CHICAGO — Carter Hawkins had to do a double take.
He had heard what he was told, but he didn’t really listen to it.
“You’re having twins,” the doctor told him and his wife, Lindsay.
Hawkins had taken a red-eye flight from Arizona during spring training back to Cleveland — he was the assistant general manager there at the time — to be at the appointment and couldn’t rest, so surely it was the sleep deprivation.
“I thought I was in a dream because I hadn’t slept,” the Cubs general manager said. “The doctor’s telling us there’s two in there and I was like, ‘Is there supposed to be two?’”
It was the day that changed the life of the Cubs’ general manager – the day he learned he’d be a father.
On Father’s Day, Hawkins and some of the other dads on the Cubs recalled the journey from the moment they found out to today and what they call the greatest job on earth: fatherhood.
‘Am I ready?’
Justin Turner returned to his house in Boston after the 2023 season and walked into his bedroom where a gift bag was wrapped up on his bed from his wife, Kourtney.
It wasn’t his birthday or anything noteworthy, so he was unsure why the bag sat there. He opened it and inside was a positive pregnancy test. He let out a smile and immediately hugged Kourtney.
“I was completely shocked, overwhelmed with excitement,” Turner recalled. “It was a very special night.”
“Talk about life-changing … there’s nothing more beautiful than becoming a parent.”
Dansby Swanson on the emotion of learning he will become a father 🫶 pic.twitter.com/dg1tdYCkW1
— Marquee Sports Network (@WatchMarquee) May 9, 2025
The feeling is pure bliss for the first time – but it comes with plenty of questions and, understandably, concerns.
“Wow, am I ready for this? What do I do?” Cubs left-hander Matthew Boyd recalled. “I don’t even know what to do.”
Naturally, you can ask for help – but might receive a common message.
“Nothing,” Hawkins recalled a friend with children telling him. “So that was pretty wild.”
The best a father-to-be can do is to be supportive.
“I think it’s about staying in the moment,” Turner said. “Being there and being supportive for your wife and obviously the miracle that she’s going through and embrace every moment.”
Surreal moment
Craig Counsell was manning shortstop for the Arizona Diamondbacks on May 3, 2003, against the Atlanta Braves when he received a message late in the game: his wife, Michelle was going into labor.
“It’s incredible news to get and it makes you go into the gamut of emotions,” Counsell said. “Mostly nerves and excitement and wanting to be there for your wife.”
The Cubs manager finished the game out and went to the hospital with her and their son, Brady, was born.
“It was a great night. Sleepless night,” Counsell said. “I actually played the next day which I really wanted to and Michelle wanted me to.”
Why?
“I just really wanted to play for my son. I was excited,” Counsell said.
Seeing their child for the first time was an indescribable event.
“Watching [Bo] come out, hearing him scream, cry for the first time, they set him right on my wife’s chest and she got to hold him – it was just a surreal moment,” Turner said. “And not too long after that she let me hold him and he just laid his head right on my chest and I think that’ll always be my favorite feeling in the world.”
It’s a long process, so finally meeting the little one makes it worth the wait.
“You got the sonograms and the doctor appointments and everything like that, but once he’s out in the real world, and you’re holding him, you can’t really describe it,” Cubs reliever Ryan Pressly said. “It’s one of those things where you’re slightly like, ‘Wow, this is for real now.’”
It can be overwhelming, in a good way.
“I just bawled my eyes out,” Cubs right-hander Ethan Roberts said. “There’s really nothing, honestly in words, that you can describe it without experiencing it.”
It changes a father immediately. That’s impressive, for a professional baseball who has dedicated their whole life to themselves to try and reach the epitome of the game.
“I just remember when I’m holding [Meira for the first time], you just go, ‘I would do anything for her,” Boyd said. “I would give my life for her. I would literally, I mean that, give my life for her. Words can’t even describe it.
“This is a different level of responsibility but I would give my life for this girl.”
“I think you understand love on a deeper level when you hold your child for the first time,” Counsell said.
A new normal
Counsell immediately jumped into playing, but just three days after Brady’s birth, he injured his thumb on a slide – a frustrating injury for any player, but in this case had a benefit for him.
See, players can be placed on the paternity list after the birth of a child and can spend up to three days on it. Counsell was out for a little over two months with the injury.
“I got to spend a little bit extra time with him those first couple of weeks,” Counsell said. “I always do feel for players that when they have their first child and they’re there for the birth and then we go on a road trip.
