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The greatest lessons came from his mother, Patty Snider, or rather because of her. When Snider was 14, she slipped into a coma. She emerged from it with memory loss and a damaged liver, and her marriage with Snider’s father, Denne, ended. Snider needed to take care of his mother and himself. All of his grievances – each a derivation of how and why – found resolution in anger-management counseling and his greatest outlet, baseball.
And just when Snider thought he had come to peace with himself and his story, Patty’s car swerved across a highway median in 2007, and she was killed days shy of her 50th birthday.
Even there, the Blue Jays were initially skeptical. Area scouts turned Toronto onto Snider, and assistant GM Tony LaCava visited Washington often. Ricciardi wouldn’t sign off on the pick until he saw Snider, and he didn’t want to see Snider against high school competition, where he could face an inferior pitcher or get walked.
So the Blue Jays flew Snider to Rogers Centre, and Ricciardi threw batting practice to Snider. After a few left-handed swings, he needed little convincing.
