Brault plans to lead with his own style
Veteran left-hander is not big on spiels in locker room
Steven Brault isn’t much for your stereotypical, rah-rah, sports leadership roles.
In the aftermath of the offseason departures of Trevor Williams, Joe Musgrove and Jameson Taillon, a left-hander could be looked at as a natural candidate to step up as someone to look up to in the clubhouse. After all, he and Chad Kuhl are now the longest-tenured Pirates in the starting rotation, and Brault is probably the most gregarious person on the team.
With that in mind, it could be seen as a bit of a surprise when Brault, talking to media in his first Zoom conference call of 2021, described himself as “more of a silent leader type.”
“The whole team speech thing is really cool in movies, but I feel like it doesn’t have quite the same effect in real life,” Brault said. “I think what really matters is being able to make sure that you’re building chemistry through interpersonal relationships more than building chemistry by standing in front of a team and all that stuff.”
It’s an important thought for the Pirates right now, given the youth movement currently rising through the ranks of the organization. Hopes for a bright future are reliant on young players who are still multiple years away. The faster those players arrive in the majors, the sooner the Pirates’ window of opportunity for success opens.
And though those individual timelines will almost entirely rely on each player’s abilities and development, it can’t hurt to get some input and mentoring from experienced players who have done it before. Brault, as talkative as they come, fits that mold.
“I think it’s more of just kind of continuing to do things the way I do them ... kind of making sure that new guys, especially, are comfortable with the way that we do things,” Brault said. “I’m always the guy you can ask a question if you’re not exactly sure how things work. I like to be the guy that people feel comfortable coming to and asking those questions.”
At the same time, Brault obviously has his own business to take care of. For all this talk of mentoring, it isn’t as if he’s going out of his way to help the Pirates and then quietly exit when the young pitchers are ready.
The 28-year-old still has baseball left in him. He showed that at the end of the 2020 season, throwing a complete game while allowing one run and two hits in his second-to-last start of the year, then following that with seven shutout innings in his finale.
During that success, Brault explained that he was thinking less on the mound. He was following the lead of catcher Jacob Stallings and trusting his arsenal.
He and Pirates pitching coach Oscar Marin believe in that sort of attack mentality, that Brault’s pitches are good enough to throw in and around the strike zone and continually get hitters out. In a perfect world, that would lead to more sustained success than just two consecutive starts for Brault.
He believes that’s possible, and with all the talk of younger pitchers and upcoming prospects, he doesn’t have plans of just giving up his spot so a top-ranked minor leaguer can take it.
“Yes, I think I can be part of that core,” Brault said. “I think that I’m not that old. I believe what we’re doing here is good. Ke’Bryan [Hayes], I think, is the center of that core. I think that everybody would agree with that. He’s going to be something to behold. I’m excited to watch him play a lot and have him play third base behind me because he’s so freaking good. I think the core will continue to grow. It depends on how the team does, how much of the team stays together. That’s just the nature of the game.”
This sort of dynamic seems a bit counter-intuitive to how fans and those on the outside view a rebuilding team. Winning seasons aren’t expected for the next couple of years, so attention turns to the farm system and those who will, ideally, be the team’s next generation of stars.
If a player on the team currently fits into the proper age range, great. If they don’t, the questions often become how they are helping to usher that next era of stars along in the meantime.
That isn’t how it works for the players themselves, though.
Brault says he’s more of a lead-by-example type of player. This spring training, as with any other, he’s working on his own arsenal, attempting to set himself up for the season as best he can. The hope for all involved would be that he does so successfully, and any transferable work habits rub off on the players around him.
It’s a matter of simply being a good teammate, in the end — building relationships with the players around you, getting your own work and building something together if you can.
“We want to tell [the young players], ‘Hey, we want you to help us win. The way that you help us win is by feeling comfortable where you are and knowing that you can be successful,’ ” Brault said. “So we’re going to foster that feeling of wanting immediate success instead of, ‘Oh, you’re a rookie, blah. You have to grind your way through it.’ Just don’t. We don’t need it. We’re going to be welcoming, and we’re going to try and build these relationships as quickly as possible.”