Versatile on and off the field
The Journal Sentinel’s Todd Rosiak caught up with Milwaukee Brewers utility player Hernán Pérez to discuss his young son, his versatility and his English. Pérez, 26, is hitting .268 with 11 home runs and 36 runs batted in over 85 games this season, with 66 starts at six positions (27 in left field, 13 at third base, 11 in right, seven in center, five at shortstop and three at second base). He was originally claimed off waivers from the Detroit Tigers on June 2, 2015, and will play in his 300th game with the Brewers this week. Pérez is playing on a one-year deal that’s paying him $545,700.
Q. Your 3-year-old son, Christopher, has become something of a cult hero in Milwaukee since last season. Baseball is obviously in his blood, but did he just pick the game up on his own?
A. It was by himself. The first time I saw him swinging it was in Lakeland, early in spring training. I went to the cage with a couple guys, and he saw one guy, Steven Moya, swinging left-handed. Since then, he’s been left-handed. I never taught him. I taught him how to hold his hands, but that was his decision. I didn’t teach him anything else. Everything he does, it’s because he’s watching TV. He lives in this world, baseball, and he loves it.
Q. His impersonations are spot-on, even down to the bat flips and pointing to the sky. How does he do it?
A. He knows Stephen Vogt and Eric Sogard already. I was surprised. He’s always watching at home. I called back home after a game and my wife said, ‘Hey, look at this,’ and she put me on FaceTime with him and he was doing the different stances. Sometimes I’ll tell him, ‘Do it like this, this guy does it like that.’ He does (Ryan) Braun’s
jump with Eddie (Sedar) when he hits a homer. He does (Domingo) Santana and (Keon) Broxton. He’s always watching.
Q. How cool is it to be able to have Christopher around you and embraced by all your teammates during the course of a long season?
A. That means a lot to me, knowing that if I bring him everybody’s going to be cool with him. Everybody likes him. He says hi to everybody. For me, that feels great. I know I can go lift weights or whatever and know they’re going to take care of him.
Q. Who’s his favorite player? His father?
A. I would say me. If we go around and he sees a No. 14, he’ll say, ‘Daddy, that’s your number!’ But he likes everybody. He likes (Orlando) Arcia a lot. He likes (Jesús) Aguilar. He likes Braun because of his stance. He knows everybody’s number. He knows everybody’s name.
Q. Everyone’s affinity for your son kind of speaks to the unity in the clubhouse this season in general, would you agree?
A. Yeah, it’s amazing. Last year was a little different. This year we’ve got a lot of young guys, and the older guys are getting to the younger guys. Everybody’s together. It feels like everybody’s the same age and everybody has played for 10 years together. It’s amazing.
Q. You’ve been in a lot of clubhouses over the years, and the chemistry sometimes just isn’t there. Have you been on any other teams before that are this close-knit?
A. Winter ball. I think the Latin guys, we bring that from winter ball. I’m not saying the American guys don’t do it, but there’s a couple guys that are really quiet, really kind of shy. But in this clubhouse, everybody clicks. Now, when Braun hits a homer, he jumps with us for the camera. It’s something we haven’t seen from him before.
Q. Speaking of that
dugout receiving line that comes after homers – who started it?
A. I think it was Aguilar with Eric Thames, because they’re strong. Like, ‘Come on, let’s go!’ After that, everyone has been doing it. And they
to do it, no matter what. We’re connected. Like (Craig) Counsell said at the start of spring training – we have to be connected as a team. We have to be a family. And that’s what’s happening right now. We’re playing good, everything’s going good. But I think it’s because of the energy we bring to the field and to the ballpark.
Q. Your Brewers career has been an interesting one. Claimed off waivers from the Tigers in June 2015, outrighted after the season, resigned with the Brewers 10 days later. Failed to make the 2016 openingday roster, called up in late April and been an indispensable piece since then. How have you handled all the ups and downs?
A. It was a little crazy. I hadn’t heard a lot about the Brewers (in 2015), like Boston or the biggername teams. I said, ‘Brewers? OK, I’ll go there.’ I got here, met Counsell and he said, ‘I saw you play in high-A in Lakeland.’ I didn’t remember that. But I was one of the guys, and it was cool he saw me playing. Then they put me on waivers, and I signed back with them because I saw opportunity. I saw that third base was open, and I can play different positions. I like the National League because in my situation, I can play everywhere. So I signed back, didn’t make the team and was frustrated. My wife supported me, my family supported me so I did good at Triple-A, came back and had a good year.
