How a Royals prospect wound up organizing workouts for area pros in Kansas City
Baseball players of all levels develop best when they’re facing live competition. Practice is important, but you find out how you’re really doing when you use what you’ve learned against someone who is trying to beat you.
For the thousands of minor-leaguers who are not part of Major League Baseball teams’ 60-man rosters during 2020, that’s presented a problem. There was no minor-league season this year because of the COVID-19 pandemic, so finding live competition became a challenge.
Leave it to a Royals farmhand to solve the problem for local professional baseball players who found themselves in that situation.
Grant Gavin, who pitched at Double-A Northwest Arkansas last year and likely was headed to Triple-A Omaha this summer before the world turned upside-down, organized gatherings of Kansas City-area pros who otherwise wouldn’t have had anywhere else to play.
“One of my minor-league pitching coaches, Carlos Reyes, told me, ‘The hitter will tell you if you’re good or not,’” Gavin said. “‘You don’t need to ask anyone. The best feedback you can get is from the guy with the bat in his hand.’”
Gavin played high school baseball at St. Pius X, and his college ball at Central Missouri, before being drafted by the Royals in the 29th round of the 2016 draft. He first got the idea to hook up with fellow pros as a way to stay in shape for a quick return to the game.
“My mindset in the beginning was that we could be back in spring training in two weeks,” he said. “I wanted to come back and be ahead of the guys who went home and didn’t throw at all. As it went on, I figured I would be throwing anyway; I might as well simulate my own season.
“It’s not the same. You’re pitching competitively once a week instead of three times a week as a reliever, but it’s better than not doing anything.”
Similar sessions have likely been taking place across America, but the fact that this one happened as a result of a Royals farmhand impressed J.J. Picollo, the Royals’ vice president/assistant general manager for player personnel.
“His agent gave me a call and said that Grant was working out at his high school and there were a bunch of minor-leaguers there,” Picollo said. “I didn’t realize it at the time, but Grant was the one to arrange it. It was good to hear that it was one of our guys who was taking the lead.”
When the major-league season resumed and Gavin was not selected to be part of the Royals’ 60-man roster, he kept the process going, including as many as 25 hitters and pitchers at any one gathering. He’d maintained a connection with his high school coach, Rick Rengel, partly because he mowed the grass sports complex as a part-time job. Rengel let him have access to the field for the workouts that began with fewer than 10 guys.
Luke Ritter, who played at Rockhurst and Wichita State before being selected in the seventh round of the 2019 draft by the New York Mets, was one of those who attended. He thought the stoppage would be a short-term thing and he stuck around when it turned out to be much longer.
“When they sent us all home, I originally thought this would be a two-week thing and then we’d be back and have our season,” Ritter said. “I quickly realized how serious it was when our whole country shut down. Then I realized that we weren’t going to have a season. The Mets organization still paid us, which was great, so we had incentive to keep working. We felt like we needed to get some at-bats and get better some way.”
Of course, pitchers pitch and hitters hit, but someone needed to be behind the plate, and the same catcher couldn’t be back there for the full four-hour workout. Gunnar Troutwine, who played at Shawnee Mission East before joining Ritter at Wichita State and being selected in the ninth round of the 2019 draft by the Chicago White Sox, was another one of the regulars who helped spread the word.
“You can do the day-to-day routine every day on your own,” Troutwine said. “But being a catcher, I have a relationship with pitchers in this area. They were always looking for catchers to throw to. I kind of got the idea of combining things to have live ABs. The pitchers, hitters and catchers can get their live work in together.”
While Picollo was impressed with Gavin’s leadership, he was not shocked.
“It’s not very surprising,” he said. “Grant’s always been a pretty driven kid. I think he’s made himself into a prospect from high school to UCM. He’s always been very driven. When you put the pieces together they fit.
“I give so much credit to Grant for doing things like he’s done. These guys challenge themselves to make themselves better. They had two choices during this time. They could sit back and hope things will go better next year, or they can do everything they can to make sure things go better. By and large, all of our minor-leaguers have done that. It’s not an ideal situation, but it’s nice to see our guys take the initiative.”
The temptation has to be there for young players to loaf when no one is watching, but this group has taken the opposite approach.
“It’s easy to take a day off and not do stuff,” Ritter said. “The guys who worked out and stayed consistent with hitting and throwing this summer will see a difference next year.
“Going a whole year without playing is hard enough. If you’re not going to do anything when you’re supposed to be playing it will be hard to catch up. I think that for the guys who were doing the work the progress will show.”