Kovacevic: Cutch wants to come back, and the call should be his alone

Aug 30, 2024 • 11:13 pm

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CLEVELAND -- Andrew McCutchen, one of the most prominent players in the 143-year history of the Pittsburgh Baseball Club, shared with me on this Friday at Progressive Field, before hammering a home run and a double in a wholly hollow 10-8 loss to the Guardians, that he intends to return for another season at age 38.

It was part of a long afternoon talk we'd had in one corner of the visiting clubhouse, and the reply to my initial question came without the slightest hesitation or hedge. In his inimitably confident way, to boot.

"I want to come back," he'd say. "Obviously."

Obviously.

"I’d like to play another year. Hopefully, that opportunity is there for me.”

Obviously, I came back, it'll be there.

"We'll see how it goes."

Oh, right. That.

Look, I can make this the most condensed baseball column of the summer. I could conclude that Cutch is Cutch and, especially in the current environment in which Ben Cherington and Derek Shelton continue to fire themselves with a 20th loss in 26 games and 51 runs conceded in the past four alone ... Cutch had better get what he wants. Because he's Cutch and the people running this operation -- into the ground, as it were -- aren't Cutch. Because he means everything to the franchise and the fandom, and they mean less than nothing.

And I'd be correct.

I could also remind that Bob Nutting and Travis Williams have both told me that this is where Cutch belongs, and this is where he'll be for as long as he's a ballplayer.

And I'd be correct again.

But instead, I'll speak in a dialect that the whole of 115 Federal would find more familiar, both on the statistical and on the financial fronts:

• After going 2 for 5 with three RBIs in this game, Cutch's first in two weeks because of a left knee that'd finally inflamed too far, he has an OPS of .752 that's third-best on the Pirates, a home run total of 17 that's third-best on the Pirates and a walk total of 51 that leads the Pirates. So, by any reasonable definition, he's been their third-best hitter behind Bryan Reynolds and Oneil Cruz.

• Extrapolating that to include the entirety of Major League Baseball, Cutch's OPS ranks seventh among all designated hitters qualified for the batting title, and it ranks 10th among all who've appeared in 100-plus games.

• His participation's held up, with 102 games and 442 plate appearances, and let's recall that was Cherington's singular stated concern last winter in waiting a little weirdly long to bring back Cutch.

• Cutch's value can't be beaten. Neither can his risk/reward. His current contract pays $5 million for a single year. His next contract wouldn't/couldn't pay much more, if any more.

• This:

ANDREW McCUTCHEN TIES THE GAME

HE'S BAAAAAAAACK

102.5 MPH exit velocity, 418 feet, .800 xBA, HR in 25/30 ballparks pic.twitter.com/Hq4v2QqWZm
— Platinum Ke’Bryan (@PlatinumKey13) August 31, 2024

That's Cutch's two-run double off the top of the tallest part of that jutting-over left-field fence, measured at 418 feet and a home run in pretty much every other park on the planet. His second time in the box after missing 14 games, with no rehab stint.

• But wait, no ... this:

"That's a homer"

Andrew McCutchen hits the 2nd home run off of Emmanuel Clase this season

103.1 MPH exit velocity, 369 feet, HR in 21/30 ballparks pic.twitter.com/9SnKOXJ5PN
— Platinum Ke’Bryan (@PlatinumKey13) August 31, 2024

Know who that dude is on the mound?

That's Emmanuel Clase, the Guardians' legitimately great closer and now, after the save that'd follow, Cleveland's all-time leader in that category at 150.

And that pitch, the third of the at-bat that'd top 100 mph, with the first one knocking Cutch down, came with merciless movement away from the bat.

And that result was ...

“Impressive," Shelton would say. "Clase just got his 40th save and ... that’s a tough AB. It’s 100 moving hard, and the first one was at his head, and then to take him oppo ... good swing."

I asked Cutch if he felt he'd carried through the IL stint a sense for the strong stretch -- 11-game hitting streak, reaching base safely in 22 of 24 games -- that'd preceded it:

Good stuff there, but a touch too technical for my taste. I much preferred when he'd later liken it to "riding a bike."

“It feels good, and it'll feel even better after this," he'd say. "That’s always the challenge coming back. You haven’t seen live pitching in however many days, so getting back into the groove of that, getting comfortable again is always a challenge. But felt like I was back to where I left off."

Shelton on that same subject: "Lots of good swings. It’s nice to have him back. That’s important for us.”

Sure is.

As for youthful energy and enthusiasm ... I don't even want to know what this was after the home run:

Some of you will probably hate this, but I think this is the energy this team needs to get out of this slump pic.twitter.com/YHnpgGe8vN
— Platinum Ke’Bryan (@PlatinumKey13) August 31, 2024

My friends, this column's already three times longer than it needed to be, so it'll close here: If Cherington doesn't want to bring back Cutch, then Nutting and Williams need to see to it that whoever replaces Cherington does so. Because Cherington's earned nothing in this fold, and Cutch has earned everything and then some.

Still correct.

• Not forgetting what mattered most on this day, the Guardians did a first-class job of honoring Johnny Gaudreau and expressing condolences to their fellow Ohio franchise, the Blue Jackets, as did the fans on hand and, of course, the participants themselves: