Even as she listened to the voice on the other end, Kay Bohan wasn’t convinced. It had been months since she sent out a letter to thousands of professional athletes requesting a signed item to help raise money to build a permanent home for the Rocky Mountain Deaf School in Golden.
The response was overwhelming but never this personal. Jason Grilli, a reliever for the Rockies, was on the other line, wanting to know if she received his autographed memorabilia.
“I was so taken aback that he would actually call, I was like, ‘Who is this again?’ ” Bohan recalled last week. “He was asking how we are doing and what else he could do to help.”
So began a relationship that has put smiles on faces, an intersection of a cause and an athlete who has long thought outside the batter’s box.
Bohan’s 9-year-old son, Troy, is profoundly deaf. He has attended Rocky Mountain since he was 15 months old, when, on that day, Kay realized that doctors were wrong.
“They kept telling me he was autistic. He would bang his head for hours, had suffered strokes and seizures,” Bohan said. “I stopped by their toddler program, and he couldn’t move his right leg, but he crawled and grabbed a Goldfish cracker and put it in his mouth. I knew I had found a school for our son. All he needed was a language. He was aching to communicate.”
Hearing the story, Grilli’s eyes lit up. He works for 5Links, a private voice-over IP business that sells a cutting-edge videophone. Grilli realized what kind of impact this technology could potentially have at the school. Grilli, whose work demands constant travel, carries the phone everywhere. It’s how his wife told him she was pregnant, how he watched his father open a birthday gift.
“Anyone can sign a few autographs. I wanted to make a difference,” Grilli said.
He set the school up with videophones. A local country club plans to donate money from a spring fundraiser to help every student have a phone.
“It can be life-altering for some of the kids,” Bohan said.
From a distance, Grilli’s rise to the big leagues seems almost a cliche. His dad pitched for the Tigers, and Jason was a first-round draft choice in 1997. But not long after he was taken out of Seton Hall, just 22 credits shy of his business marketing degree, Grilli’s road “went from smooth to gravel-paved.”
Traded from the Giants to the Marlins for Livan Hernandez, he suffered a serious elbow injury in 2001. He teased his mom as he perused the classifieds, telling her if the surgery was unsuccessful he would follow up on a pizza boy ad. Deep down, however, Grilli was scared. He vowed to make it back to the big leagues, but even he wasn’t sure how long the ride would last.
“That’s the trap you fall into in this business. You sign out of high school or out of college early whether you are given $25,000 or a Snicker’s bar and a pair of cleats,” Grilli said. “They were getting ready to cut on my arm, and I knew as much as I loved baseball, I couldn’t keep all my eggs in this basket.”
Always a gadget guy, Grilli joined 5Links a little more than two years ago. It’s a marriage of his college background, his personal website and general interest in business. He’s hoping to work out a deal with rapper 50 Cent regarding the videophones. Singer Montel Jordan and former Broncos defensive end Neil Smith are among those who work with 5Links.
“Jason certainly breaks the mold. I knew that right away after I met him,” said Andre Maronian, 5Links senior vice president. “He’s very savvy. But he’s not the kind of guy that’s like, ‘I am a baseball player and you’re not.’ He’s humble and people are drawn to him.”
For Grilli, the transition to Colorado has been an easy one after a messy exit in Detroit. A target of fans at Comerica Park, the 31-year-old right-hander has gone 3-1 with a 2.76 ERA in 49 games for the Rockies, developing into a trusted setup man.
But it was that first conversation with Bohan that may ultimately define his season.
“I am blessed to do a job that is so fun,” Grilli said, “but supporting something that is this positive means a lot.”
Troy E. Renck: 303-954-1301 or trenck@denverpost.com
