Before he was a World Series champion, earlier than he was Carlos Correa’s inheritor obvious as Houston Astros shortstop, Jeremy Peña was identical to the 1000’s of different minor leaguers keen to do something to realize their dream of reaching the large leagues.
For the Providence, R.I., native and former UMaine baseball star, that dream included an uncommon detour.
During the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Peña was left within the lurch when spring coaching was lower quick and the minor league baseball season cancelled. Then a High-A prospect, Peña related with former faculty teammates Joe Bramanti, Jake Rainess and Alex McKinney and spent the summer season in Maine understanding in an outdated barn.
Bramanti, a North Andover resident, first shared the story final season after Peña initially established himself with the Astros. Now again at Fenway Park for the primary time since successful the World Series, Peña mirrored on his personal reminiscence of that formative expertise.
“Everyone cleared the school, facilities got shut down, everyone went home and the only place we had to hit was a barn,” Peña mentioned. “I don’t know how we found the barn, I guess he knew somebody from up there, but the barn had a cage, it had a pitching machine, we had some good baseballs, so we spent all of COVID hitting in a barn.”
For months the group skilled, taking batting apply, fielding floor balls, throwing, lifting, you identify it. With lingering uncertainty over when the pandemic may subside, Peña labored as if the season may be proper across the nook.
“At first it was kind of we didn’t know when we were going to start, so it was like ‘stay ready, we might start in a week, we might start in two weeks,’ so the whole time I was training as if the season was going to start in a week,” Peña mentioned. “Then when two months went by and it’s like the season is cancelled, then we kind of toned it down a little bit from our workload and then I got invited to the taxi squad.”
With campus empty and the entire nation primarily locked down, the 4 didn’t have a lot else to do exterior of baseball. Peña remembers spending most of their downtime crammed in a tiny condo, which had a squat rack, the kitchen and the sofa and TV all in the identical room.
“It was quite the scene, you’ve got dudes playing video games, some dudes cooking and other dudes working out, so it was everything in one room,” Peña mentioned. “It was a memory, for sure.”
Strange because the circumstances have been, that summer season wound up having a large influence on Peña’s improvement. Though Peña suffered an harm setback as soon as the minor leagues resumed, present process left wrist surgical procedure in April 2021, he was an absolute monster as soon as he obtained again on the sphere in August. Promoted straight to Triple-A, Peña hit 10 residence runs in 30 video games to finish that season.
The Astros knew immediately they’d one thing particular, a lot in order that they allowed Correa to stroll in free company and put in Peña as their opening day shortstop. He responded by changing into the primary rookie shortstop in MLB historical past to win a Gold Glove, and are available October he was named each ALCS and World Series MVP after main the Astros to their second World Series title.
Yet so far as he’s come, Peña says that summer season within the barn was important to his improvement.
“A lot of players didn’t have places to work out at or hit at, so we had to improvise,” Peña mentioned. “But the barn had everything we needed to keep putting the work in and keep getting better, so I’d say it was crucial.”
Source: www.bostonherald.com