SURPRISE, Ariz.
The latest comeback began with a phone call, a baseball Hail Mary on a quiet day last November. It lasted 45 minutes in all, a series of inquiries and questions and a dose of skepticism from an aging 35-year-old pitcher.
Chien-Ming Wang was not yet convinced — not completely, anyway — but he had few places to turn. This new plan represented hope. A decade ago, he had won 19 games in back-to-back seasons for the New York Yankees. By last summer, he was still lost into the darkness, his career beginning to fade away.