Like a bad movie trailer, Kevin Newman’s 2018 late-season call-up to the Pittsburgh Pirates was not so much a preview as it was a warning.
If we’re talking tomatoes, his were rotten: a .209 batting average and a .247 on-base percentage; only two extra-base hits in 91 at-bats in an August-and-September cameo; a .231 slugging percentage that ranked 622nd in the majors last year, one spot behind New York Mets pitcher Zack Wheeler.
He was putting too much pressure on himself, and the results showed. It was supposed to be the most joyous time of his career, of his life, and Newman was in his own mind.
“The game was tough for me last year when I came up, and I did it to myself,” said Newman, who earned the call-up after slashing .302/.350/.407 in Triple-A Indianapolis.
“I envisioned the big leagues being so much different even than from Triple-A. I hurt myself thinking now that I’m in the big leagues, everyone is so much better, I have to be so much better.”
He entered the offseason a shell of his former self, depleted. No, really. Literally. Newman lost 15 pounds through the course of last season.
The first offseason after a player’s first call-up is already the most important of a career, and in Newman’s case, this was doubly so. He wasn’t just trying to set the stage for a critical 2019, an all-important season that could seal his long-term professional fate, but he was trying to erase the remnants of 2018 from his mind.
Luckily he had a workout buddy, someone to push him when he could no longer go on, a trusted friend from his Arizona Wildcat days.
• • •They met again on Monday at Philadelphia’s Citizens Bank Park, Newman and Scott Kingery, his former roommate, his neighbor, his offseason workout buddy.
Like Newman, Kingery is in Year 2, and like Newman, Year 1 was not so kind to him. Kingery was a sensation throughout the minor leagues for the Phillies, who signed him to a six-year, $24 million contract with three additional club options, a record for a player with no major-league experience, easily surpassing the $10 million in guarantees that Jon Singleton got with the Houston Astros in 2014.
Then Kingery batted .226 with 33 extra-base hits in 452 at-bats, 126 strikeouts and 35 RBIs.
Down but not out, the two old friends worked out during the offseason at Fischer Institute of Physical Therapy & Performance in Phoenix, both trying to rebound from disastrous debuts.
“This last offseason, I had the most to gain, because of what I’d lost,” Newman said. “Literally, I had the most to gain. The amount I worked out didn’t change. But I had tasted the big leagues. I’d seen it. Maybe that was an extra driving force.”
For both, the results were immediate.
Kingery has bounced back as a sophomore, batting .271 with 15 home runs, 30 doubles, 44 RBIs and a .826 OPS.
Newman, riding a hot streak to close out August, upped his batting average to .310 through Friday, when he collected multiple hits for the fourth time in a seven-game hitting streak. One day earlier, he nearly hit for the cycle against the Colorado Rockies in an 11-8 win, going 4 for 4 with two home runs, a double and four RBIs.
“I felt like a fresh new me coming into spring training,” said Newman, who added strength and speed before reporting to the Pirates. “I was really ready to wipe the slate clean.’
Newman played throughout spring training with motivation just to stick with the big-league club, but after losing the starting shortstop battle to Erik Gonzalez, he wasn’t sure if he’d done enough. Two days before the season started, in Houston, Pittsburgh manager Clint Hurdle gave him the news.
“There was no point before that when I thought I made it,” Newman said. “The whole spring training was a battle, and I knew it would be coming in.”
But with a little boost from his good friend, Newman came into the season ready to prove doubters wrong.
Now both are in the majors, and comfortably.
“It’s kind of a surreal feeling,” Newman said. “I look back and remember the day I was sitting next to him at athlete orientation at Arizona. I remember that day, and now we’re here.”
For a long time, they hope.
• • •It’s not as if Newman’s entire rookie season was an exercise in futility.
By the middle of September, he’d started to find his groove. There were no explosions like this week against Colorado — no near-cycles — but Newman did finish the season on a five-game hitting streak, which came soon after a six-game hitting streak that was then the best of his career.
“Last year, the last couple weeks, I started swinging better. It was huge for me to get those last couple weeks and feel confident. I wouldn’t say there was one hit or one game when everything clicked, I’d just say the last two weeks.”
And even before then, Newman tried to get by, even if the results weren’t there.
“The first two weeks were really tough for me — I wasn’t hitting, I struggled a bit on defense, and if I had to say the worst time of my career, it was then,” he said. “But even during times like that, I came out and got my work in, tried to do everything I can to prepare myself, so even if I don’t have a great game, I can say to myself, ‘Well, at least I did everything to prepare.’”
That kind of attitude is not lost on his Pirate teammates, who’ve seen Newman thrive once he was promoted into the starting lineup.
“There’s a level of comfort knowing you’re going to be in the lineup every night,” Pittsburgh slugger Josh Bell said. “It allows you to slow your process — it’s not that you have to change the game tonight. You can change a series, or a week, or a month for the squad. Allowing him to get out and play every day has let him show what he can do for us. For him to come out and hit .300 and play the defense he’s been playing and lead the clubhouse in a way is a testament to who he is going to be in the future.”
That, above all, has impressed Bell about Newman.
“The game does a good job of giving you a reality check at times,” said Bell, one of the Pirates’ other crucial young pieces. “He went into last offseason hungry and focused. He came back wanting to prove what he can do, and he’s done that, on both sides of the ball. And as a leader? His presence in the clubhouse — he’s one of the guys who you can tell will be a captain in the years coming.”
High praise from arguably the Bucs’ best player.
But worthy praise for a guy who is hitting .355 on the road, with eight of his nine home runs away from home.
Told he was batting .344 on the road on Tuesday, Newman was stunned. Another important offseason is just weeks away, but he refuses to let his mind wander.
“I steer away from the offseason thoughts because there is a month left,” he said. “That can affect people differently. The reason I didn’t know that number you just said — I don’t look at any numbers until the season is done. There’s still work to be done. I’m focused on today.”
