This story was excerpted from Jason Beck’s Tigers Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.
Kevin McGonigle can remember every strikeout he had during his senior season in high school this spring — both strikeouts, in detail.
“The first one,” he said. “We were playing in Blue Rock Stadium over in [Wilmington], Del., and it was my second at-bat. I’d just swung through two sliders, one was low and away, and then he hit the same spot low and away on the last pitch. So I swung through two sliders, and I was like, ‘Wow.’ I mean, it was going to come at some point.
“So the first one came, and then the last game of the season, we were facing a tough righty. He just started off with a fastball low and away. I watched it, and then I think I fouled a ball back. And then he threw a slider low and in and it was like, I think a ball and a half or two balls in. [The umpire] called it a strike, and I just went back out and just played my game.”
He is not going to build a mental inventory of every strikeout going forward. He understands it’s a game of failure, even if he didn’t do much of that on his way to becoming a first-round pick in last week’s MLB Draft (37th overall in Competitive Balance Round A). But at that level, it’s a demonstration of the combination of the raw hitting talent and deep focus that made him one of the best pure hitters available.
“His bat-to-ball skills are up there probably with anybody in the class based on the evaluations of our staff,” Tigers amateur scouting director Mark Conner said. “He hit on Team USA. He hit throughout the summer. Every time our scouts went in, he continued to hit.”
The hitting skill came partly from his dad, Kevin Sr., who worked with him in the backyard when he was younger. Part, too, was self-taught, coming from watching videos of pro hitters. Tony Gwynn was a great place to start. Phillies legend Chase Utley was another.
The Utley connection has been nearly lifelong. McGonigle was just 4 when the Phillies won the World Series in 2008, but he remembers going outside and banging pots and pans in celebration. From then on, he idolized Utley.
“I followed Chase Utley’s career and was like, ‘I really like this guy a lot. I love the way he plays. That’s how I want to play when I’m older,’” McGonigle said. “So far, I’ve just been working as hard as I can to kind of model my game after him.”
It’s a tough standard, and McGonigle is a couple of inches shorter, but the style fits for a left-handed hitter who plays middle infield and is tough to strike out. Utley had a 15.2 percent strikeout rate for his career, and had virtually identical walk and strikeout rates in 2010 and 2012.
McGonigle has had to put in the work to try to meet that standard.
“When you start looking at his complete game, he is what you classify as a baseball player, a baseball rat,” Conner said. “And when you start talking about the type of makeup that you want to add, this is one of our favorite players. Our area scout was around all year; he had been pounding the table on his makeup. He’s wired the right way, and you get to add him with [No. 3 overall pick] Max Clark and [second-round pick] Max Anderson, it is super exciting.”
Officially adding him is still a work in progress. While Clark and Anderson have signed, McGonigle is still at least officially weighing going pro against a commitment he made a few years ago to Auburn. The expectation is that he’ll be a Detroit Tiger, but Conner and assistant GM Rob Metzler will have to get some other Draft signings done leading up to the July 25 deadline to make the numbers work with the Tigers’ bonus pool, which is second only to the Pirates this year.
“I’ve heard a lot of great things about Detroit,” McGonigle said. “I’m ready to learn even more about Detroit, but we’ll see what happens.”