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Posted by Emily on 12/3/2005, 11:26 am SANTA ANA, Calif. -- Doctors have been busy this offseason fixing various parts of J.D. Drew's anatomy, but Thursday he showed there's nothing wrong with his heart. In a Santa Ana warehouse, Drew jumped into the assembly line with volunteers who were putting the finishing touches on shoe boxes filled with donated holiday gifts that would soon be shipped out to children in the Philippines, Nepal, Indonesia and Sri Lanka. When Drew learned that one of six national processing centers for "Operation Christmas Child" was in Southern California, he said it was a no-brainer to combine a local visit with Dodgers doctors to get a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to get all those gifts into the hands of all those kids. "Operation Christmas Child" is conducted by Samaritan's Purse, a faith-based charitable organization with ties to Drew's hometown charity, the Mailbox Club International, which follows up the gifts to the kids with a bible study session. "This is where my heart is," said Drew, who not only signed autographs and posed for pictures with volunteers, but spent 90 minutes working the line. "This is a partnership. Eight million kids will get these gift boxes and about 2 million will take part in the bible lesson. "Three years ago, I helped hand out these boxes to kids in the Dominican Republic and two years ago to a Native American reservation near the Grand Canyon. You should see how the faces of those kids light up. But I had never seen first-hand all the work involved. That's one of the reasons I'm here. Another is to encourage people in Los Angeles to produce more boxes." While most of the contents of the shoe boxes are donated by the public, corporations contribute, too. For example, hundreds of pallets full of surplus Happy Meal toys were provided by the McDonald's Corporation, allowing for one toy to be added to each shoe box. To date, more than 280,000 boxes had been processed through the Santa Ana facility, trucked in from 1,500 relay centers. "It's an awesome honor to be here," Drew told the workers. "The work you're doing doesn't go unnoticed." A day earlier, Drew said doctors found his recovery from operations on his right wrist and right shoulder to be healing on schedule. The right wrist had cleanup work to bone on the top of the wrist and the repair of a slight ligament tear. The shoulder had a "bucket-handle" tear to the labrum repaired. No surgery was needed on the bone chip in his left wrist, the result of being hit by a pitch July 3, ending his season. "The shoulder will take the longest; they said three months," said Drew, who had the operations Sept. 20. "I'm completely optimistic I'll be ready for the season. When I would throw, it would burn for 15 to 45 seconds, then go away. But as it got weaker, I noticed in the batting cage it would fatigue. I'll take it nice and easy throwing in the spring." Drew, signed to a five-year, $55 million contract last winter, said he continues his therapy work while monitoring the events of a tumultuous offseason for his club, which has lost its manager and general manager since the season ended. "I've been in the Major Leagues for eight years and this is the business side and it can happen to any front office," said Drew. "I know Frank [McCourt, chairman] wants to put a winner on the field for the fans as much as anyone."
209.215.107.240
Outfielder also on schedule in recovery from surgeries
By Ken Gurnick / MLB.com
12/01/2005
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