Braylen Wimmer Looks to Bounce Back After Brain Surgery

Hitting a baseball is hard, but that’s nothing compared to what former South Carolina infielder Braylen Wimmer (2020-2023) is doing now. Wimmer recently underwent brain surgery on November 19 to remove a golf ball size mass of tissue behind his left ear that was discovered last month.

“It’s a called an awake craniotomy,” Wimmer said of his surgery. “They put me asleep to start to the incision. Once that was over, they woke me up. So, I was awake for an hour and half and there were two other doctors I was talking to while they removed the mass. It was like being at the dentist when they’re scraping your teeth. It felt like he was scraping my brain with a piece of metal. I didn’t feel it because I was medicated in that area. I remember at one point the right side of my face seized up, and I couldn’t really talk. That was the only time I felt something. I was awake and talking the whole time. Then they put me back asleep to stitch up my incision.”

Wimmer was in ICU the next day and then was able to go home the following morning.

“It has been pretty crazy and super emotional for me,” Wimmer said. “The first couple of days after surgery, I was doing really well. They gave me a bunch of medicine, but I couldn’t eat much. The biggest pain was that the stitches were so tight.”

A few days later he had some complications. He became very sick to his stomach and then lost the ability to speak for several days. He had another seizure which led to a return to the hospital.

“I was just lying there in the hospital thinking my life was ruined,” Wimmer said. “I couldn’t talk and at one point, I couldn’t even hear. It was Thanksgiving Day when my speech started to come back. I think I cried every morning for about a week straight. I couldn’t believe I was alive. I still have a little bit of stutter sometimes, but my strength is coming back.”

Two weeks later, he was hitting soft tossed balls and recently had his dad throw him batting practice as he tries to resume some sense of normalcy and chase his professional baseball dreams, which is where the scary chapter of his life began.

Wimmer started most of his four years for the Gamecocks, hitting over .300 in each of his last two seasons. As a senior in 2023, he hit .304 with career bests in home runs (14) and RBI (42) while leading the Gamecocks with 13 stolen bases. Now playing professional baseball in the Colorado Rockies organization, Wimmer was participating in the Arizona Fall League last month. While riding to the ballpark, something went wrong.

“Everything was normal that day,” Wimmer recalled. “I hit BP, took ground balls, and did everything in the morning before we left to play a game. I got on the bus, and I started to hear this really loud ringing inside my head. My first thought was that something was wrong with the bus. Luckily, (teammate) Charlie Condon was sitting right across from me. I started tapping him and said, ‘I feel weird.’ The right side of my face started getting numb and was seizing up. At that point, I knew something was off, and I told Charlie I think I need to go to the hospital. They pulled the bus over and the ambulance came. I went to the hospital in Scottsdale.”

Wimmer initially thought it was a panic attack, but the MRI came back to him on his phone before the doctors came in, and he found out he had a mass on his brain. The doctor told him it was a grade 2 astrocytoma, which is a form of brain cancer. The 24-year old was scared.

“The first words out of my mouth were, I’m dead,” Wimmer said. “I didn’t know anything about it. It was the scariest moment of my life.
“It was on the left side of my brain near my speech and motor skills area.”

Now in Oklahoma City with his parents and girlfriend, Wimmer is awaiting the full pathology to see what the next steps might be for his care, but he has had all restrictions taken off him by his medical team. For now, he’s trying to play baseball.

“I’ve done a lot of research about what kills cancer cells,” Wimmer said. “I’m still trying to figure a lot of things out. I’ll do everything I possibly can from diet, to hyperbaric oxygen chambers, and anything else. I don’t have any other choice.

“I’m working my way back. I’m hoping to hit off a (pitching) machine next week. I’m throwing and catching ground balls. I’ve been lifting almost every day.”

A GoFundMe page was set up in his name as friends and former Gamecock teammates have rallied around Wimmer, and he noted that prayers are certainly appreciated. For now, Wimmer is trying to get back to normal.

“I’ll never take anything that I can do for granted ever again,” Wimmer said. “I started playing baseball when I was three. It’s all I’ve ever known. My plan is to be at Spring Training in February.

“I also want to help people who may be going through something like this. Maybe this is my purpose.”