San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Wise old Crawford finds joy as mentor
34yearold Giant helping those who might replace him
Early in shortstop Brandon Crawford’s pro career, he received a valuable stream of advice from an unlikely source. The competition. When Crawford was participating in the Giants’ instructional league, months after he was selected in the fourth round of the 2008 draft, he was approached by another Giants prospect playing the same position.
“Manny Burriss was awesome,” Crawford said. “First time I met him, he was really talkative with me and interacted with me, and our relationship kind of grew from there.
“He had a little bigleague time at that point, and I was competition. I thought that was even cooler of him to come and help me out as much as he could.”
During Crawford’s decorated pro baseball journey, from his first minorleague stop in 2008 to approaching the final year of his contract in 2021, he has morphed from a mentee to a mentor. Mauricio Dubón raves about him. So does Hunter Bishop.
Baseball is a generational game not just because parents pass it down to their kids but because veterans pass it down to younger players with insight, advice and storytelling that is, in turn, handed down again.
Mentors come in a variety of ages and personalities. They can be coaches, teammates or family members. They can be thrust on you or emerge organically.
“We infielders have a bond that puts us together regardless of competition. We kind of speak the same language,” said Burriss, who won two World Series rings as a Giant and now is hitting coach with the Dodgers’ TripleA team in Oklahoma City.
“The last thing I wanted for Brandon was for him to be unprepared. He was so good talentwise, no doubt in my mind he’d play for a while, so let’s make this kid as comfortable as possible. He was special. He still is special.”
During a career that has included two World Series championships, three Gold Gloves, one Silver Slugger and a gold medal in the World Baseball Classic, Crawford has tried to pay it forward.
Dubón often is in Crawford’s group during infield practice and seen conversing with the man who’s eight years his superior, absorbing every morsel of information.
Regarding 19yearold shortstop Marco Luciano, ranked as high as the seventhbest prospect in baseball, he hasn’t worked with Crawford yet, but there’s still time with nearly two weeks remaining until the season.
“If he ever has anything for me or I saw something with him and he was open to listening to me, I would definitely help him out,” Crawford said. “I do hope they switch up the groups a little bit and I work with him at some point.”
In large part, majorleaguers are separated from minorleaguers, and during the pandemic, players are encouraged to distance and depart when their work is done.
So it hasn’t been an ideal environment for Crawford to tutor Luciano, but manager Gabe Kapler suggested they could still spend time together and pointed out young players often learn simply by watching and studying, which Luciano has been doing.
While Luciano plans to eventually ask Crawford for advice, Luciano said through interpreter Erwin Higueros, “Right now, I am observing and seeing what he does and how he plays his position . ... He is a Gold Glove winner, and seeing him here at camp, I can see why he is a Gold Glove winner.”
From what Crawford has seen, he’s impressed with Luciano’s self assurance and the fact he has been in bigleague camp as a teenager. Crawford turned 19 in January 2006, just before his freshman season at UCLA.
“He’s probably not as wideeyed as I was at 19 as a freshman in college,” Crawford said. “But I can’t imagine taking reps with 34yearolds. He doesn’t lack confidence, though. I have seen that. That’s something a lot of star players in the league have.”
Ditto with Dubón, who arrived late in 2019 as a middle infielder and exuded so much confidence that when he was converted to center field, he said his goal was to win a Gold Glove.
It’s somewhat of a dream for Dubón working alongside Crawford, whom Dubon idolized when he was a high school kid in Sacramento.
“He’s been unreal with me, even in the offseason,” Dubón said. “He’s been teaching me a lot since Day 1. Every day we take groundballs, there’s something I ask him. It’s crazy having his perspective and being so close to him.”
Crawford embraces sharing the wisdom. He has plenty with 10 years worth of bigleague highlights including his sevenhit game, grand slam that sank the Pirates in the 2014 wildcard playoff and Game 7 double play with Joe Panik that helped ignite the Giants’ more recent World Series victory.
The sort of things Dubón can only imagine.
“He asks questions all the time, and I love that about him,” Crawford said. “There are some guys, you don’t know if they want your input. Maybe they’re just not as open to it.
“But Dubón’s not like that. He’s always trying to learn new things. It’s been easy to talk to him about that kind of stuff.”
It’s not just infielders who cherish Crawford’s guidance. Bishop, an outfielder, was asked if there’s a veteran who has assisted him in camp. He said Crawford.
“The character that guy shows with me and how he treats me and some of the other guys, he’s an exemplary human being,” Bishop said. “I really love Craw. I bounce stuff off him, ideas and things about my game to get better. Man, he’s been amazing.”
This is the first bigleague camp for Bishop, and Crawford remembers his. It was 2010, and he was taking grounders alongside an established and respected shortstop. Edgar Renteria was a year younger than Crawford is now and that fall was named World Series MVP.
“I still remember one thing he said to me that really sticks out in my mind that I still use with other guys,” Crawford said. “He told me ‘quick feet, slow hands.’ Don’t try to do too much with your hands. They should be pretty still, but use your feet to get in position where you don’t have to move your hands up and down.
“That always stood out to me. That’s part of the reason, whether it’s with little kids or guys I’m playing with, I always try to preach footwork as one of the most important things to playing shortstop.” When asked to name a mentor early in his pro career, someone who helped with the transition from his days at UCLA, Crawford immediately mentioned Burriss, just two years older and a higher draft pick in 2006 (33rd overall) than Crawford was in 2008 (117th).
“While I was taking groundballs with him or eating in the clubhouse with him, he would talk to me about expectations, what the coaching staff likes to see, what to expect at the bigleague level,” Crawford said. “I always appreciated the input he had for me.”
Burriss recalls his conversations with Crawford, including one approaching the 2012 playoffs. Burriss had experienced the 2010 postseason as a reserve and pulled Crawford aside two years later to advise him on what playoff life is like because “I wanted to make sure he was OK.”
“With Brandon, it was, ‘Look, bro, this is what’s going to help, this is what’s going to hurt,’ ” said Burriss, referring to their early chats.
“I remember how tough it was for me because I shot through the minors probably quicker than expected. Some situations I could’ve handled differently if I had known what to expect. To hear him say those things about me makes me really happy.”
Crawford could talk forever about those who helped him along the way, from his coaches in amateur ball to the pros to, of course, his father, Mike, who still likes to coach his son. “Whether I like it or not,” Crawford quipped. Former teammates Ryan Theriot, Matt Cain and Javier Lopez were pivotal early in Crawford’s career.
“Theriot and Cain made you relaxed by saying something funny, and Javy gave you that calming veteran presence, a guy who knows the answer to everything,” Crawford said. “It gave you confidence that you’re in the right spot, you’re in the big leagues for a reason and the team needs you.”
Then there’s longtime Giants infield coach Ron Wotus, who not only hit endless grounders to Crawford but constantly instilled confidence in him. Especially in tough times, including early in 2012 — Crawford’s first full season.
“It was probably the most firedup conversation we’ve had,” Crawford said. “He was telling me I’ve got to pick it up. It was true. I kind of turned it around. Even during that conversation, he was still relaying the confidence he had in me to be able to be the shortstop for a long time.
“He knew I had it in me.”