Kyle Cliff was a member of the 2013 On Deck O’s and graduated from Central Cabarrus High School in 2013. He signed with Limestone College, out of high school, but decided to transfer to a junior college in order to make an attempt to achieve his goal of playing DI baseball.
While pitching in the Fall of 2014 for Roane State Community College (TN), he realized he could not grip the baseball and his hand was cramping and turned blue.
Immediately, Kyle went to see a doctor in TN to see what was going on and the medical staff quickly became concerned when they could not record a blood pressure in his left arm (throwing arm). They were finally able to record it and it was over 80 points different than his right arm. An ultra sound revealed a blood clot in Kyle’s axillary artery and he was immediately placed on bed rest.
Kyle was immediately admitted and spend 4 days in the hospital and went through 3 angioplasty procedures to get the clot removed.
He came to Charlotte and made an appointment with the Sanger Clinic. The medical staff determined his hand was in really bad shape and needed immediate attention. He was admitted and had a catheter inserted that was used to open up and increase the blood flow to the hand. He spent 3 days in intensive care due to the risk of bleeding out because of the high dosages of blood thinner he was on.
During the procedure it was determined that Kyle needed bypass surgery of the axillary artery in order to not only pitch again, but to just function.
On November 24, 2014 he had axillary bypass surgery which took a vein from his leg to be used in his chest.
The doctor cleared Kyle to pitch again, but since he had not completed this surgery on anyone under 65 years of age, did not know what kind of rehab to put me on, so he created one with the assistance of all of his former baseball coaches.
Kyle was not enrolled in school for spring 2015, because he was working himself back from the surgery. He spent that time getting back into shape, and was able to gain the attention of Elgin Community College in Elgin, IL. They offered him a scholarship, so he enrolled there in fall of 2015.
He started the season throwing pretty well and had a great fall campaign. UNCG saw him in September and began the recruiting process.
On November 24, 2015, exactly one year removed from bypass surgery he was sitting in the offices of the UNCG baseball staff where Head Coach Link Jarrett told Kyle he wanted him to play for UNCG and offered him a spot. The journey and dream continue…!
