Offseason work pays off for Pirates’ Bell
Pittsburgh Pirates first baseman Josh Bell, a Texas native, spent his entire past winter in Newport Beach, California ... and never went to the beach. Snubbed the nightclubs. Skipped the fine dining.
Oh, but he can tell you all about the batting cages, workout facilities, practice fields and health food spots in Southern California.
“I didn’t go there on vacation,” Bell told USA TODAY. “I went there for work.”
And Bell returned to the Pirates from his four-month Southern California excursion as a completely changed player.
A year ago, he was labeled as a oneyear wonder, changing his batting stance more often than his socks. He set a National League rookie record for a switchhitter with 26 homers in 2017, only to see his power game vanish last year — his homers plummeted to 12 while his RBI totals dropped from 90 to 62. He was treated as if he lip-synced his rookie year, with an anonymous scout in Sports Illustrated calling him a virtual fraud. He was also informed by the Pirates that unless he showed dramatic improvement, he could be spending the season as a platoon player.
Today, Bell is one of the most feared hitters in the game and a legitimate MVP contender.
He entered the Pirates’ homestand beginning May 21 hitting .333 with 14 home runs and tied for the major league lead with 44 RBI and league-leading 30 extra-base hits. It’s the most homers by a Pirates’ player in the first 44 games since Willie Stargell in 1973, the most extrabase hits since Paul Waner in 1932, and tied for the third-most RBI in franchise history.
Bell, who hit .442 with five homers on the Pirates’ grueling 11-game trip without an off day, has three multi-homer games in the last two weeks. His 1.101 OPS ranks behind only Cody Bellinger of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Christian Yelich of the Milwaukee Brewers.
“We’ve never seen him like this,” Pirates manager Clint Hurdle said. “Really, we haven’t seen anybody like this in a Pittsburgh uniform in quite awhile.”
No one, not Barry Bonds, Roberto Clemente or Stargell has ever had a start like this in Pittsburgh. He might still be 6-4 and 240 pounds of muscle, but looking deep inside his soul, he’s a changed man.
“I saw him in Newport Beach in the offseason,” Pirates starter Joe Musgrove said, “and you could just see the look in his eyes, that demeanor.
“We talked about it, and he knew there were a lot of expectations and a lot of pressure for him to come out and have a big year, and he embraced it. He said, ‘I know what’s expected of me. I had a monster year my rookie year, and I don’t want last year’s season to define me as a person and who I am as a player.’