LOS ANGELES -- With his hopes of ever getting another shot at the big leagues dimming and within a day of reluctantly signing a professional contract with a Mexican League team, Yohel Pozo felt a tremendous sense of relief when the Cardinals came calling last February with an offer of a Minor League deal.
These days, it's the Cardinals that are relieved that the sweet-swinging catcher with an unlikely journey to the big leagues was still available because of how Pozo has adapted to life as the team’s go-to pinch-hitter late in games.
Pozo, who was homeless for a time during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic that shut down the Minor League season, came through in the clutch again when he delivered an opposite-field, RBI single that proved to be the difference in the Cardinals’ stirring 3-2 win over the Dodgers before 46,628 fans at Dodger Stadium.
Incredibly, Pozo is 6-for-12 with two doubles, a homer, seven RBIs and four go-ahead RBIs this season as a pinch-hitter.
“I always get ready as soon as the sixth inning hits and you can pinch-hit me any time after I get some swings in, get my body ready and get a sweat going,” said Pozo, who hit a 95.9 mph cutter from Brock Stewart to drive in pinch-runner Garrett Hampson. “Even if we’re losing by a lot, I go hit and if we’re winning by a lot, I go hit.
“So, I’m always ready to hit. But if you ask me if I was able to do this at the beginning of the year, I’d say, ‘I don’t know.’ But it makes me super happy to do this.”
Pozo, a native of Maracaibo, Venezuela, enhanced his hand-eye coordination as a child by hitting black beans thrown to him by his baseball-loving father, Yohel, and grandfather, Rafael Pozo. Whereas his father never made it out of the Minor Leagues, the younger Yohel briefly reached the big leagues with the Rangers in 2021 and has stuck with the Cardinals since an early-season knee injury to Iván Herrera. In between, he spent all or parts of 11 years in the Minor Leagues, while hoping for his shot.
“More than anybody I’ve probably ever been around, he takes it all in and appreciates it every single day,” Cardinals’ manager Oliver Marmol said. “There’s not a day where he shows up and says, ‘Gosh dang it, it’s hot out’ or ‘we’re playing 17 [days] in a row.’ It’s always a new day for him and he’s happy as hell to be out there.”
To help make sure that his father and grandfather “live this dream along with me,” Pozo takes pictures and videos of each new stadium the Cardinals travel to on the road. Monday’s game was his first at Dodger Stadium and he made sure to take sweeping panoramic shots of the stadium, sending video images of the historic ballpark home to Venezuela. His dad’s response: “Go, son, go. Keep going!”
Pozo was in a position to win the game after Sonny Gray spectacularly limited the Dodgers to one hit over seven innings while striking out eight. Six of his K's came on a tight sweeper that he used to strike out three-time MVP Shohei Ohtani twice on the night.
“I knew [the sweeper] was sharp when Shohei swung at it as the first batter of the game, but I also set it up pretty well because I got the ball to his hands so that his hips were moving earlier,” Gray analyzed. “But when I threw that first one to [Ohtani] and he swung at it, I knew that was a good thing. Then, when Freddie [Freeman] did it as well [in a first-inning strikeout], it was executed. Then, I felt more comfortable in those moments because I was executing, and I had done the work to force them to swing.”
Usually a free swinger who values aggressiveness over patience, Pozo had the biggest swing of Monday night when he worked the count to 2-0 and then muscled Stewart’s cutting pitch into right field. Excited about the clutch hit, Pozo pumped his fist in the direction of the Cards dugout and slapped hands with excited first base coach Stubby Clapp.
While proving himself to be one of the game’s most productive pinch-hitters, Pozo hopes he’s proven to the baseball world that he can hit at the game’s highest level and he deserves to stay.
“I had almost no offers, I almost signed to play baseball in the Mexican League and I had to sign a Minor League contract with no invitation to big league camp,” Pozo said. “I signed with [the Cardinals] just for the opportunity and to keep myself in baseball. So, to now be doing this in the big leagues, it’s really special.”