Pitt senior Kevan Smith was drafted in the seventh round of the 2011 MLB draft. Smith was selected by the Chicago White Sox with the 231st overall pick and was the seventh highest draft pick to come out of Pitt.
Smith was an All-Big East first-team selection in 2010 and 2011. He hit .396 in 2011.
A football quarterback turned star catcher, he sat down with Peter Gegick to talk abotu all things sports and how he got to where he is today.
Pete: After starting your career at the school as a football player, did you ever think that you’d end up returning to baseball?
Kevan: Actually, no, I didn’t. I kind of went into football thinking that I had a future in it, with just the talent and the raw ability that I had. I was just hoping that by playing at Pitt, and turn into something that would get me to the next level, and honestly, things just weren’t working out that way.
At the end of my second year, our centerfielder, Zach Duggan, always joked with me about coming over to play baseball and we just laughed about it and stuff, because I was still 100 percent towards football. But actually, after that year and then this other one, I actually felt baseball might be an option for me, because I definitely wanted to keep my athletic career going.
And that’s how things happened, and I ended up switching over.”
Pete: So, from there, it turns out that you were the AAAA baseball player of the year for WPIAL.”
Kevan: Yeah, senior year.”
Pete: Now with that success, why did you choose football over baseball?”
Kevan: It was actually a really confusing situation. I was having great years as a baseball player from my freshman to my senior year. But, it wasn’t like I was getting recruited by baseball colleges that hard.
But I was getting recruited by football colleges, which, a lot of the time, a baseball school can’t compete with the football scholarship. So a lot of baseball schools will stop recruiting kids if they’re getting full rides for football.
So that’s why the major league teams came in and started watching me.
So it was pretty much at my senior year, ‘If I get drafted in the top round, I’m going to do that, but if not, I have football to lean back on.”
I ended up not getting drafted and so I played football. I later found out through the…he’s actually, at the time, the Pirates’ player development guy, he was saying how I was supposed to a top-five pick, a top-five rounder.
‘But every ball club thought 100 percent, that you were going to play football and that you wanted to get your education, you wanted to go play football. So they didn’t want to risk a draft pick’
It’s kind of like I was saying, ‘Go to college, get your education, play football for a little bit, go play the sport you were meant to play and get your degree.’
That’s positive, so that’s how I look at things.
I mean yeah, I probably I could have played right out of high school, but I had a great experience with these guys and I got to experience the college life.
And football was awesome, played in some big games, and not a lot of guys can say they played football and baseball at a D-1 school.
Pete: Among those big games, and I took a little look back here, one of them was I think less than two years after you graduated from Senaca Valley, you had to play at Michigan State, which is a huge school.
Kevan: Yeah, definitely one of those things I remember for me is going from playing a thousand people at Senaca to 85 thousand at Michigan State.
But I mean, I thought I prepared well, and obviously a few things went bad there, and a few things didn’t go my way.
But that, that’s something that every Freshman quarterback is going to experience and I mean, we still should have won that game. Obviously there were some bad throws on my part but there were some dropped passes and some bad things that just went wrong on the offense.
Our defense gave us plenty of opportunities to win that game…but that was it. That was a big eye opener for me and that was just a great experience. I mean, I just took that and used it to my advantage.
I think I got into Rutgers…I mean I played UCONN and a few others and then got into Rutgers a few weeks later and really shined a little bit because I finally realized how much preparation and how much it takes to be successful.
Unfortunately, I got hurt at the end of that Rutgers game, which set me back a little bit. It was definitely a great experience for me, though, and I don’t have any regrets about that year.
But that following year was when it was between Bill(Stull), me, Pat (Bostick) and Tino(Sunseri) and it was kind of like, ‘Who’s going to quit and who’s not.” Everyone was getting their share of reps and mine were kind of dwindling.
I didn’t feel like I was getting the opportunity to perform and to succeed, because the biggest thing that I lacked was experience, and experience was a huge thing that I needed.
It just wasn’t happening for me, and I knew I could hop right back into baseball, because it was like riding a bike for me.
And that was what happened.
Pete: Going along with the whole(QB situation), you just mentioned the three quarterbacks: Bill Stull, Tino Sunseri and Pat Bostick. Were you surprised when you came into that next season and, despite the fact that you had this experience, you were on the low end of the totem pole?
Kevan: Well, what was my big eye opener was when we played Notre Dame that next year. I mean, Bill and I, Bill, Pat and I, we were going back and forth all camp and obviously, Bill came out on top.
