Photo by Doug Koontz David Canada can't see more than a "couple feet"out of his right eye and that, usually, is only shadows.

In the classrooms at Frederick High, his attention to detail and studious nature have helped Canada boast a continuous 4.0 grade-point-average from his freshman to his senior year, which will end in the upcoming days.

Around Frederick 's athletic facilities, Canada was seen drilling field goals, and placing punts inside the 10-yard line for the football team during the fall. This spring, he was a senior leader for the Cadets baseball team, logging innings as a starting pitcher and outfielder.

Canada relies on precision for everything.

The fact that he's done it all with one eye -- his entire life -- adds to the incredible student-athlete that is David Canada.

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"We never knew until first grade, I guess. Then we found out," Canada said of the condition that plagues his right eye. He was born with a scar on his retina, leaving him 80-percent blind. To this day, he can't see more than a "couple feet" out of the defective eye, and that, usually, is only shadows.

"I was young, so I didn't know the difference," recalls Canada, who will turn 18-years old in September. "I never knew what it was like to see with both eyes anyways."

The well-spoken, soon-to-be graduate of Frederick High has carried on under those terms since his early childhood. When his eyes first opened, his vision seemed normal. He felt normal.

After learning about the eye, nothing has changed.

"I don't really think about it much," Canada says. "Maybe if I would have been able to see before, and then I just kind of went blind, it would be worse."

Judging by his numerous

sports and academic accolades, life probably couldn't be much better for Canada, considering his circumstances.

Splitting the uprights

Canada tried football for the first time at the lower levels in eighth grade.

"I hated it," he remembers.

By his junior year, the compact, 5-foot-9, 150-pound all-around athlete realized place-kicking might be his true calling on the football field. The Frederick varsity team needed a kicker, and Canada had played soccer as a youngster, justifying his decision to join the Cadets.

While still experimenting with being a high school kicker, Canada made two field goals as a junior, his longest in any game a 37 yarder. He also averaged 33.4 yards per punt.

Frederick coach Vince Ahearn says Canada decided to punt, as well, to help the team.

"He came to me and said, 'I'd really like to play football, but I'd just like to kick,'" Ahearn said. "I think he thought I wouldn't be happy about that. But I thought it was awesome."

Canada grew passionate, and enthusiastic about his role on the football team. He studied the nuances and technique of place-kicking in the offseason, and spent many voluntary hours booting field goals off the tee at Frederick 's facility with his father. Canada even told Ahearn he was considering dropping baseball from his spring plans to focus on football, an idea Ahearn is happy he never acted on.

"He was extremely accurate right away, with a good leg," Ahearn said. "When he knew that, he decided kicking was what he wanted to do. He wanted to put all of his effort into it, but I'm glad he continued with baseball. Everything worked out great for him."

Being a people person, Canada's love for kicking stretches beyond extra-points, clutch field goals, and end-zone kickoffs.

"It's something that not a lot of other people can just do, I guess," he said. "It's fun, coming down to the end of games and stuff like that. With football, there's a bigger crowd, so if you make kicks, people scream."

The first time Canada tried to kick wearing a football helmet, he was reminded of his eye. It wasn't the darkness of the night sky, or the bright lights of the stadium that toyed with his already weakened vision, but simply the protection attached to his headgear.

"Trying to see out of the facemask, it effected me," Canada said. "I noticed more of the bar on the helmet, I think. I struggled at first."

At the time, Ahearn wasn't even aware of Canada's optical ailment.

"He never talks about it," Ahearn said. "It's never been an excuse, or anything like that. We were just talking and then it came out. I was like 'What?'"

At Frederick 's training camp, and during practices last fall, Ahearn remembers Canada staying busy, using drills he had learned from videos and kicking camps to master his trade. As a senior, Canada was an all-MVAL and News-Post honorable mention, nailing 28 extra-point attempts, two field goals, and upping his punting average to 38.7 yards per attempt.

He has signed with Division-II Shepherd College in nearby Shepherdstown, W.Va., where he intends to compete for the kicking job as a freshman later this year.

"He's going to kick for Shepherd, because he won't stop until he does," Ahearn said. "Once he's got a plan or strategy, he doesn't let go."

Good eye

If booting a football through the 18-foot, 6-inch gap between the uprights seemed daunting for Canada, painting the black on home plate as a right-handed hurler, reeling in a high fly ball from the outfield or making contact with a 80 mph fastball at the plate added more dimensions to his unique abilities.

