A Star in the Making

McCutchen has already surpassed the hype
By Joe Giardina

Superstar status can't be achieved without one moment when it all comes together. It's a prerequisite of sorts, a moment in time when talent meets opportunity and creates legend.

Andrew McCutchen's moment came in grade school, and was accompanied with the sound of shattered glass.

It was the result of his first ever homerun – as a 10-year-old in his hometown of Fort Meade, Florida. It cleared the fence, crashing through a windshield and landing in the front seat of a car that was surely parked without any thought of receiving a souvenir from a 4th grader.

"You could really tell that this kid was going to be something," said Jon Spradlin, an assistant coach at Fort Meade High School while McCutchen was there. Spradlin, now the head coach, has watched McCutchen play since his days in the youth leagues. "He was considerably better than everyone else," he said. "It got to the point where they would never pitch to him."

Selected out of high school by the Pirates in the first round of the 2005 draft, McCutchen instantly became the most exciting Pirates' prospect since Barry Bonds two decades earlier. When he was promoted in June of last season, he immediately became the Pirates' first pure centerfielder since Andy Van Slyke.

Coincidentally, both those players were the core of the last winning professional baseball team to call the North Shore home.

McCutchen has the star power to be the centerpiece of the next winning team. "He's a rare talent," said Pirates pitcher Paul Maholm. "He's mature beyond his years. He's only going to continue to get better, and that's something that we need – a guy like that who can be a threat on both offense and defense. "

He isn't just making splashes in Pittsburgh, either. "I don't think he is going to put up gaudy numbers that appeal to the media," said John Hart, current MLB Network analyst and former general manager of the Cleveland Indians and Texas Rangers. "But his skills and tools are certainly 'star status.' When you put the entire package together – those are all a part of making this guy into a very, very good player. If you put a premium on center of the diamond players that can do it on both sides of the ball, you'd put Andrew McCutchen as one of the most desirable players."

McCutchen's star status landed on some peoples' radars before he even hit high school.

As an 8th grader, McCutchen was already playing varsity, earning first-team All-County honors in the process. It was then, while playing in a regional tournament against sophomore sensation Lastings Milledge—who was already being scouted as a potential high draft pick—that Spradlin knew McCutchen was special.

"Seeing those two compared to each other at different ages," Spradlin recalled, "to me, that's when I could tell that, 'wow, we have this little 8th grader, and he already compares to this kid.'"

McCutchen was, without a doubt, a superstar in high school – in just about every sport. As a freshman, he won a state title as a member of the 4x100 track team. As a sophomore, he was rated one of the top football players in the state and was named first-team All-County. As a junior, his multi-sport tour of honors continued as he was named an AFLAC All-American in baseball.

And it was around that time that he realized professional baseball was a reality.

"You don't start noticing those things until you've got scouts calling you and trying to talk to you," McCutchen said. "That wasn't until my sophomore or junior year, and that's when I started thinking, 'I can do this.'"

While focusing on baseball, all he did as a senior was hit .709 with 16 homeruns and 42 RBI in just 22 games. He was clocked running a 6.2 in the 60-yard dash, and eventually broke the Florida record for consecutive stolen bases. No one is sure of the exact number – Spradlin stopped counting around 50.

He was named Gatorade's High School Athlete of the Year for Florida, and was rated the top high school player in the state by Baseball America.

His size wasn't—and still isn't—imposing by any means. But his bat was so strong that he was often intentionally walked – to lead off an inning.

"This is going to sound crazy, but even at 155 pounds, he was the same way he is now," said Spradlin, referring to his power. "His hands were just so fast, he had so much bat speed."

The Pirates, simply put, had no choice but to select him with the 11th overall pick. But dominating in high school means little in the pros. A strong character, however, goes a long way.

"What attracted people at a young age to this kid is just the tool set," said Hart, who also currently serves as a senior adviser of baseball operations with the Rangers. "The separator was that the kid had a really strong make up. The things that I think are meaningful if you're going to draft a kid first, [he had]. You've got a kid that's going to get the most out of his ability and at some point, when he becomes a star, he's going to be a great representative of what your club stands for – a winning-type player, someone that you can count on."

In 2005, his first season in the organization, the 18-year-old hit a combined .310 in 58 games in rookie league and low-A ball. The following season he was named the Class-A South Atlantic League's Most Outstanding Major League Prospect and the Pirates' Minor League Player of the Year. At age 19, he became the youngest player in franchise history to be promoted to double-A. Baseball Prospectus depicted him as: "The crown jewel in the tarnished tiara that is the Pirates farm system. McCutchen is the real thing: A five-tool player with no weaknesses."

Glass-shattering homeruns make good stories, and minor league awards are nice fireplace memorabilia, but the final test of star power at the major league level comes in the form of consistency.

Which is precisely what McCutchen has shown since June 4, 2009.

If you choose to measure success by milestones reached, consider this: In August of his rookie year he became the first rookie in franchise history to hit three homeruns in a single game. Three weeks later, after his defensive gaffe led to the Phillies tying a game in the top of the 9th, McCutchen calmly stepped to the plate in the bottom of the inning and deposited a game-winning, walk-off homerun over the centerfield fence. In a game at Wrigley Field in May of this season, he went 5-for-5 with a walk, a homerun, five runs scored, two RBI and two stolen bases.

Not bad for one year of service.

If you prefer to judge a player on statistics alone, how about this: In his rookie year, spanning 108 games, he hit .286, with 12 homeruns, nine triples, 26 doubles and 22 stolen bases on his way to being named the Baseball America Rookie of the Year. Over his first 162 career games, he hit .297, with 19 homeruns, 108 runs scored, 71 RBI and 35 stolen bases.

All this for a team that is at or near the bottom of every offensive category.

It would be naive to automatically assume the 23-year-old McCutchen will be in black and gold his entire career (his entire life, actually, as the Fort Meade Miners' colors are also black and gold). He cannot become a free agent until after the 2015 season, but at the rate he is progressing, he may be outside the Pirates' price range by then. That's why some have speculated signing him to a long-term deal now, as Tampa Bay did with Evan Longoria, or as Arizona did with Justin Upton.

For this franchise, if there was ever a player worth locking up at any time, it would be McCutchen. And soon. "You gain experience by playing every day," McCutchen said. "It helps you out in the long run because you see the same teams, the same faces, the same pitchers, so you kind of know what to expect. In your rookie year, you really don't know what to expect, like playing in different ballparks. Now I have seen pretty much every place. I know what to expect." And now, so does the rest of the league.