A pair of Oklahoma pitchers announced their departures from the Sooners’ softball roster on Monday.
True senior Macy McAdoo and sophomore Emmy Guthrie both announced their medical retirements from the sport, in separate social media posts.
McAdoo was the 31st-ranked player in the class of 2019 and spent three years on the OU roster. She made 22 appearances in the circle as a Sooner, including taking the circle four times in the 2022 campaign. She ends her career with 30.2 innings pitched, five wins, and 22 strikeouts to her credit. All five of her wins came during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.
“To my family, friends and [OU] fans. Some of you know but most don’t so I will tell my story,” McAdoo wrote on Instagram on Monday. “I am currently sitting here in a recliner, ice on, hip brace and crutches sitting next to me. In the past month I’ve had to make the hardest decision of my life and I had to make it to better my current and future self. I made the decision to Medically Retire from playing softball. My body has suffered the unimaginable in the past two years and I would never wish what I’ve had to go through on anyone else. In the past 494 days I have experienced so much pain and suffering due to my hips. On may 10, 2021 i went under for my first hip surgery due to collapsing in the bullpen mid pitch. I had to have my labrum in my hip replaced with 3 anchors, they had to extract a piece of my hip bone that broke off during the impact. As well as shave off pieces off my hip bone and repair multiple torn ligaments. That was hip surgery 1, and it was a hard and long process. I was still currently doing rehab up until the end of this past season. Around the first week of May, I was pitching in the bullpen like everyday and I collapsed again… I knew that feeling and I knew that I didn’t like that feeling. I tried to ignore the feeling and just pretend like it didn’t happen. Well it did…
“We won the National Championship on June 9th on June 13th I was in the MRI machine to determine if I had to have another surgery. Results come back and there’s no shock, I have torn my other hips labrum. I was devastated… I was thinking this couldn’t happen to me again… yet it was. I had all summer to decide what I was going to do with my life and it still was so hard to actually say out loud that I was done. If I would have known that the last time I was in the sooner softball uniform was my last then I would of cherished it way more. If i knew that last time I got to throw a pitch was the last time I would of cherished it more. If i knew it was the last time I would get to be playing with my sisters I would have cherished it. But God has my back and is steering me through this time in my life. I have devoted everything in my life to him and he is taking care of me like always.
“I will still be with the team and still be surrounded by the girls but I will never have the privilege of putting on another softball uniform. To all college athletes take care of your self and let God lead the way in everything you do. Thank you to my parents for everything that they have sacrificed and gave me, thank you to my family for the endless support, thank you to my many coaches for all the time that you have spent on me, and thank you to my friends that have been by my side though all of this. Having two hip surgeries in two years while being under the age of 22 is a lot, but as it says in Philippians 2:12-13.”
Guthrie, for her part, was the 22nd-ranked player in the class of 2021. She did not appear in a game for the Sooners during their run to the 2022 Women’s College World Series title after being named the Gatorade Player of the Year for the state of Oklahoma as a senior in high school.
Jamie Guthrie, Emmy’s mother who also played college softball at Central Oklahoma, wrote about the true sophomore’s medical issues in a social media post of her own:
“For those who have asked, Emmy has made the decision to medically retire from softball. The past couple of years she has been sick. We finally got answers last spring, and we were hopeful that her humira injections would be a miracle drug that would enable her to keep chasing her dream of OU softball( that barely got started). Even though she has had some improvement, it’s not enough improvement to be able to keep up with a pretty brutal schedule that is required to play at this level. Maybe someday things will be different for her, but for now we are just trusting God’s plan for her.”
Following the departures of both McAdoo and Guthrie, the Sooners’ roster now sits at 20 members for the 2023 season. That group includes 12 returners, 4 transfers, and 4 incoming freshmen.
