A match-up between the Chicago Cubs and St. Louis Cardinals on a holiday weekend is the sort of thing that draws in fans from beyond the city’s furthest reaches and can become a cherished family memory, a trip about which tales are told for years to come.
It’s those memories which breed natural shorthand, and which can fuel lifelong passions and grudges which defy rationality.
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No one walked through Wrigley Field’s gates on Saturday expecting to leave with a strong opinion in one direction or another about Cardinals backup catcher Yohel Pozo.
By the time he was done circling the bases after hitting what would become a game-winning, three-run, pinch-hit home run in the top of the eighth inning, the portly Venezuelan backstop was already locked in to stories and memories which will span the coming decades.
By dinner time Wednesday, thousands of Cubs fans had likely pledged permanent hatred, just as thousands of Cardinals fans locked him into favorite player conversations for years to come.
“This is [my] first time playing in Chicago,” Pozo said. “This is electric. They pass all the game yelling at our players and all of that. It feels good to do it. I’m OK if they’re gonna hate me. I don’t care. And for our fans, just keep pushing for this team, because we compete every day. We have the young talent here that we can do special things.”
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For Pozo to be part of the conversation at all required countless breaks in his direction on top of his own work. As a rookie ball player in 2016, when he was 19, Pozo was investigated – and ultimately cleared – by Major League Baseball following an alleged sexually inappropriate hazing incident. He endured periods of homelessness simultaneous with a stroke suffered by and incorrect diagnosis of his toddler son.
He saw 21 games in the big leagues with Texas in 2021 but played 758 games in the minors before Iván Herrera’s April knee injury in Boston saw him promoted to the Cardinals for what could have been temporary duty. And even that promotion came with its own long odds; Pozo signed a minor league deal with the Cardinals over the winter that didn’t include an invite to big league spring training, and he was toiling away as one of the oldest players in minor league camp.
The Cardinals, though, were unimpressed by the spring performances of some of their depth catching options. Director of baseball administration John Vuch, who had been involved in Pozo’s signing to begin with, pushed his name and performance to President of Baseball Operations John Mozeliak, and at a round table staff meeting late in spring, the decision was made to give him a real shot.
And so he returned that shot on Saturday, providing both one in the arm to a Cardinals team which was on the verge of seeing a game and series drift away, and one to Waveland Avenue in the form of a well-struck baseball.
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“I absolutely love it,” manager Oli Marmol said. “When you come from not a whole lot and you’re able to make something of yourself, and then the way he approaches every day. He loves showing up to the park. Doesn’t matter if you play a hundred days in a row with no off day, he just loves being here.”
And to be there, he swings the bat. Pozo trails only San Diego Padres infielder Luis Arráez in percentage of pitches put in play, and he swings at balls outside of the strike zone more than anyone else in the majors this season. He’s also hitting .329; there can be allowances for chasing if those chases turn into hits.
“From the first day I saw him, I really loved his swing,” outfielder Lars Nootbaar, who scored on Pozo’s homer, said. “Just his mechanic-based swing, sometimes it looks kind of outrageous, but when you really break it down, he’s got an awesome swing, an awesome approach, he does well battling up top, and then when he gets a pitch he can handle it.”
Standing on third base, Nootbaar had perhaps the best view of anyone in the ballpark (other than Cubs pitcher Brad Keller) of how Pozo handled the backup 3-2 slider which he deposited on the street. With the game tied and one out, Pozo had confidence he wouldn’t see a fastball in a full count, given that his high contact rate would almost surely loft a high velocity offering to the outfield. He waited on the slider, got the one that met his barrel, and jogged around trailing new memories.
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“If there’s anybody that’s going to do it,” Nootbaar said of anticipating a ball in play, “for me, at third base, pretty, pretty good idea that he’s at least going to get the job done at the very least.
“It’s impressive for him to have that outlook from us as teammates, when he has limited at bats and opportunities. But it seems like whenever he does, he comes up big for us.”
Whether the trajectory of Pozo’s career changes along with the new fan trajectories he created from Saturday’s blast will likely continue to depend on a number of factors outside his control.
What he can control, though, is the memories made by his own family. His father and grandfather live together in Venezuela, and the youngest Pozo made sure to pay for access to a streaming service that guarantees the prior generations – both ball players themselves – can see what he achieved in real time.
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Pozo joked that his father was almost certainly more nervous than he was for his at bat, and that the house was certainly “pretty loud” when the ball jumped off the bat. That, he figures, they’ll definitely remember.
“Being here is not just for me,” Pozo said of trying to share his big league experience with his family.
He’s right about that, certainly, when it comes to his loved ones, but it’s true for the broader fan community as well. His being in that place in that moment turned out to be for all of them, too, and they’ll never forget the Yohel Pozo Game.