Q. You came up as a shortstop/middle infielder but have looked like a natural pretty much everywhere Counsell has played you. That’s obviously not easy. How proud are you of your versatility ?
A. I mean, I’m proud of that. I’m one of those guys that has always listened to everything. When I was playing short, I’d always go to the outfield and listen to the outfield coach and what they said and what they were teaching. Even when I’m next to a catcher, I listen. I always go up to (Manny) Piña and Vogt and ask them questions, because you never know what can happen. I’m the third catcher here, so I have to listen. (Pitching coach Derek Johnson), when he talks to the pitchers, I always try to listen to what they say. I like to hear what’s said.
Q. Milwaukee is quite different from your native Venezuela. Do you like it here?
A. Yeah, I love it. It’s pretty quiet. For me, I have a family, a wife and kids, and it’s a really good city for us. We go to the mall, we go to movies, we go to the lake and walk around. Bring Christopher to some parks to run around.
Q. Your English is tremendous. Was it tough for you to learn?
A. It wasn’t too difficult. When I was in school I always liked to learn English. That was one of my favorite classes – English and math. I loved those two. When I signed, we had an English teacher in the Venezuelan summer league and he taught us the basic things, all the stuff we’d use in the stadium. When I flew to the USA for the first time in 2009, we had a teacher. But I heard from someone, ‘If you want to learn English, you’re going to have to talk with American guys. Because if you talk with Latin guys, you won’t learn it.’ That year in rookie league my manager was Dominican, the hitting coach was Puerto Rican, and we didn’t have anybody speaking English. So I always talked with the American guys. They liked learning Spanish, too.
Q. Do you think being able to speak English as a major-leaguer is important?
A. For sure. That’s very important. I always use this example: If Miggy (Detroit’s Miguel Cabrera) would speak English, he could be the face of baseball because he’s talented in everything he does. But he doesn’t like to speak English, and his English is not very good. That’s so important to me. A clubbie in summer league told me once, ‘You have to be good with the media, with the trainers and with the clubbies. Because the media can lift you up or knock you down, the trainers are going to take care of you and the clubbies know everything about you.’ That’s something I’ll never forget. That’s why even if I have a bad day and you want to talk to me, I’m open. Let’s talk. Bad days happen. So let’s talk about it.
Q. Do you think part of the reason some players are hesitant to speak English is because they’re afraid what they say might not come across the way they intend?
A. Yeah. I think they don’t want to say something wrong. Sometimes you guys can interpret it differently, you know what I mean? It can be that they’re nervous that day doing the interview and they don’t know what to say. But at the same time, you have to try. If you want to get better, you have to try. If I feel like I don’t understand what you’re asking me, I’ll go to Carlos (Brizuela, the Brewers’ Spanish translator) and try to understand. If I have a bad day and I want to say something but I don’t feel good to say it, I’ll call Carlos and say whatever I want to say in Spanish. I know that guy over there, No. 3 (points across the clubhouse to Arcia’s locker), he knows English. I think he’s afraid to talk.
Q. He's going to be one of the faces of this franchise in the coming years. Will you impress upon him the importance of trying to learn?
A. His English is OK, but I think he’s afraid to speak in English. He doesn’t like to, but I think he knows (it’s important). If you talk to him, he’s understanding what you’re saying. Two of the guys he pays attention to are Aguilar and me. He pays attention to us. When we’re on the road we always go to eat and we’re always telling him, ‘Hey, you have to speak. Don’t be afraid.’ When we were in the rookie league or the minor leagues with an American guy and they didn’t understand something or we say something wrong, they might laugh at us. That’s why some guys don’t speak it. ‘They’re going to laugh at me, I don’t want to speak English. Speak in Spanish if you want to talk to me.’ I’ve been there. But I’d say, ‘Teach me how to say it, and I’ll say it right.’ But this year, I think he’s going to start speaking English.
Q. A relatively inexperienced team playing in a pennant race early in a rebuild – do you guys have the confidence you can hang on and win this thing?
A. Yeah, we have the confidence. The connection we have is amazing. The good thing that we have this year is we don’t believe in just one guy. Everybody can do the job. We lost Braun for a month and we were winning. Then (Friday) it was him. The game before it was Santana, (Travis) Shaw, Aguilar in New York. Everybody’s doing the job – Sogard, Piña. Big hits. Everybody’s doing the job to help us win games.