Then whenever Bill got hurt, we were supposed to play Notre Dame. I took all first-team reps that whole week. Even in the walkthrough before the game, I was starting and I was going to be the head guy. So that right there that these coaches believe in me, they’re letting me play in this huge game on national television.
And then the game comes and Pat starts out of nowhere.
That showed me right there that the coaches just didn’t believe in me, didn’t trust me, and that was a big eye opener for me.
Whenever coaches break that bond with you, it’s kind of hard to keep that player-coach relationship and for them to trust me, especially after I’ve proven everything that I’ve proven to them.
But right there was kind of the big thing that showed me that maybe it’s a smarter idea to go on and find a different path.
I still stayed, doing the football thing and being on the team, but as the year went on I was starting to think a little more about baseball and the way things worked out, I got to switch over.
Pete: Now I saw that you had offered to play special teams after you realized that you wouldn’t play quarterback.
Kevan: Oh yeah. I mean, I really wanted to stay on the football team with all my buddies and I loved the coaches. Just because I didn’t play in that game didn’t make me hate them. I still had a great experience, and they were great for me and I appreciated everything they had done for me, and I really didn’t want to leave the team.
So I pretty much went into (then-Head Coach Dave) Wannstead’s office and told him, ‘I really want to stay committed to you guys, but I know I can have a future in baseball and a potential future in football. But I don’t just want to throw football away,
I know the offensive system and I can play baseball in the spring and football in the summer and fall. I mean, I did it in high school and I’m sure I can do it in college.’
It wasn’t like I was a freshman kid coming in, where I have to learn the whole offense and everything. I already knew everything. And at that time, I’m 6-foot 4, 240, I could have easily been a special teams specialist and I would have done anything he wanted me to do.
You know, for some reason, he didn’t buy it and didn’t want that. So he pretty much told me, ‘You have to pick one sport and you have to stick with it.’
And I was like, “Alright, I pick baseball.’
He shook my hand and I thanked him for everything, and that was pretty much how it went off.
Pete: Were you taken aback by that? Because there have been stories of athletes who did the exact same thing.
Toby Gerhart is the one who sticks out in my mind. He played baseball and football for the University. Were you kind of surprised he(Wannstedt) was like that?
Kevan: Yeah, I was actually really surprised. I mean, you would think that a Division I football coach would promote multi-sport athletes. That looks awesome for recruits. If there’s a kid who wants to play two sports, that’d be awesome if they said, ‘Listen, we have this guy that also plays baseball and football, and he’s doing great in both, he’s excelling in both and he’d doing great in the classroom, so it is possible.’
But for some reason he(Wannstedt)must have wanted that scholarship that bad.
I don’t know.
It kind of did shock me a little bit, but that’s what made the decision that much easier. Whenever he said you have to pick one, I was like, ‘Alright, I’m going to pick baseball,’ because if he had shown any interest in keeping me around definitely would have played both.
I think he was thing that I had a better future in baseball than football.
And I don’t know. That’s sort of what happened.
There was nobody who stopped or didn’t work hard or anything. I had a lot of things here still. Still good friends who I hang with. I mean, there’s no hate or anything towards the coaches or anything.
It’s just a personal decision I had to make, and they respected it, and that’s just how it happened.
Pete: Now, speaking of that, they took away your scholarship, did you immediately get one for baseball, or did you have to walk-on that team.
Kevan: I actually…the way it worked out was our football scholarships work that you sign them for a whole year. So I actually got to keep my whole football scholarship for that whole baseball year the first year I switched over.
So after my first year of baseball and my football scholarship, then it kicked over to my baseball scholarship after it.
It actually wasn’t that big of a hit.
But obviously, a baseball scholarship isn’t anything like a football scholarship, you’re obviously not getting the big checks or anything on a monthly basis.
Where I was smart with my football checks I was getting, I actually saved up enough money to pay for everything that baseball didn’t cover.
So, it all worked out in the long run.
Pete: Now going along with that, you were a football guy going to this baseball team. Was there any kind of resentment on the team? Like they had thought that you had been given a spot?
I know that you had a teammate from high school on the team?
Kevan: On baseball you mean?
Pete: Yeah. Was there any sort of (resentment) when you joined?
Kevan: No, I don’t think there was any resentment. I mean, I knew a few of the guys through Zach (Duggan, an outfielder for the team) and I mean they were all excited for me to switch over.