Hand-eye coordination is the basis for everything in baseball.

"It's just amazing, that he is an outfielder with the depth perception, and he's a pitcher. Therefore, he's the closest guy to the hitter, and he's got to react to a possible ball coming back at him," Frederick baseball coach Phil Rhodes said. "And hitting-wise, in my mind, that he's even able to focus and make contact, and do well, is really crazy."

Rhodes first learned about Canada's eye when he was a freshman, trying out for the Frederick program.

Rhodes thought someone was playing a joke on him.

"I just assumed someone was pulling my leg. How can a guy that can only see out of one eye play baseball?" Rhodes recalls. "And if he is, we're probably not keeping him, because he's not going to be successful."

But Canada's skills four years ago proved no laughing matter to Rhodes, in a hurry.

"He was doing well. Some of us still thought it must be a prank. We asked him, 'What exactly is your situation here?'" Rhodes said. "He told us. In all the years that I've been around baseball, I've never seen or known of any athlete with a vision problem. Nobody has actually been able to see out of just one eye."

A lingering knee injury ----which ended Canada's football season -- brought him into the 2007 baseball season confined to the dugout. Ten games in, much to the delight of Rhodes, Canada got his first start off the pitcher's mound, and helped Frederick defeat Walkersville , 13-2. He tossed five innings and 65 pitches to earn his first win, controlling the Lions with a mix of off-speed offerings.

Canada also finished as an all-MVAL honorable mention in baseball, throwing 24 innings, winning two games and maintaining a 4.08 earned run average. As a mainstay in the Frederick lineup upon his healthy return to the team, he also finished with a .286 average, knocking in 11 RBIs.

All spring, and through most of his baseball travels, Canada has carried eye drops in his bat bag. Dust or debris in the eyes can cause him serious trouble.

"If I get dirt or something in the good eye," Canada says, "I'm pretty much done."

As an outfielder, Canada doesn't run into problems until dusk, during late-game situations after the sun has set. He says line drives become harder to judge.

When he toes the rubber and delivers pitches to home plate, sometimes he can't see the catcher's glove, or misses his sign.

"The fingers are a lot smaller than the glove is," Canada says. "Sometimes I have to step off the rubber if my other eye gets blurry. I just step off and wait."

In the batter's box, it's a little different. Canada has to operate under the opposing pitcher's terms, and sometimes his functional left eye -- which also offers worse than 20-20 vision ----fogs up.

If he can't motion to the umpire for a timeout quick enough, in comes the pitch, and Canada doesn't know it.

"I have a contact in my left eye, because it's not great," he said. "Between pitches, I kind of have to wait for it to come back. It usually does, just by blinking or something."

Serious student

Around practices and games, Canada forces himself to be a straight-A student.

"It's something my parents have always stressed. To get good grades," he said. "It's just trying, I guess. A lot of people could get A's if they tried. It's just putting in the extra time to study, and doing your homework."

Canada has been so serious about his academics, Rhodes teases him about it.

"We were joking with him a couple weeks back, asking him when he had something other than an A," Rhodes said.

Turns out, that was sixth grade. Canada will take a flawless GPA with him to college, along with advanced placement credits. He has also rounded out his student portfolio with many volunteer activities, including a kicking clinic to benefit a local food bank, and visits to Lincoln Elementary School to read books to younger children.

It has all amounted to recognition for Canada as the Cadet football team's scholar-athlete last fall, and honors by the Frederick County Coaches Association as Frederick High's outstanding male scholar-athlete of the year.

"It feels good," Canada said. "It's good that I can manage the sports and the schoolwork with AP classes, and still be able to do well."

But Canada's no bookworm. On top of his academic success, he was named the Class of 2007 Homecoming King, and "Mr. FHS," two other superlatives he's proud of.

"It's pretty cool to win all that stuff," Canada said. "It's just having fun. I try to pretty much be friendly with everybody. I have different friends from a lot of different groups, I guess, different types of people."

Ahearn can't recall seeing another student scoff at Canada, ever.

"Sometimes a 4.0 probably intimidates a lot of kids in the hallways," Ahearn said. "But it seems a lot of kids like him. David is one of those guys that's everywhere. He's so unassuming, and so conscientious about things that it makes it easy for people."

Added Rhodes: "All of the kids like him and hang around him. He's smart, he's athletic and he's cool. He's got all of it."

Right now, he does. And David Canada has so much left of the world to see.