ADRIAN — When Saul Bosquez joined the Army in 2006, it wasn’t exactly a lifelong dream. It was more like a last resort. 

After graduating from Adrian High School in 2003, he went to college but it wasn’t turning out the way he’d hoped. Bosquez had worked some summer jobs in factories and didn’t think he’d fit there either, and in Lenawee County, other options for work were limited. So he enlisted, changing the course of his life forever. 

Six months into his first deployment in 2007, he was hit by a roadside bomb that resulted in the loss of his left leg below the knee. 

“I was an athlete, a soldier,” Bosquez said. “And I literally had my legs taken out from under me.” 

After his injury, he was taken to the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center to recover, a process that took about a year and a half. He was fitted for a prosthetic a few months after his injury and, within six months of losing his leg, he was walking without a limp. But there were more struggles to overcome. 

While losing a limb is very physically traumatic, it was the mental and emotional part that gave Bosquez the most trouble. 

“Physically,” he said. “I could have been out of Walter Reed in about six months. The physical part was the easy part. Trying to figure out what’s next was harder.” 

He hadn’t realized, before his injury, that he didn’t know any amputees. While Bosquez knew something like this was a possibility when he enlisted, he didn’t think he would need to live with it himself. He wasn’t sure where to look to find other people who had been through what he had gone through. 

It was a struggle that concerned his loved ones, too. 

“It was very traumatic because he was my ‘baby,’ even at 22 years old,” Janet Dillard, Bosquez’s mom, said. “I couldn’t get to Walter Reed fast enough because I had to see him.”

A year after he was released from the hospital, things took a turn for the better when Bosquez got a call inviting him to try out for a slow-pitch softball team. 

At first, he was skeptical. As a lifelong athlete, slow-pitch softball had never been high on his list of things to do, especially with his background in baseball. But he decided to give it a try anyway, going to a camp at the University of Arizona in 2011. That led to him joining a team made up of amputees, the majority of whom are combat veterans, and starting him on a years-long journey of traveling the country, playing softball and inspiring the people who come out to watch the team play. 

The team — USA Patriots — is the only one made up of all amputees and they play against able-bodied teams (“There just aren’t that many amputees,” said Bosquez, “and there aren’t that many who play softball”) but they incorporate their identity as amputees when playing these games too. The team invites local children who are missing limbs to serve as bat boy or bat girl for their games. 

Bosquez was surprised to learn, however, just how many amputee children there were across the country and — as an amputee himself — had an idea of just how unique the experience of growing up with limb difference could be. 

“They might be the only amputee in their school or town or general area,” he said.

Knowing how sports was such a core part of who he was both before his amputation and after, Bosquez wanted to be a part of helping these children and others like them embrace sports. 

The team’s camp for amputee children started in 2012 and has continued every year since — with a year off because of COVID in 2020 — bringing together kids from around the country for five days of softball fun. 

The program is funded entirely by donations and pays for everything for the young athletes, including transportation for them and a guardian, all lodging, all food, and the equipment necessary to play the game. If the child’s whole family wants to join, all they have to do is get to the camp’s location and the team covers the rest. 

For the children, this camp is a unique experience for a few reasons. It’s frequently the first time they’ve had a chance to play a sport and they often need a lot of help from the adult players on USA Patriots to figure out how to adapt the sport to their bodies. But, even more than that, it’s an opportunity for them to fit in. 

“It’s always the goal to get these kids to feel comfortable in their skin,” Bosquez said. “If you’re helping out at the camp and you have all your limbs, you’re the odd one out. Parents can tell them something left and right but, unless you talk to someone who knows what you’re going through, it doesn’t hit the same. On the outside, it’s a softball camp. But really, it’s the vehicle we use to inspire these kids and teach them to navigate the rest of their lives.”

The week always ends with the campers playing in their own game before watching USA Patriots play in an exhibition game so they can see how embracing sports can carry through for their whole lives.

It ends up being such an impactful experience, the children often end the camp asking when they can see USA Patriots and their teammates again. After a few years, the team started up an alumni camp every summer, giving previous campers a chance to come out and relive the fun annually. 

The camp has become a labor of love for Bosquez’s whole family. His wife helps out with the kids’ camp and his mother works on the alumni camp. This year’s alumni camp is in Adrian for the second time, with the alumni teams playing at 5 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 10 at Adrian College’s Nicolay Field, followed by a game between USA Patriots and Moonie’s Goonies. 

“Having these kids camps mean the world to me,” Dillard, Bosquez’s mom, said. “After going to my very first one, I heard from my son and others that you have to experience it firsthand to understand what the camp does for not only the kids but for the team, too. These kids live in different states and are probably the only amputee in their school and town. But at the camp, they are all alike.” 

For Bosquez, the road to playing slow-pitch softball might have been an unexpected one but it’s one that he’s thankful for. 

“I treat [my amputation] as the biggest blessing in my life,” he said. “Without it, I would probably still be in the Army but my life has become infinitely better since then. I’ve had bad days but for every bad day, I’ve had 10 good things happen to me. I always try to keep that positive mindset, and baseball really helped me with that. Baseball is something where you’re going to fail seven out of 10 times and that adversity helped me adapt and overcome. 

“This was just another hurdle for me to have to jump. It happened, but I’m not going to let it define me. It hasn’t stopped me from doing most of the things I wanted to do in my life.” 

To donate to the USA Patriots kids’ team, visit usapatriotsathletics.org/donatekidscamp.

USA Patriots softball games

• Date: Saturday, Aug. 10, with opening ceremony at 5 p.m.
• Location: Nicolay Field, Adrian College (off U.S. 223)
• More info: Alumni Camp kids will play first, followed by the adults. There will be food trucks, USA Patriots apparel for sale, and raffles to benefit the camp.