And I think everybody understood that it was going to take a little bit for me to get my body back into baseball shape and for me to just start getting back to being a baseball player.
I think wanted to be playing and seeing what I could do and anything. And the catcher at the time, Cory Brownsten and he was a much more polished and better player than me, and I respect that.
But he gave me his input and me and him worked together every pitch to get better and it ended up working out great. He got drafted 15th or something round by the Braves last year(it was the 15th) and I ended up getting drafted this year.
So it worked well for everybody, and it was great experience and I thought it was good.
Pete: I know that you’re first year on the team, you and Brownsten platooned. How do you think that helped you grow.
Kevan: It actually helped a lot. I mean, for a Division 1 program to have two quality catchers is rare. Usually, guys will have just one good catcher that just catches all your games and the other tries to swing the bat and catch mid-week(games).
For Cory and I to be on the same team, it was great, because we both could both match it. All the days off, we’d just DH. And, ultimately, it allowed us to both get better, and get plenty of experience.
But for me individually, it obviously helped me that I could play a game and then sit back and hit. Maybe one or two coaching pointers while I caught.
I mean, just watching him I learned a bunch. But honestly, it helped getting up for a game. You’re not playing every day, so you’re not like ‘Alright, I’m tired every day.’
But that’s about it.
Pete: Now this year, you were nominated for the All-Big East team in the preseason and at the end of the season, you ended up being a unanimous selection to the team. Obviously, catcher is a taxing position. How did you keep your playing level high throughout this whole season.
Kevan: Actually, I didn’t let that preseason ranking affect me. I’ve seen a lot of guys get caught up in the Draft and get caught up in the All-American team and all this stuff.
But I honestly…like if you can block that stuff out, your performance will go sky high. You just have to block that stuff out and focus on your game and focus on playing for each other.
And that’s what I did and that’s what I focused on and obviously it ended up working out great. I wasn’t going into games thinking, ‘I’ve got to hit two or three home runs here to make this this team or do that.’
It was like, ‘I’m just going to do whatever is best for the team and just play like that the whole season and see what happens at the end. Let everything take care of itself’
Obviously it did and it ended up working out.
Pete: So you ended up with the Chicago White Sox. What do you about that organization. Is there anything that you’re looking forward too or anything that you’re hoping for?
Kevan: Just seeing how…I’ve obviously only been here three or four weeks now and having a great experience.
But a big thing with the White Sox that I heard from my agent is that the White Sox actually take care of their players and actually care about them. You do hear about a lot of minor league players who hate coming out of the leagues cause it’s a grind and there’s no treatment when you’re hot, sweaty or cut, but they actually take good care of us.
It’s a great organization for me to be in. I mean, they told me that they don’t really have a set catcher for the future. I mean the guy up there now, he’s 34, 35, and hopefully, there’s going to be about two or three of us that are going to be competing for a future job.
I’m just going to take it day by day competing and working hard.
So that’s a big thing I like.
Pete: How would you describe yourself as a baseball player coming into this organization?
Kevan: That’s a tough one. I mean, obviously when I get on the field, the catching position is my natural, leading position. But I just think I’m not the real vocal, Chatty Cathy kind of guy who’s out there that’s going to yell every play. I think that guy is…
Lead by example. I have a presence out on the field. I mean, you don’t usually see a 6-foot 4 240 catcher behind the plate. I think my size has an assured presence out on the field for everyone to follow.
I mean, I was just strong player, can hit the ball…I’ve got a lot of things to develop and that’s why I’m in the minors.
I think down the line, you just climb the ladder.
Pete: Are you looking forward to possibly meeting Ozzie Guillen after all the stuff he’s done?
Kevan: Oh, definitely. Hopefully he’ll be down there in Spring Training…not Spring Training, instruction in the Fall. I have to go to Arizona, probably for a couple weeks this year.
So hopefully, he’ll be there and I’ll get to meet him. But if not, obviously, he’ll be there at Spring Training and I’ll get to meet him and see what he’s all about.
Definitely looking forward to that.
Pete: So after looking back on this career you had at Pitt for the last five years, would you go through all of it again?
Kevan: Oh yeah, definitely.
I tell everybody that any decision I made or any situation I made, I was grateful for everything I got to experience, everything I’ve been blessed with…having the ability to go play football at a Division 1 school and go play baseball, it was awesome.
You know a lot of guys have that regret, playing one sport, but I got to see both through the whole way, and I’m ever-grateful for it.
Now, I’m honestly playing professionally, and wanted to just work. That was my main goal.
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