Clint Frazier was a highly touted prospect with equally high expectations during his time with the New York Yankees. However, the results were mixed and Frazier never ascended to the level many anticipated.
Frazier was released in late November and later signed with the Chicago Cubs. That change has breathed new life into him and now Frazier is opening up about some of his past struggles.
During an appearance on Barstool’s Short Porch podcast, Frazier revealed that he suffered mental health issues during his time with the Yankees. It impacted him both on and off the field.
“I never understood the whole mental health stuff until like recently,” said Frazier, via Yahoo! Sports. “When you go through something for so long, and you just feel the same way every single day, it’s really hard to move forward. And the way that I was feeling was affecting my quality of life. I was severely symptomatic with some of these past issues that I was having. I was like, ‘We gotta pick the pace up. I need help. I need serious [expletive] help.’
“I needed to separate baseball and my health because, like I said, it was about quality of life at this point. I was severely struggling with this stuff. … It just drug out because we didn’t have the diagnosis.”
Despite the issues, which manifested in different ways, Frazier admits he never brought it to the Yankees’ attention.
“They weren’t aware, that was on me. I was fighting for my life,” Frazier said. “And I fizzled out. I was trying to continue to play. So I didn’t tell them. And then I showed up to spring training and started to feel better, and then it kind of, like, came back, because I had an instance where I bumped the wall again. I went into the whole season feeling that exact way.”
Frazier added that he doesn’t have an issue with many Yankees — including general manager Brian Cashman — but envisions sharing a few words when the Cubs visit the Bronx in 2022.
“Yeah, there’s a lot of conversation that need to be had in person, and there’s a couple people that are very deserving of conversations that I would like to have in person, especially whenever I’m there. I’m not calling nobody, I’m not doing it over text,” Frazier said. “There are some things that I am going to say. And I don’t know who it’s going to be, it just depends on who it is because there’s some things that I want to address now and some things that are very like damaging to my career-type things that were said after I was released that were making it exponentially harder for me to sign on with a team.”
The Yankees will host the Cubs for a three-game series in June.
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