Giants’ Andrew McCutchen enjoys being just one of the guys

By Ann Killion
https://www.sfchronicle.com/giants/article/Giants-McCutchen-enjoys-being-just-one-of-the-12717441.php
February 28, 2018



Andrew McCutchen #22 of the San Francisco Giants leaves the dugout prior to a game against the Chicago Cubs on Sunday, February 25, 2018 at Scottsdale Stadium in Scottsdale, Arizona.(Alex Trautwig/MLB Photos via Getty Images)


SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Andrew McCutchen already penned his heartfelt goodbye to Pittsburgh. An emotional soul-searching asking the question — “Who Am I?” — with which McCutchen wrestled after being traded from the only team he ever knew.

And now, as he pads around the Giants’ spring training clubhouse, he’s trying to answer the question this way: just one of the guys.

“It’s good to show up and just be a guy in the clubhouse,” McCutchen said Wednesday. “A guy who’s going to contribute. Not necessarily having everyone’s eyes on one person. ... It can be taxing to be that guy.

“There are a lot of guys on this team with a lot people looking at them. So just show up and play baseball. That’s it.”

McCutchen learned of the trade Jan. 15 while he was putting down his infant son for a nap. Pre-nap with the Pirates, mid-nap with the Giants. On a cold day, the Pirates traded their longtime center fielder, their franchise player, their face, for two men named Kyle Crick and Bryan Reynolds, along with some cash.

“I was prepared because of what had happened the year prior, when I was almost traded and then I wasn’t,” McCutchen said. “I went in with my mind open that it was a possibility. When it did (happen), I had already mentally prepared myself.”

But, as he wrote in his farewell piece for the Players’ Tribune, he never had the chance to say goodbye. On a Wednesday night in September it hadn’t really occurred to him that it could be the last time for so many things: Putting on his Pirates uniform, or having his name announced at PNC Park when he stepped into the batter’s box.

But the fans could sense it. They gave him a prolonged ovation and McCutchen tipped his hat. It was, indeed, the last time.

Now, everything is the first time. First time in Scottsdale. First time wearing orange and black.

First time not being the franchise face.

“You have some guys on this team, they’ve won some championships, MVPs, Silver Sluggers, Gold Gloves,” he said. “You’re just a part of it. You just want to be able to do what they’ve already done. Win a World Series.

“That’s what I’m here for.”

In his piece for the Players’ Tribune, McCutchen wrote this about the Giants: “I’m not just a baseball player. I’m also a fan. And any fan — anyone who loves and follows this game — you’ve been watching what the Giants have been doing for the last decade … in awe. This is an organization that is all about winning talent, and all about winning culture. And that’s what I’m about, too. So to say this is a good fit … it’s an understatement, man. For me to get traded to San Francisco — the fit is perfect.”

Like a lot of us, McCutchen was surprised by the Giants’ 98 losses last season. He knows that the baseball gods deliver the occasional disaster with the good times and that every team will go through lows. From his perspective, his new teammates seem to have processed the disappointment.

“At the end of the day, you can look back on it and learn from it and I think a lot of guys have done that,” he said. “They’ve shown up this year and are ready to go.”

One of the byproducts last season was an unhappy clubhouse. McCutchen arrives with a reputation as being a joyful, good-for-chemistry presence. But he isn’t going to force anything.

“If you feel like you have to do something, you’re trying too hard,” he said. “I’ll just be myself like I’ve always ever done.

“I’m vocal when I have to be. I talk when I’ve got to talk. I like to lead by example, go out and play the game and have fun. Play hard, but you don’t have to be serious. The way I play is to have a lot of fun doing it, and it shows. That’s how I am. ... It’s always fun for me. I don’t know any other way.”

According to McCutchen, chemistry doesn’t start in the clubhouse. It starts on the field, when players perform and do well.

“That’s our ice breaker,” he said. “It’s all about being together, playing together. That creates the language, the fun, the camaraderie. Not going around the clubhouse shaking hands. It happens when the game goes on.”

McCutchen is excited to have the fans at AT&T Park rooting for him rather than against him. He hasn’t yet found a home in San Francisco for his family, consisting of his wife, Maria, and their 3-month-old son, Steel. McCutchen said Pittsburgh always will be home for them. He also said that, contrary to reports, he did not name his son as a tribute to the Steel City or the Steelers, but rather to bestow a name of strength.He feels energized by his new challenge.

“It does get you pumped up,” he said. “You left a team — not to say it didn’t want you or need you — but now you have a team that did want you more. That gets you fired up to show this wasn’t a fluke.

“It’s a little more sugar in your coffee. “

McCutchen isn’t alone in this new project. He shares a corner of the clubhouse with Evan Longoria, the former Tampa Bay third baseman. Two franchise faces in a new land. Two men whose teams didn’t have the financial desire to keep them. (Those same teams — the Pirates and Rays, along with the A’s and Marlins, are the focus of a grievance filed last week by the players’ union, saying all four franchises failed to spend revenue-sharing money.)

In that one corner of the clubhouse reside — figuratively, not literally — four Gold Gloves, five Silver Sluggers, eight All-Star appearances and one league MVP.

And each is trying to be just one of the guys.

Ann Killion is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist. Email: akillion@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @annkillion