Overwhelmed with emotion probably doesn’t even come close to describing what Drew Maggi is feeling after the Pittsburgh Pirates’ 8-1 victory over Los Angeles on Wednesday night.
In the bottom of the eighth inning, Maggi pinch-hit for designated hitter Andrew McCutchen, making his much-anticipated major-league debut that was 13 years in the making.
Maggi, who turns 34 in May, was a 15th-round (No. 447 overall) selection by the Pirates in the 2010 MLB Draft out of Arizona State..
After 1,154 career games played in the minors, the right-handed infielder was called up to the Pirates from Double-A Altoona on Sunday when Bryan Reynolds was placed on the bereavement list.
Three games passed between Sunday and Tuesday without Maggi cracking the Pirates’ lineup, but Wednesday, with the Pirates riding an 8-0 lead over the Dodgers, manager Derek Shelton gave him the call.
“He just looked at me and said, ‘You ready?’ I said, ‘Yeah.’ He said, ‘You’re hitting.’ It was kind of like, ‘It’s your time, so let’s go,’ ” Maggi said. “I liked the way he did it.”
Upon leaving the on-deck circle and making his way to the batter’s box, Maggi was greeted by a warm ovation from the 12,152 fans in attendance at PNC Park, who chanted his name and cheered him on through his at-bat.
“I give our fans a ton of credit because the response was awesome,” Shelton said. “And I thought (home plate umpire) Jeff Nelson did a really nice job letting him have the moment.
“… I think everybody realizes how much time he put in. I mean, 34 years to make your big-league debut — It’s a lot of grinding, man.”
Dreams come true ????
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) April 27, 2023
After nearly 13 years and 1,155 minor league games, Drew Maggi made his MLB debut for the Pirates ????
(via @MLB)pic.twitter.com/za5atSaEAb
It took all of a handful of seconds for Maggi to demonstrate how locked in he was as he swung at the first pitch thrown to him by Los Angeles reliever Alex Vesia — a 93.5 mph fastball, per Statcast — ripping it foul into the stands parallel to shallow left field.
Maggi said he long has thought out aspects of his first big-league at-bat, for whenever the day ultimately came.
Namely, no matter the circumstances or location of his first MLB pitch seen, Maggi was going to be in attack mode.
“I would have gotten a lot of heat from a lot of different people over years and years because you talk about that first at-bat and it’s, ‘Oh, I’m swinging first pitch,’ ” he said. “I’ve been telling everyone that for a long time, like, ‘head’s coming out. I don’t care where it is, I’m swinging.’ ”
However, after taking the first pitch from Vesia, Maggi let things get away from him for a moment as he was slow to get back into the batter’s box and was assessed his second strike for a pitch-clock violation.
Drew Maggi spent 13 seasons in the minor leagues before getting a chance to make his MLB debut
— Jomboy Media (@JomboyMedia) April 27, 2023
When he finally got his first at-bat, he got a pitch-clock violation called on him pic.twitter.com/VSq3NLis6N
Shelton laughed it off after the game, revealing that he declined to bark at Maggi from the Pirates’ dugout and rain on the parade of the latter’s debut, despite Maggi’s momentary lack of awareness.
“There’s no comment there,” Maggi said, with a smile. “Yeah, that was tough.”
Maggi fouled off one more pitch from Vesia and took a high fastball to make the count 1-2 before going down swinging on a slider.
Back in September of 2021, while in Minnesota’s farm system, Maggi was called up to the Twins, spending two days with the club without making an appearance.
His call-up to the Pirates thus had a different feel to it: Would this finally be the moment he worked to realize for nearly a decade-and-a-half, or would it end in another ignominious stint as an MLB “phantom player?”
Maggi wrestled with that very real possibility over the last several days, but in the end, whatever his future with the Pirates and baseball in general holds, he can hold his head high, having achieved a lifelong dream.
“There’s a slight bit of (doubt) because you never know in this game and you never know in life,” he said. “But, it’s over now. I got the first one. I’ve never been more happy for a strikeout in my life.”
