Rutigliano eager to level up with Rogues

Published 10:42 am Wednesday, June 12, 2024

Frankie Rutigliano has been on quite the baseball journey, rising through the ranks at every level that the Rogue Valley has to offer with the latest joining the Medford Rogues for his first season in the Pacific Empire League.

His motivations are simply to accomplish a dream that many have had and that few get the opportunity to pursue: to someday play professional baseball.

“That has been it since Day 1,” said Rutigliano. “It started when I was playing catch with my dad when I was about 3, then I got into a league at 6 and that has always been my common goal.”

His passion is easily seen whenever he plays, the shortstop leaves it all out there with diving catches, strong batting and fearless baserunning.

All of his effort can be measured by the amount of dirt that has accumulated on his uniform. It is almost like a timeline of the plays that he made throughout the game.

Rutigliano, who will turn 18 on July 9, finds how dirty he can make his uniform as a badge of honor.

“If I can find a chance to get dirty then I will, I like my work to show,” he said. “I don’t want to have had a great game and then look like I didn’t do anything. I want to have some sort of dirt on my chest and it’s just a lot better feeling when you’re dirty.”

The individual accolades only add to show his hard work, earning first-team all-conference honors in the Southwest Conference in all four years for the North Medford baseball team along with first-team all-state his junior year and second-team all-state in his senior year.

Last year, the Black Tornado grad committed to play at the University of Portland and will study business and hopes his game improves enough to play professional baseball after his collegiate career.

Fellow Rogue and North Medford alum Aiden Horsley has been nothing short of ecstatic to see his lifelong throwing partner thrive.

“He’s always been a great teammate,” said Horsley. “He always plays with awesome effort, he’s a great hitter, he’s great defensively and he is an awesome player to watch.”

“You have to have those expectations that he has,” he added. “To make it a long ways, you have to have confidence in yourself to go that long.”

And there is excitement for the next chapter and making a jump in terms of play and competition. All of that is welcomed, however, one of his biggest challenges may be doing his own laundry especially with how dirty his uniform will be.

“That is all props to my mom,” Rutigliano said with a laugh. “She does most of my laundry. It’ll be a huge adjustment, but I think I should be able to do it.”

And that is just one of the things that the shortstop credited both of his parents for with their instrumental support behind the scenes with his development and dreaming big.

It has created a positive environment where the sport has become a household staple.

“It runs in the family,” according to Rutigliano, with both of his younger sisters having taken up softball.

With the siblings showing enthusiasm and drive to improve their game, a batting cage was installed in their backyard as a Christmas gift in 2022 to polish their game along with giving them time also to bond together in the summertime.

It is a gift that the eldest Rutigliano is grateful for and once again knows that he owes his parents a great deal of thanks for the continual support along this path.

“That is the biggest part of my journey, being able to get extra work in at home rather than having to go somewhere,” he said about the advantage of having available equipment. “But they knew that later down the road that my siblings would use it.”

Those extra hours of batting practice have allowed the 6-foot, 145-pound shortstop to record a .379 batting average going into Tuesday’s game against CCL Showcase, already registering three doubles and one triple for seven runs and five RBIs through nine games.

Rogues interim coach Pat Esposito has been impressed with Rutigliano in the short amount of time that they have been together, comparing him to a “gym rat.”

“A guy who’s got a batting cage in his backyard, he is just like a gym rat guy that goes and shoots hoops every day,” he said. “And that is a kid who wants to go pro. They need to do that kind of stuff. This isn’t a game where you can just practice when the coach calls practice.”

A baseball-filled summer still awaits Rutigliano with a long season on the Medford Rogues team just getting started.

Along with playing for the Rogues, the UP commit was selected to the Oregon All-Star Series and is on the South roster with North Medford’s Kellen Willer, Ashland’s Mateo Moore, Crater’s Hayden Kindreich and Jimmy Morgan as well as Troy Osborne of Grants Pass.

Games for the 6A & 5A seniors are June 22-23 at Goss Stadium in Corvallis.

“Just enjoying one of my last summers at home,” Rutigliano said about soaking in the next few months. “This is potentially my last summer at home before going up to college. I love playing ball and getting better and getting reps in at a higher level that’s going to prepare me for the next level.”

“Everything’s very fine details at this level,” he added. “One play can skew the game the opposite direction. It’s just a lot a lot more difficult to get out there and get a job done but keep putting in the work and you can get it done.”

The Rogues will also be the perfect place for him to improve his game and earn his spot at Portland.

With his foundation set, the real work begins to try to get a precious spot in the professional baseball leagues.

“He’s on his way right now,” said Esposito. “Knowing that Portland is going to take him and make him a player in their organization. You’ve got to move up through the ranks and he’ll start off as a freshman and work his way through and, hopefully, he wins a job.”

“Then he will be there and stand on that field,” he added. “It’s that old adage, ‘Scouts are gonna find you, if you’re a guy, they’ll find you.’”

And with a rollercoaster of a journey so far, he cherishes these moments of clarity and peace because, according to Rutigliano, “there’s going to be more downs than there are ups.”

“My dad always said, ‘Don’t take your foot off the pedal,’ and my grandpa always says, ‘110% all the time,'” Rutigliano said about the sage advice from his family. “As soon as you let off, you are gonna plummet down and when you are at those high points, you can’t take your foot off that pedal.”