Wallingford’s Gozzo embracing super-utility role
HARTFORD — Come out early to a Reading Fightin’ Phillies game and you’ll probably see Sal Gozzo in the outfield shagging balls. You might even see him catching a bullpen session.
Stay for the game and you could see Gozzo playing anywhere around the infield: third base, shortstop, second base. About the only position he hasn’t tried yet is pitching. No position-player-on-themound alerts for Sal Gozzo ... yet.
“I’ve been looking forward to it,” Gozzo admitted. “We haven’t been losing that badly, which is good.”
Otherwise, Gozzo will do anything to get on the field.
“Wherever they need me to fill in, I’ll play anywhere they need me,” said Gozzo, the Wallingford product who helped lead Sheehan to the 2015 CIAC Class M title as a shortstop. “Superutility guy, that’s who I am.”
He kind of has to be. In his third year of pro ball after signing with the Phillies as an undrafted free agent in 2019, Gozzo has yet to hit above .200 at any of his four stops. Entering this weekend’s action, the switch-hitting Gozzo was hitting just .149 for the Fightin’ Phils.
“I don’t think I need to worry too much about it, just take it one at-bat at a time, one pitch at a time,” he said a little over a week ago, when Reading was at Dunkin’ Donuts Park for a six-game series with the Yard Goats. “Do whatever I can to help the team once I get on base: walk, get hit, RBI whether it’s a groundout or a hit. One pitch, one at-bat at a time.”
Despite his less-thangaudy offensive numbers, Gozzo has already made it to the highest level of the minor leagues. He spent a good portion of last season with Triple-A Lehigh Valley, moving up and down between there and Reading multiple times — and spending some time at High-A Jersey Shore, as well.
Gozzo hit .149 in 39 Triple-A games.
“It took a little bit,” he noted, “but seeing that kind of pitching every day, who are able to throw two, three pitches over the plate and can locate, you’ve got to really hone in on your approach, which, in the beginning, I didn’t really have one. But I started to get a little more comfortable, which I think has helped me this year, as well.”
Gozzo has spent this entire season at Double-A to this point.
“It was a great experience, playing with former big leaguers, facing former big leaguers and guys who are top talent,” he said of his Triple-A experience. “But it’s been nice kind of staying in one place this year, not traveling as much.”
In fact, last week’s visit to Hartford allowed Gozzo to stay at his family’s home, which is now in Berlin, where his parents moved a couple of years ago. His mother, aunts, cousins and plenty of other family and friends got to Dunkin’ Donuts Park last week.
“It’s been nice seeing the family, sleeping in your own bed,” he said last week.
Gozzo hails from one of the more prominent Connecticut baseball families. His twin brother, Paul, played alongside him for a season at Tulane before transferring to UConn, where he played two seasons before ending his collegiate career at UC-San
Diego. Paul Gozzo has hung up the cleats and is now working, mostly remotely from Berlin, as a financial analyst in Manhattan.
And, of course, the Gozzos’ father is Mauro “Goose” Gozzo, the former Berlin High star who pitched six seasons for the Mets and three other teams from 1989-94. Gozzo managed the independent New Britain Bees in 2019 and is currently skippering the independent Gastonia Honey Hunters of the Atlantic League.
Sal got to meet up with Pops recently when Reading was at home and the Honey Hunters were playing in nearby Lancaster, Pennsylvania. What position was Sal Gozzo playing that week? Doesn’t really matter.
“I get paid to play a game,” he noted. “Can’t ask for much more than that.”
MOVIN’ ON UP
Watertown’s Justin Guerrera has been promoted from Class-A St. Lucie to the Brooklyn Cyclones, High-A affiliate of the Mets.
Guerrera, who played college ball at Fairfield University, was a 20thround draft pick by the Mets in July. He hit .286 with five home runs in 30
games between the Mets’ Rookie League team and St. Lucie last summer.
Guerrera began this season back at St. Lucie and was hitting .215 with
five homers and 20 RBIs in 39 games before his promotion.