
Then you also mentioned you've got generalized anxiety disorder. Was there ever a time where you didn't want to play because of it?
To give you some more insight on my freshman year… I mid-year transferred, and then midway through the season my parents called me and told me they were splitting up. And I was like, wow, I have no control over anything. I wasn't playing. I didn't know where I was going to be living. When I got home, we didn't have the same home. I was going through a breakup. I was sitting there. I remember looking at myself my freshman year and just being, why am I even doing this? Why am I even here? I hate using this word, but I felt like a victim. I felt like everything had just come crumbling down on me at once.
I didn't know who to go to because my foundation at home was no longer the same. This wasn’t maybe the start of my anxiety, ‘cause I think I've had anxiety for a long time, but it definitely was a catalyst in the realization that, wow, there's a whole lot going on up there that I can't explain and I'm just so scared of the unknown that I'm assuming it's going to go poorly. So that's when I was like, man, I don't want to go to the field, but I have to find a way. And that was why I was like, I need to ask for help. I took some time off of baseball. I went to therapy. I went home to see my parents. And that was one of the most important things I could have done for myself was analyzing that I needed space from the game because we're not usually given that space.
It's easy to tell everyone they should go to therapy. But when you're all alone, you're in a new place because you were recruited to one place and you have to go to another, you know fewer people, you're less comfortable. Did you try any kind of self-medicating ways before you went to therapy?
I definitely did some pretty abysmal things to myself for a while there to try and cope. My first experience in therapy was with someone who was trying to give me all the whys, trying to give me the reasons why I was feeling this way. I thought that's what I needed. I had come to that conclusion because I was like, my parents are divorced, there's got to be some reason. And little did I know that that was actually the root of the anxiety. It was always looking for a reason in the past instead of thinking about how to deal with it now. I had tried doing things on my own. I had tried asking my peers.
But at the end of the day, the only person who could help me was the resources that I use. It's up to me where I get help. When someone has anxiety, it can almost feel invasive. If someone comes up to you and it's like, hey, is everything OK or hey, do you need something and it's like, whoa, I didn't ask for help. I'm not ready for this yet yeah. So the realization from me was when I was looking at myself and I said, you've got nothing going your way right now. You might as well ask for help. And that was hard. It's almost impossible to look at yourself and be like, I can improve, but it's an integral part of admitting that you need help is saying that you can get better.
It's an up and down roller coaster for sure. You get help, process their divorce, personal issues, baseball turmoil, you're feeling pretty good after a little while. You get to a good spot and then you get Tommy John. You're out of baseball for a long time, again. Were you more prepared for that second blow?
With Tommy, John, I was more willing to ask for help. But that was only half the battle, because I still had to do the things that would commit myself to actually getting better. It's hard getting hit with Tommy John when you’re at the top of your career because you know how good you are, but you also know that you're not there right now. I still had a huge ego, but I didn't have anything in front of me to show it, and so I was going through life, and I'll be real, my junior and senior year, I essentially was telling people what they wanted to hear rather than the truth.
And that was because I had had this idea that I was the most important thing right now and my health was important. It was easier to come back from Tommy John until the reality hits that that ego doesn't carry me anymore and then, in the fall when I commit to a new school after Tommy John, I had a complete ego death. You are not as good as you thought you were. And the best way to get better is to admit that. It's easier now because I was failing and I asked for help and I started a process that helped me instead of doing things that I thought was helping everybody.
You didn’t pitch much this year, but you pitched well. Did you decide before you got on the mound this year that that would be it? You wouldn't try to go independent ball to chase that dream and hang on?
In the fall and spring I was terrible. I couldn't get out of a single inning. I would walk 4 guys, get pulled. It was preseason, so it doesn't matter, right? But we're constantly told that it does. And so I'd gotten so low at a point where I was, like, do I even want to stay? Do I even want to play right now? A lot of times the answers were no. I can't tell you how many times I called my girlfriend and said I don't know how much longer I can stay here. I had committed myself on the promise that I wanted to be on a team that was going to win. I wanted to go out as on a team that won.
My goal wasn't a personal goal. It was to be on a team that was successful. How is team success driven? Is it driven by me or is it driven by everybody? Is it driven by what the coaches think? I was offered a redshirt and I told them no because I wanted to play and win now. I knew my role wasn't going to be that big. But I had kept thinking to myself, well, if I get in the game and I throw up a zero, my role could be bigger. I could help the team win more. It was no longer about me succeeding or my own career advancing. It was about the team, and that's where I found the comfort to be like, if this is my last year, I want to contribute to wins the most that I can.
How did you guys finish?
We finished with 31 wins. We got knocked out of the conference tournament in the second round. We won our first game and lost the next two in Conference USA. It's excellent for FIU. We were committed to a winning program and we had produced a lot more than FIU has ever seen before. I couldn't be prouder of that team and that group of guys.
And you got good grades, too. Were you always a good student?
Absolutely not. When I was anxious, I procrastinated everything. I'd also e-mail teachers and be like, hey, I'm really anxious and I can't get this done. And I probably abused that. It made it so that I could just skate by at a 3.1, 3.2 GPA and have 3 zeros in the grade book. The way that I fixed that was by committing to a process every morning, just being like, I'm going to go make my bed in the morning. Celebrating that little goal and then all of a sudden I was like, oh, I can do homework now, I can do other things, because I had started my day with that.
So what's next for you? Where do you want to be in five years?
I want to be helping people raise their floor. I don’t know exactly what career that may be. But I love coaching, I love helping people. I think at one point I'd want to do something with mental health, with psychology, maybe specifically sports psychology. It requires more school, and yet it's a challenge that I want to face because I think it's important to see that athletics isn't the only thing.
Do you see a lot of burnout and other mental health issues in the sport even for young people?
People get burnt out so much in baseball. I had a couple of people DM me who were former Minor League Baseball players talking about burnout and how you feel like you have to hide things because they need you, rather than doing things for yourself. It's because people see it as a job. It's because when we're 10 years old, we're told that velocity is king and that you have to throw hard if you want to be scouted. I was lucky enough as a kid I just threw harder. I don't know how. I don't know where it came from. I just naturally threw a little bit harder than everybody else. And because of that, people were more willing to put time into me.
What is it about baseball that you love so much?
I think it's the most challenging sport that anybody can play. It is mentally the toughest sport. I love a challenge. I am obsessed with trying to be something that not everybody can be. My love for the game then grew because wait, all these other people are just having fun with it and they don't see it as a challenge. They see it as a game. That is so beautiful. That I can see something with this intricate level of detail. And some people can see it so simplistic. And we both get the same level of enjoyment out of it. I think that's the beauty of baseball is that it's so challenging and can also be simple.
I have two things I really want to talk about. I think the first thing I want to talk about is what we touched on earlier. Everybody ends their career at some point, but 0.00001% of them get to end it on their own terms. Hall of famers are the only people who can really end their career on their own terms. FIU for me, was the realization of, wow, there is a level of competition that is this good. Just because I ended my career at FIU, and someone else might end their career three years later in a minor league system, we both went through shared experiences as baseball players.
And the second thing I wanted to say, what I want to say to all people who are listening is, if you need help, ask. If you are struggling, tell someone. You're not alone. No one's ever alone. We can all reflect on the vulnerability in our own lives and find a way to conquer it. It's just about finding what works for you.