RANCHO CUCAMONGA, Calif. --- Rich Poythress has driven in more runs than any other player in the California League, but he has been spending part of his summer chasing more modest goals.
Along with a few teammates, Poythress is growing a mullet, a pursuit that started as a joke. Now, almost six months later, it's fairly serious, though his baseball cap keeps fans from getting a good look.
"I think he's looking good," said Jake Shaffer, his roommate and another player with short hair on top and long hair in back. "He's started to get a legitimate flow to his hairstyle."
Poythress is having plenty of fun this season -- and for good reason. Poythress, 23, was the first player in minor league baseball to record 100 RBI, a feat he reached by hitting a home run in his team's 113th game. Through Sunday, Poythress was hitting .312 with 126 RBI for the Class-A High Desert Mavericks.
Poythress recorded strong numbers at Greenbrier High, but he blossomed in three years at Georgia. As a junior, he hit .376 with 25 home runs and 86 RBI, and the Seattle Mariners selected him in the second round of last June's draft.
Now in his first full season of professional baseball, Poythress is playing 140 games in a hot, dry, desert climate. The Mavericks' home stadium in Adelanto, Calif., about 80 miles east of Los Angeles, is known as a hitter's ballpark (it was the site of a 33-18 game last season), but Poythress' numbers are impressive enough to draw accolades.
He was named to the California League All-Star Team, and his hitting coach said he has improved markedly this season.
"Before, he was hitting the ball the other way a lot," hitting coach Tommy Cruz said. "Now he hits for power. It's a beautiful thing to see. That's what it's going to take for him to get the big leagues."
Poythress is usually a first baseman, but he has started playing at third recently, a position he has played sparingly in the past. Playing at third could make him more valuable to the Mariners, but Cruz said Poythress might be too big to play anywhere but first.
Still, Poythress said he hopes his old reflexes will return with enough repetitions.
"I always grew up thinking I was going to be a shortstop," he said. "By the time you get to about 6-4, 225 pounds, you're going, 'I don't think that's going to happen anymore.' "
Poythress has brought his relaxed Georgia charm and easy sense of humor to the Mavericks' clubhouse. He is known for his love of country music and pickup trucks, as well as hunting and fishing.
On a recent off day, he and some teammates fished at Big Bear Lake, a popular recreational area surrounded by a national park. They caught trout, which he said were a little different than the largemouth bass he usually catches in Georgia.
"I'd never caught a trout before," he said. "They have the pretty colors all over them."
Poythress lives with two teammates in a rented apartment. Nights are often spent lounging on rental furniture and deciding what to watch on television. SportsCenter and Seinfeld are favorites. Meal choices are important too, with Subway most popular for lunch, and Applebee's the favorite spot for dinner.
Poythress received a signing bonus of nearly $700,000, but he said he has purchased little. He did buy a Kawasaki ATV, which he plans to use for hunting this off-season. While he might play winter baseball in Venezuela or Australia, he expects to move to Georgia and live at home in Grovetown.
It's been a long time since he has lived at home -- he lived in Athens last off-season -- but Poythress has brought one of his old superstitions to California.
In high school, he never changed his hat in four years, and he remembers the cap turning from green his freshman year to white his season year.
"It looked like a cloud," he said.
This season, through nearly 121 games, he has worn the same hat, and it, too, is turning white from dried sweat. But he has a plan to keep it from smelling too much.
"I keep a dryer sheet in it," he said. "It keeps it smelling good."
If all goes well, Poythress will start next season with a new cap, probably from Double A. It'll be another progression on the long road to the majors.
"This isn't our final goal to play in the California League," he said. "We all want to play in the big leagues."
I find you stats suspect, a 3.45 era would mean that you are making more runs than you team completes in a season, maybe you should leave the majawana at home.
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