Shortstop prospect Tucker hoping to drum up major league gig soon
BRADENTON, Fla. — On the deadline to add prospects to the 40man roster to protect them from the Rule 5 draft, Cole Tucker went to see “Green Book” by himself. A call from an unknown number with a 412 area code interrupted the movie, and Tucker rushed out of the theater to answer it.
“‘Hey Cole, it’s Frank Coonelly,’” Tucker recounted. “‘Just wanted to congratulate you on having a really good Fall League. Hope you’re doing well, how’s your family?’ Frank just being a really awesome dude, just calling to see how I’m doing and
congratulate me.
“And then the phone call kind of comes and goes, he didn’t say a word about the 40-man. I was like, ‘Oh, sweet, thanks, love you, Frank.’ I was just like, shocked. It felt like someone kicked me in the stomach.”
Tucker finished the movie and was out to lunch when senior director of minor league operations Larry Broadway called him. He did indeed have a 40-man spot. Coonelly hadn’t put two and two together on what day it was.
The 40-man spot for Tucker, a 22-year-old shortstop whom MLB.com ranked as the Pirates’ No. 5 prospect, was inevitable. A promotion to the majors could soon follow, possibly as soon as this season.
“It’s exciting and it’s big,” Tucker said. “It could be really cool, and I’m excited to get up here and help this team win, obviously. When that happens is kind of out of my control.”
Tucker will experience Class AAA for the first time this season. Last year, with Class AA Altoona, he had a .333 on-base percentage, a .356 slugging percentage and a .259 average, but those numbers don’t adequately explain his season.
“April was cool and then at the end of April …” Tucker made the hand motion of falling off a cliff. “And then May was depressing.”
From April 25 to the end of May, Tucker hit .192 with a .486 OPS. He felt himself chasing hits and struggled to maintain a solid base with his legs.
“He would lose his front side and the barrel is in and out of the zone, so you’ve got to be perfect timing-wise to square it up,” Broadway said. “He’s always been pretty strong, but he hasn’t been very stable. He’s like one of those used-car sale lots [inflatable air dancers]. It’s just long limbs.”
Tucker changed his mindset. He tried to stand tall in the box, be athletic and try to impact the baseball, meaning hit it with authority rather than just get a bat on it. From July 1 on, he hit .273/.360/.411 with 33 walks compared to 44 strikeouts in 273 plate appearances. He had 22 walks and 60 strikeouts in 316 plate appearances before that point.
“July was awesome. August was awesome, September was awesome, October was awesome,” Tucker said. “It just kind of carried through. I’m just trying to carry that over to this season and the rest of my life, really.”
October encompassed the Arizona Fall League, in which Tucker hit .370/.442/.457 for the Surprise Saguaros. He won the AFL’s Stenson Sportsmanship Award. During the presentation, he met Adam Zweiback, a musician who asked him what he did during the offseason.
“Do you play golf?” Zweiback asked. “I was like, ‘No, I don’t really play golf, I’m pretty terrible actually. … But I usually just sit around and play the drums all offseason.’ He was like, ‘Oh, no way. I’m in this band and we just play around, gig around Arizona. We kind of need a drummer for the next couple months if you’re interested.’”
Thus began Tucker’s stint with the Twice Baked Band (Zweiback roughly translates to twice-baked in German). Tucker has played drums all his life.
Tucker also traveled to Rome and Spain with his older brother, Quinn.
“Larry Fitzgerald obviously is like the king of Arizona, where I live,” he said. “He always talks about how he goes on all these different trips in the offseason. We work so hard during the season, in the offseason he likes to reward himself by going on a trip every year. That’s something that I would kind of like to do.”
His 2018 season started in mid-February and ended in November. If he gets the call this year, his season might again extend beyond the end of the minor league schedule.