Ex-Met Ed Hearn, seeking kidney transplant, faces uphill battle
Former Met Ed Hearn is afraid of heights.
He’s not afraid of dying.
He is, though, worried about what could die with him.
These things don’t immediately seem correlated, except that Hearn, 62, who’s on eight hours of dialysis a day for his failing kidney, was invited to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in March. There was a beat of confusion, and then understanding: Someone else — a baseball fan named Bobby McLaughlin — was going to climb in his name, and in the process, try to find Hearn the living kidney donor he likely needs to stay alive.
“I’ve done a lot of things here the last 25, 30 years through my talks, my book, encouraging people,” said Hearn, who’s had two transplants and multiple bouts of cancer and battled deep depression before becoming a motivational speaker, author and now transplant activist. “But my last journey, if I get a kidney, will be educating people on what Bobby is doing. I’m not climbing a mountain, but I’m going to use the gifts I’ve been given as a speaker and a former athlete. I know I’m not a big-name guy, but we need to educate the world to save people’s lives.”
For many, Hearn’s claim to fame was being part of one of the most lopsided trades in baseball history. He is the catcher the Mets sent to the Royals in March 1987 in a package for David Cone.
Hearn is a 1986 world champion with significant promise whose major-league career was cut short by injury. He was, at times, reviled in Kansas City, which is 20 minutes from where he lives in Shawnee, Kansas, with his wife, Tricia, a nurse from Lindenhurst.
But athletes are people, more than bits of esoteric baseball trivia, and Hearn proved as much in his post-retirement life — one spent not only highlighting the importance of organ donation but of moving on after the death of his major-league dream.
Former Met Ed Hearn with his wife Tricia.
Credit: Courtesy of Ed Hearn
But Hearn’s transplant — and his ability to continue his life’s work — is compromised. He previously received a kidney 20 years ago, and last year it stopped working the way it should — its function now is down to 7 or 8%, he said.
It generally takes three to five years to get a transplant the “typical” way, on UNOS, the nation’s United Network for Organ Sharing. But live donation — a kidney from a living donor — is possible and is becoming more accessible through the National Kidney Registry, a non-profit that helps donors and recipients create a sort of kidney chain.
World Kidney Day
Someone donates a kidney, and even if it’s not a match for the person whom the donor directly wants to help, it kicks off a chain reaction in which a more suitable donor can “exchange” one kidney for another. Once the process begins, the typical wait time for a match is about two months, according to the registry.
“We all have spare kidneys, for God sakes,” Hearn said. “We can solve this problem worldwide . . . if we can just educate the public about what’s possible. That’s what Bobby is doing climbing this mountain.”
McLaughlin, 55, donated his own kidney to a stranger in 2019 after discovering that his surgically repaired wrist contained donor bone and tissue. Since then, he’s been highly active in the transplant community and, from March 3 to World Kidney Day on March 9, he’ll join 33 climbers — organ donors, recipients and doctors — in hopes of bringing more attention to living donation.
McLaughlin, of Seattle, saw Hearn’s search for a kidney on social media, and being a baseball fan, he was immediately moved. Plus, he figured he owed the Mets one. He caught Lee Mazzilli’s game-tying pinch hit home run during the 1979 All-Star Game at the old Kingdome and never figured out how to give it back.
Grim statistics
“I tried for a long time, but being a nobody, it was hard to get connected to someone of that stature,” McLaughlin said. “Through a kidney community, I heard about this 1986 World Series guy that needed a kidney and I thought no way — how random but not random is this connection.”
Bobby McLaughlin will climb Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania in support of former Met Ed Hearn.
Credit: Courtesy of Bobby McLaughlin
Hearn is delighted by McLaughlin’s generosity, but even in that, the former catcher is more concerned about the bigger picture than the specter of an early death. He rattles off the mortality statistics for people on dialysis with casual efficiency. He’s three months into this latest round, he notes, so unless he gets a kidney transplant, there’s at least a 50% chance he’ll be dead in five years. About 13 Americans a day die waiting for a kidney, he said — a number that’s backed up by the American Kidney Association.
“And that doesn’t scare me at all,” Hearn said. “It’s been a tough road. My wife, for 35 years, she’s done nothing but take care of me . . . The only thing I’ve done for these last 30 years is be married and be a father and make a difference. I think that’s so important.”
Putting prayers into action
That’s not to say he isn’t trying. Hearn posted about needing a transplant last March, but he hasn’t had any luck. Twenty years ago, he noted, he simply told about 75 people that he needed a kidney, and 13 immediately stepped up to get tested. Now he doesn’t even need a match — just someone willing to donate and go on the kidney registry.
For many donors, the surgery is laparoscopic — two small incisions — and most patients are able to leave the hospital after two days, according to the American Kidney Association. As with all surgeries, there is the potential for complications.
Hearn joked that though he hasn’t had any offers on social media, he sure has had plenty of prayer hand emojis on his posts. “But Bobby? He takes action. I love prayers, but I believe in taking action [too],” he said. “Bobby is the antithesis of the praying hands . . .
“I told him, have you ever heard of the apple seed? Anyone can count the seeds in one apple, but no one can count the apples in one seed . . . I told him, you have no idea, brother — you have no idea how many lives you’re going to save and change with this.”
For Hearn, another chance — and another kidney — means an opportunity to keep being part of that, too.
Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.
