anon for this: his brother is also disabled, and I don’t think he’s even aware of the embellishments to the story. One time he told me he was jealous of his brother, and he also wanted to hit a home run.
One thing I wasn’t clear on in my last post: I said Shaya didn’t die that winter. In fact, as far as I know, Shaya is still alive and well (I haven’t been in contact much with the family, but I think I would have heard if something did happen to him G-d forbid)