With mom on his mind, Tellez eager to prove fall surge was no fluke

Scott Mitchell

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TORONTO — Three years ago, Rowdy Tellez authored a breakout season in Double-A that put him on the prospect map at the age of 21.

It looked like the Toronto Blue Jays had their first baseman of the future.

But two years of struggles, on and off the field, followed.

Rocked by his mother Lori’s battle with brain cancer, baseball didn’t quite take a backseat, but the focus Tellez needed to finish his climb to the big leagues waned.

In 2017, taking his first crack at mastering Triple-A, Tellez disappointed with a .222/.295/.333 slash line, with few knowing exactly what was going on in the big left-handed hitter’s life.

With his mother spending 90 per cent of her days in hospital, last year was more of the same, as Tellez tried to juggle baseball and family. He was forced to leave the team on three separate occasions.

When Lori Tellez died at the age of 53 last Aug. 19, everything changed, and Tellez went out and put on a heartwarming September performance, a feel-good story in an otherwise lost season for the Jays.

Twenty-three games.

Seventy-three trips to the plate.

Four home runs.

Thirteen extra-base hits.

His performance exceeded all expectations, especially considering the circumstances.

“I was clear-minded for the first time since the end of the 2016 season,” Tellez said. “I didn’t have to worry about coming off the field and making sure everything was OK. That’s how I feel this year. Clear mind, ready to go.”

Tellez has something to play for each and every day, and every glance down at his glove or cleats provides a reminder.

“I have a tattoo on my arm now, from the top of my shoulder down to above my elbow,” Tellez explained. “All my cleats and my gloves have something on them. It says ‘4P4M’ which is ‘forever playing for mom’ and I wear the number 44, so that’s how I incorporated my number in. It’s on everything.”

Last September almost never happened.

When Tellez went home for his mother’s funeral in August, he informed the Blue Jays that he was done for the season and had little desire to come back to play out the string for a Buffalo Bisons team that was out of the postseason picture.

“I even told Mark (Shapiro) and Ross (Atkins), ‘You know, I’m done for the year. I’m not going to come back. There’s no point,’ ” Tellez said.

“Devon Travis actually talked me into coming back and was like ‘Hey, man, you should come back and finish out the minor league season,’ and then I was blessed enough to get the call to Toronto.

“I was told I wasn’t going to play very much and I was going to be up there to learn and just grow as a player and be around the guys. But they let me have a couple opportunities and I took advantage of it.”

Provided another opportunity last week when Kendrys Morales was shipped to the Oakland A’s on the eve of the season opener, Tellez has once again taken advantage.

With DH bats now there for the taking, Tellez’s big-time power has shown up already in the form of a pair of no-doubt home runs in his first five games.

New Blue Jays hitting coach Guillermo Martinez wants Tellez to power down in order to help him power up, which, in turn, will help make him a more complete hitter.

“He’s able to do a lot of things,” Martinez said. “When he learns how to not search for power, that’s when he’s actually going to be able to hit for power a lot more consistently. Just stay through the middle of the field. Sometimes he gets a little bit pull happy and those are the things we talk about daily in the cage, just try to stay through the middle of the field. He can go deep anywhere, but just maintain that balance.”

Justin Smoak, who lost his father to cancer as he was breaking into the big leagues in 2011, is a believer. 

The veteran first baseman has been guiding the 24-year-old Tellez since the pair met in spring training a few years ago.

Whether it’s baseball or life, there’s a lot more in common between the two than just the position, the body types, and the desire to crush baseballs.

“Honestly, I’ve been through it, too, and it’s always going to be in the back of your mind,” Smoak said of dealing with death while trying to focus on hitting major-league pitching. “That’s not leaving. It’s not really not thinking about it, it’s how you handle it and how you get your mind off it. When his situation happened, I talked to him through his whole time dealing with that because I dealt with it and it’s not easy to do. For me, I kind of let all that build up inside forever and he’s been able to come to me when he has questions here or questions there.

“Hopefully, he can get his mind towards baseball but, honestly, if I’m him I’m thinking about whatever I was thinking about last September.”