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by Henry Nichols
Staff Writer
 

Tim Corbin has seen quite a few great pitchers come and go since his tenure as Vanderbilt’s baseball coach started in 2003.
 

David Price went No. 1 overall in the 2007 Major League Baseball Draft and is a future Cy Young candidate as a starter in the Tampa Bay Rays rotation. Jeremy Sowers went No. 6 overall to Cleveland in the 2004 draft and has started 15 games with the Tribe this season. Mikie Minor, Vandy’s ace in 2009, went No. 7 overall to the Atlanta Braves in June and started his first game in the minors last night for Class A Rome.
 

Perhaps the greatest pitching product of Commodore coaching, however, is Casey Weathers, who served as Team USA’s closer during and after his time on West End. The converted outfielder from the City College of San Francisco transferred to Vanderbilt in 2005 as the least heralded pitcher in the ‘Dores’ first No. 1 nationally-ranked recruiting class and left as the No. 8 overall pick to the Colorado Rockies in 2007.
 

“He’s such as strong-armed kid and he possesses two quality pitches: a very explosive fastball and breaking ball,” Corbin said. “I just think he’s got a lot of ceiling based on the fact that he hasn’t pitched much and is still learning how to pitch in a lot of ways.”
 

Unfortunately for Weathers, who many projected to be called up to the Rockies quickly because he was drafted as a closer, he is currently sitting out the 2009 season recovering from Tommy John surgery, which doctors recommended after he returned from the Olympics where he last pitched for Team USA.
 

“I was really disappointed. I kind of felt like I let the Rockies down,” Weathers said. “After the Olympics, I finally felt like I was starting to gain the consistency that I was going to need for (the Major League) level.”
 

“To be honest with you,” Corbin said, “he would be the last guy I thought would have Tommy John surgery because he was fresh, he was strong, his arm and mechanics were clean. It just wasn’t a recipe for disaster as far as arm injuries were concerned.”
 
In fact, Weathers' devotion to proper mechanics, specifically using his legs, has earned him devotees from many professional pitching critics.
 
"Many of my students know who Casey Weathers is," Carlos Gomez wrote in The Hardball Times blog in 2007. "Why? Because I try to make them copy his lower body action. Vanderbilt's pitching coach, Derek Johnson, and I share many views on mechanics."
 
Understandably, with Price and other top prospects he’s faced and played with from high-level competition getting called up already, it’s tough for Weathers to just sit and watch.
 

“I can’t really control that. I just need to get my work in,” Weathers said. “Everything happens for a reason I guess, so I can just take care of my rehab and get stronger.”
 

Weathers is currently about ten months into what he says is a 12-to-15 month recovery process. While his arm is starting to feel better, he and his doctors are being cautious.
 
“I’ve had some bone inflammation,” Weathers said. “What happens is, for the surgery they drill into your elbow so they can work on the tendon. It’s been a slow-healing bone.
 

“If I was healthy, I feel like I could throw 90.”
 

Part of the reason for Weathers’ success at Vanderbilt was because, even though he was so raw, he did everything he was asked by Johnson, Collegiate Baseball's National College Pitching Coach of the Year in 2004.
 

“Work ethic is a big thing. You’re not gonna get recruited by Vandy unless they see something in you and they think you can do the work required,” Weathers said. “I don’t think I would have been drafted as high if they didn’t think I had the tools to make it in the big leagues.
 

“I told DJ numerous times that I’ll do whatever you say because I didn’t know much about pitching. When (Vanderbilt) recruits ask me for advice, I tell them that I did everything the man told me to do. Everything. He turned me into what I am.”
 

And though Coach Johnson’s prototype disciple is shelved until further notice, Corbin thinks that it is just a matter of time before Weathers is physically able, once again, to work towards his potential like Price, Sowers and former ace Jensen Lewis.
 

“Tommy John surgery is 100 percent recoverable for anyone and being better than you were when you had it is completely based on rehab,” Corbin said.
 

“But Casey Weathers will be better than he was, because if you could (grade out) an A-plus on rehab, Casey Weathers is that guy.”