Lakeland, Fla. — Watching him grind through these hot, Florida days with a smile on his face, joking and jogging, going station-to-station with the rest of the pitchers at the Tigers’ minor league minicamp, stretching, throwing on flat ground, throwing bullpens, doing the tedious fielding drills — you would never know his whole world fell apart in the span of about six months last summer.
“I went through things that had never happened to me before,” said Nivaldo Rodriguez, a five-pitch, Venezuelan-born right-hander who has a chance to put himself in the Tigers’ pitching plans in 2022. “I know now what is real life.
“I grew up in six months like I never grew up in 24 years.”
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It started on Saturday, June 26. His father, Nivaldo Rodriguez, Sr., 65 and mostly healthy, started feeling ill. He went to a hospital in Venezuela on Friday and died the next day. He had contracted the COVID-19 virus.
“That was tough,” Rodriguez said, speaking in English outside the minor-league complex Wednesday afternoon. “My father was like super special. It was a difficult time.”
Rodriguez, who made his big-league debut with the Houston Astros in 2020 and had two different stints with the big-league club in April and May, was pitching at Triple-A Sugar Land (Texas) when he got the news. He left immediately to be with his family.
“I was back in Venezuela for like 10 days with my mom and brother, then I came back to the U.S.,” he said. “Being back in Triple-A, it was tough.”
He was still grieving. Impossible to focus on baseball. In his last three outings for Sugar Land, he gave up 11 runs in 12.2 innings. The Astros designated him for assignment on July 31.
The Tigers, managed by former Astros skipper AJ Hinch, immediately claimed him off waivers and sent him to Triple-A Toledo.
“Like, in a month I got DFA’d, my father passed away, I changed teams, made new teammates, had to learn a whole new philosophy,” he said. “Just went through a lot of stuff last year.”
This kind of adversity, though, this heartbreak, it reveals something about a person. It reveals something to a person. Rodriguez, who will turn 25 April 16, never would have guessed the depth of his inner strength.
“You learn a lot about yourself,” he said.
It took a while to get his focus back solely on his career. He stumbled through 13 games in Toledo, giving up 19 earned runs in 34 innings, striking out 19 but walking 12.
He pulled himself together this offseason.
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“I pitched this winter in Puerto Rico and started to regain my way,” he said. “I did good for them and I pitched in the Caribbean World Series. Now I come here in my best shape.”
He pitched in six games this winter, making five starts, and he was strong. He allowed four runs in 25 innings, punching out 31 with six walks.
“This team (the Tigers) has given me an opportunity to pitch, to help the team in the big leagues,” he said. “They call me to minicamp and I do my work, work hard and we’re going to see what happens.”
The Tigers are at least discussing the idea of using Rodriguez as a multi-inning reliever or starter, mostly likely opening the season in the rotation at Toledo. His five-pitch mix, highlighted by a 92-mph, riding four-seam fastball, a 90.5-mph sinker and a firm, 88-mph slider, certainly lends itself to a starting role.
The difference between spending another season in Triple-A and holding a job in the big leagues, Rodriguez knows, will be his ability to command his pitches. In his two seasons with the Astros, he walked 10 in 16 innings.
“It’s not about the pitch types, it’s about command,” he said. “I worked hard in the winter league on that and I got really good results there. I will keep the focus on that same page and see what happens.”
He thinks of his father every day. Occasionally, there is still sadness. But more often now, there is a feeling of pride, of duty. Not only does he carry his father’s face with him, tattooed on his right shoulder, he carries the name and legacy of Nivaldo Rodriguez, for both of them.
chris.mccosky@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @cmccosky