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The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel has an excellent profile on Jeremy Jeffress up this morning ahead of the start of the NLCS. It’s a great look into the emotion Jeffress shows on and off the field after his struggles with addiction and how he changed after entering rehab.
But the article also provides some insight into a question many people were asking early last week: why was Jeremy Jeffress not available in Game 163 against the Chicago Cubs?
The team said it was a medical issue they weren’t going to disclose, but according to Jeffress himself, it was related to his epilepsy.
“I’ve had to deal with issues related to epilepsy throughout my life,” Jeffress said this week. “It’s not an everyday thing, not something that happens a lot, but it’s part of my life.
“That Monday in Chicago, I was working through it and they decided to hold me out. I was good to pitch and ready to go but respect their decision.”
It’s something that Jeffress has struggled with for a long time, and led to the marijuana use that had him one strike away from a lifetime ban under minor league baseball’s drug testing policy that punishes players for recreational drug use as he tried to self-medicate (the MLBPA prevents testing for marijuana at the Major League level).
Hopefully this helps further dispel some of the unfounded rumors that were going around on Twitter after the Brewers’ win in Game 163 and questions on why he wasn’t celebrating with the team on that day. For what it’s worth, Jeffress was a prominent part of the celebration in Colorado after the Brewers completed their NLDS sweep.