“And in a weird way, you think about it, you’ve missed half your son’s life or daughter’s life when you went on a road trip and he or she’s a week old.”
Players have to quickly return to work – their life turned upside down but still expected to perform at an elite level. The highs are public, just like the lows. Having a child back home can help those days stay at the park.
“Hector Rondón – I played with him in Houston – he told me when you have kids and you have a bad outing, once you get home, that bad outing just disappears,” Pressly said. “Because there’s nothing better than seeing your daughter, your son, and in my case both of them.
“It’s just ‘Dad! How did you get here?’ And they’re so excited just to see you. To me, it just melts all the problems away.”
It’s important to have that separation. That’s tough for Hawkins, whose job as general manager can make it feel 24/7 at times.
“The challenge is figuring out good ways to unplug, having good structures and strategies to do that, whether that’s putting your phone away or putting it in a different room so you’re not tempted to look at it,” Hawkins said. “It definitely is nearly impossible to be a good dad if you’re not focused on being a good dad.
“Every time I see my wife, every time I’m with our kids for an hour or two, I realize that my wife has a much more difficult job than I do. I think that appreciation kind of puts your focus into, ‘Hey, I need to have some full effort here in order to do this job well. It’s a job. It’s a rewarding job, but it’s definitely a job.”
Unique upbringing
As a young major leaguer, Pressly saw veterans like Joe Mauer and Glen Perkins bring their kids to the Minnesota Twins facility.
“I always dreamed of having that,” Pressly said.
Now, every so often during a homestand, young Wyatt Pressly can be seen scurrying around the Cubs clubhouse or accompanying his dad throughout Wrigley Field. It’s a fun and one-of-a-kind experience, but it’s an opportunity to be a parent and teach them, too.
“My son loves hanging out with [Kyle Tucker] and [Pete Crow-Armstrong],” Pressly said. “He just loves watching them hit, just being around. I think it’s good for him, too, because he sees the way that everybody kind of carries themselves and that’s how I want my son to be.
“I tell him, ‘You got to act like a big kid if you’re going to be in the clubhouse.’”
For Cubs players, playing more day games than any other MLB team is a benefit in allowing them to enjoy some extra time with their children.
“Obviously, early in my career, we don’t have as many day games as the Cubs,” Pressly said. “So I would get home, and they would already be asleep. You get back to the house at like 11:30, 12 o’clock and you don’t wind down till maybe one or two o’clock in the morning and then by the time they wake up, they’re getting ready for school and get taken to school and you don’t even really get any time with them.”
Pressly – like Boyd – makes sure to bring his son to the clubhouse because it’s valuable bonding time.
“I missed a lot of things earlier in my daughter’s [life],” Pressly said. “I didn’t get to see her take her first step, I didn’t get to hear my son say his first words. So in that aspect, it kind of stinks because you feel like you miss a lot.
“So when you get a chance to spend time with them, you try to spend as much as you can so that’s why I like bringing them in here and just as much as I can just hanging out with them.”
After some weekend home games in the summer, the Cubs make Wrigley Field accessible to players and their kids, allowing them to play and run around on the historic field.
“Probably my favorite thing is to take them out on a Sunday, maybe the team’s on the road and I’m not traveling, and just kind of run around the outfield with them and just realizing how lucky we are to be here and have such a wonderful place to work and live,” Hawkins said. “Just those moments while all five of us are together and spending quality time and we do that in the Cubs environment, it’s even better.”
Fatherhood is a never-ending occupation, though.
“As a parent and as a dad, we put way more effort doing that than we do doing our jobs,” Counsell said. “It means the world to just be able to watch them as they get older, do their own thing, and even when they’re younger, it means the world to help teach them right and wrong and then to kind of let them make the mistakes.”
And watching them grow up is a rewarding feeling for Dad.
“The best moments are always really when they’ve achieved something after struggle,” Counsell said. “That’s hopefully when you’re helping them, teaching them, because that’s what life’s about. It shouldn’t always be perfect.
“And that’s the fun of it, is that you got to go through some struggles and you got to go through some bad and that makes the good stuff even better.”
That’s what it means to be a father. That’s what makes it better than anything else – even playing in the big leagues.
“It’s the best job anybody could ever have,” Counsell said. “And I’ve loved doing it. And [I] can’t wait for grandkids someday, to be honest with you.”