Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Former Yankees No. 1 pick Culver handles expectations

Dwyer Stadium in Batavia, N.Y., isn't much of a stage. It's an old stadium, better fit for high school than professional baseball. It holds 2,000 people and rarely comes close to capacity. The grass is green and yellow, lights dim and sometimes the PA system cuts out. It's six hours away from the World's biggest baseball stage in the Bronx, but feels like a heck of a lot farther than that....

When the New York Yankees called Cito Culver's name with their first pick on draft day 2010, the response from Yankees fans was: "who?" Fans hadn't heard of him because baseball players don't come from Rochester, N.Y. A few NFLers and even an NBA player or two have come from the Western N.Y. area, but few big leaguers. Former right-handed pitcher Tim Redding is the most notable - but he only sniffed the majors. Culver is different. Not just because he was taken 32nd overall by the Yankees, but because he is a shortstop and wears No. 2.

The expectations for most late first-round draft picks is becoming a major league starter. Culver is expected to take the shortstop position from Derek Jeter. You know, the guy with more hits than any player in the history of the franchise, five championship rings and the type of super stardom only previously achieved by Michael Jordan. "Yeah, Cito, that's your gig next," the Yankees said by spending a first-round pick on him.

Somebody had to play guard for the Bulls after Jordan. Somebody had to play quarterback for the Broncos after John Elway. Culver is pegged as the guy to play shortstop after Jeter. Brian Griese and Jay Cutler couldn't handle it, neither could Pete Myers or any of the guards, even Derek Rose for Chicago. Mike Cameron was a descent enough center fielder, but he'll always be that guy who roamed the outfield post-Griffey. That's the thing about filling unfillable shoes: it takes someone special.

Yankees scout Tim Alexander told his club that Culver is that special. He watched the shortstop play more than 200 times. The arm is plus-plus, range outstanding, hands quick with a little bit o' pop. But lots of guys have all that. "Good kid?" I ask Alexander. "No," he says staring down from his wrap-around sun glasses. "Great kid."

Alexander said makeup is often overstated. He doesn't care if a kid is arrogant or friendly, smart or dumb. He wants to know if he can play ball. But, with the expectations for Culver, it's a different ballgame. "For that kid to go through what he went through and still play? That tells you something," he said.

The 19-year-old infielder watched his father try to burn his family's house down. He watched his father go to jail. He watched the draft from his home in Rochester with everyone but the man who taught him baseball.

One year after being picked 32nd overall, Culver is in the rusty confines of Dwyer Stadium of the New York Penn League. Standing at the bottom of the mountain, he can barely see the Bronx at the top. He's wearing No. 2, batting second with the word "Yankees" across the chest. Only the words "Staten Island" are above it. There's a nervous ovation as he steps in to the batter's box, only a 45 minute drive from the back yard he grew up throwing the ball around with his dad.

He doesn't look back at his mom or at the local media cameras. He looks at ball two. He's facing what scouts call an "org" pitcher. Which stands for organizational and is a nice way of saying he'll never amount to anything. The org pitcher grooves one. Culver, a switch-hitter batting left, snaps the wrists and launches a home run over the right field wall. It's his first home run of the season. The crowd exhales, then cheers.

In the fourth inning, he hit another home run. You could almost hear Suzyn Waldman screeching, "of all the dramatic things...."

Culver greets the media with a grin in the glittery media room known as the visitor's bullpen. He smiles politely at questions about coming home. "What would Jeter say?" Seemed to come out in all of his answers. Cliches about loving the game and having great teammates. But what about being the next Brian Griese? Or Mike Cameron?

"I just try to play hard, man," he says with a little less ease. "I'll take his spot only if he wants to give it to me."

What's surprising is that Jeter does want to give it to him. Alexander says Jeter has invited Culver over for dinner and talked to him about what it means to be a professional baseball player. "He's a really great guy, he teaches me things and I just try to listen," Culver says.

You can tell he's been listening.

Culver won't be playing in rusty stadiums at the bottom of the mountain for very long. Soon, Yankee fans won't say: "who?" anymore, either. The 19-year-old is hitting around .300 and playing defense fit for higher levels. We don't know yet whether he can hit a 97 mph fastball; we won't for some time. We do know that he's not afraid of expectations. Or afraid to wear No. 2.

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

What makes a big leaguer? I asked...

"Sometimes you just see something," one scout says during batting practice.

He, only halfway paying attention to our conversation about a young outfielder's swing, surmised player evaluation pretty darn brilliantly. It's a complicated process that, unless you spent thousands of hours playing, you could never truly understand. At the same time, it's simple. Sometimes, you just see something.

As hitters pop in and out of the cage, the scout studies the mechanics of each swing. Hands here, foot lands there, left leg ends here, head doesn't move and shoulders end square. Then he studies bat speed and approach.

"But, for every guy who does all those things right, there are 100 guys in the Majors who do them wrong and make $20 million a year," another scout says.

The two agree on the skills it takes to play Major League Baseball. "Can a guy hit a 97 mph fastball?" They ask. "Does he have the arm to make all the throws?"

The thing is, there are thousands who can hit a 97 mph fastball and make all the throws, yet a select few make the Majors. The difference is makeup.

An instructor for the team - an 30-year baseball guy who has a way of fitting every possible curse word into his analysis - says makeup is what separates booms from busts. ""I tell these young players, if you want to make it to the show, it's not about hitting, running or pitching. Who can't do that stuff? Fuck, man, everybody has tools. If you want to play every day in The Show, you have to be like The Wizard of Oz. I say, if you want to make it, you better have fucking heart, you better have fucking courage and you better have fucking brains."

This isn't how we usually think of makeup. We ask whether he's a good person, whether he runs out ground balls and if he signs autographs for hours after the game. That stuff matters a little, but not much. "When I ask a guy to come out of the game, does he have a problem with coming out of the game?" The coach asks. "You can't teach a guy to not ever want to come out of the game. That's what I'm looking for."

The rhetorical questions seem endless. They ask so many questions, you wonder how anyone ever has the stuff to play in the Major Leagues. Can he make it through failure? Can he make adjustments? Is he willing to learn?

So, let's say we have a player who can hit a 97 mph fastball, he has heart courage and brains, he can handle failure, is willing to learn and make adjustments. He can still fail in the Bigs. In fact, he can still never make it. "Double-A separates the men from the boys," one of the scouts says. Why? "Approach," he says.

As players advance, the fastballs get faster, the curveballs are sharper and everybody throws all their pitches for strikes. The instructor says all the tools on Earth do no good if a batter doesn't have a plan. One of the players, a lefty, says he tries to take the ball to left field each time. If he gets a hanging breaking ball, he can react, but he needs to think fastball away, fastball away, fastball away.

There a hitters who can "see the ball hit the ball." There are guys so good they swing at breaking balls to fool the pitcher into throwing it again (see: Manny Ramirez). Those are outliers. And, guys that good had to learn it from thousands of minor league at bats.

All that said, sometimes the tools aren't there or the heart or the approach and a player still has success in the majors. Sometimes you just see something.