The Rockaway Wave
Originally published July 7, 2023
On Jan. 29, 2021, the Colorado Rockies traded star third baseman Nolan Arenado to the St. Louis Cardinals. The deal, which was finalized a few days later, sent five players back to Colorado.
One of those players, Mateo Gil, is currently playing for the Brooklyn Cyclones.
“Anybody that finds out, they come up to me and go ‘you were part of the Arenado deal? That’s awesome,’” Gil said. “I guess. But it’s cool. In a way, I’m linked to him for the rest of our careers, someone that I look up to. At the time, I remember the package from the Cardinals to the Rockies hadn’t been announced yet, and I was really looking forward to watching him work. And then, end up getting traded for him, which is cool too. But I still look up to him.”
Gil said he remembers the Rockies tagging him on Twitter when the deal occurred and seeing a lot of not-so-friendly reactions from fans. He tried, and did, find some positive ones in the sea of negative ones.
“It was very, very surreal,” Gil said. “A lot of social media buzz about it.”
Initially drafted by the Cardinals in the third round of the 2018 draft out of high school, Gil is still just 22 years old despite being in his fifth year in the minors. He spent two seasons (and three years including the canceled 2020 season) in the Cardinals organization, being just 17 when he started in professional baseball.
“I still take a lot of the things that I learned with the Cardinals nowadays with how I just go about my work and stuff,” Gil said. “I remember a lot of things with my time there and how they taught me to be a pro.”
He said he didn’t feel a lot of pressure being traded for someone who might end up in the Hall- of-Fame one day. Instead, he felt more pressure playing winter ball in Mexico, for the same team his dad, Benji Gil, played for and coached.
“I never thought of him as a big leaguer, I just thought of him as my dad,” Gil said. “We would butt heads a lot when I was younger … he’s very opinionated, I’m very opinionated. Every pair of father-son that the father played in the big leagues, it’s all kind of similar, because you don’t look at him as this ex-big league player, you look at him as your dad. It’s a tough dynamic. It’s tough for him too, he’s never had to coach his son, and he knows he has all this knowledge and he just has to kind of dumb it down to two cents, so it’s tough. But at the end of the day, we both
learn. He learns how to coach me and I learned how to be coachable from him. Now it’s at a very good point, he’s helped me a lot.”
Benji was drafted 19th overall by the Texas Rangers in the 1991 MLB Draft, becoming the highest-drafted Mexican player in MLB history at the time. He played parts of eight seasons in the big leagues and won the 2002 World Series with the Angels — and was hired back by the same organization as a coach in 2022.
He was also the manager for Team Mexico in the 2023 World Baseball Classic, advancing all the way to the semifinals before losing to the eventual champions, Team Japan, 6-5. Mateo went to the two games Team Mexico played in Miami as a fan, and said it was one of the best experiences he’s ever had.
Gil then spent two years in the Rockies organization before being claimed off waivers by the Mets this offseason, which he said was a needed change of scenery. He was assigned to Double- A Binghamton to begin the season but struggled, hitting .143/.214/.204 over his first 14 games before being sent down to High-A Brooklyn.
Despite the demotion, his coaches say it hasn’t negatively impacted his mindset.
“He came here, did his work, didn’t say a peep about it,” Cyclones hitting coach Richie Benes said. “He knows it’s the game, it’s the business. He does his thing, he’s gonna be where he needs to be, where he deserves to be.”
Through 46 games with the Cyclones he’s been up and down, hitting .201/.270/.409 with six home runs, tied for fourth on the team. Three of those six homers came in a 14 game stretch in late May and early June when he hit .313 and reach safely in all but one game.
“I tend to usually hit the ball pretty hard when I do put the ball in play,” Gil said. “Right now, I’m just not hitting the pitches that I usually hit. I’m just kind of fouling off or swinging through. I’ll just make my adjustments and then hopefully soon that’ll turn around and then I can start just getting some to fall.”
Hitting the ball hard is something Benes emphasized three times in a one minute span when talking about Gil, and that’s backed up by his power numbers this season. His ISO ranks second on the team, just behind Stanley Consuegra, and he’s on pace for more home runs than he’s ever hit in his professional career.
Defensively, you can put him anywhere in the infield — and the Cyclones have. He’s played at least 50 innings at third base, second base and first base. The only position he hasn’t played for Brooklyn this season is shortstop, which is where he has the most experience in his professional career.
“You can put that kid behind the plate you can put that kid in the outfield, he’s a baseball player,” Cyclones manager Chris Newell said. “And anytime you have baseball players on your team, you’re better than a lot of them.”
He has played third the most this season, but lately has been playing a lot of first base, a position he had almost no experience at heading into this season.
“It’s a lot more work than people think,” Gil said. “Running back and forth, and you’re involved in every play … but it’s been good so far. Anytime we have work, I just make sure to put an emphasis on trying to learn it.”
The versatility Gil has runs in the family.
“I’m gonna be how my dad was,” Gil said. “My dad was a utility guy, I think I’m gonna be a utility guy if I wanna make it to the big leagues. So I try to take pride in each position, and trying to adjust to each, and play my best at each one.”
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