How volunteer firefighter role speaks to abiding spirit of new Royals pitching coach

Growing up in Yonkers, New York, Brian Sweeney was a frequent visitor to his father’s fire department. In the building he calls “Engine 6,” the boy reveled in the atmosphere and camaraderie.

Stuff like that old Coke machine that may or may not deliver what you punched. Or getting clobbered by his dad and colleagues at ping-pong. And the thrill of saying, “Dad, go down the fire pole!” … and having him do it all those times.

There and at home, he also came to know the smell of smoke so well that he still feels it in his nose. As he grew older and understood the broader meaning of that, he admired his father, Edward, and fellow firefighters all the more.

In another life, he may have directly followed into that career instead of halfheartedly taking the exam at his parents’ insistence when he was 18.

But the new Royals pitching coach is a “Plan A” guy, he’ll tell you. And baseball had been the plan about ever since older sisters Christine and Karen gave him a Wiffle ball bat and ball as a 2-year-old and he just kept swatting the ball off their back deck.

It’s funny how things unfurl sometimes, though.

Because every aspect of his journey and that background would ultimately funnel into who he’d become — and why he made for an ideal candidate for this crucial job.

Decades later, Sweeney would at last heed the call of firefighting as a volunteer with the West Crescent Fire Department in Clifton Park, NY. Just as he was finding his calling in coaching, he said, smiling, after “God told me my arm wasn’t going to be able to get outs any more” after 18 years of pitching around the globe.

Distinct as those elements of his life may seem, they mostly run on parallel tracks.

Only one is a matter of life and death, he’s quick to distinguish.

But they’re entwined in certain substantial ways in the form of Sweeney, who considers himself driven by an empathetic heart and was forever moved by the sense of team he found in the firehouse and the attached power of a shared cause.

“I really try to live my life by that,” he said in an interview with The Star at the Royals practice facility on Thursday.

That’s certainly what he radiates.

While it’s understood that plenty of his appeal stems from being steeped in analytics as the former bullpen coach for the Cleveland Guardians, he’s such a dynamic presence that one conversation with him might make you wish you could play for him.

That notion is all the buzz at spring training in his first year on the job under new manager Matt Quatraro among six new coaches overall — part of sweeping changes with the prime directive to solve the pitching issues that have afflicted the Royals in recent seasons.

Last season, the club finished 65-97 with a staff ERA of 4.70 (fourth-worst in MLB) paved in part by 589 walks — the second-most in baseball.

Sam McDowell delved last week into key strategic elements of the “Raid The Zone” movement the staff is instituting.

Before that work could be done, though, Sweeney commenced what he considered a vital foundational step.

He didn’t use this specific term to describe it, but his approach called to mind a perhaps trite but entirely true expression: People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.

“I mean, he cares,” Quatraro said. “He cares immensely about the players. About the betterment of the whole organization. The whole pitching process. The coaching staff. He cares more than anybody, and that’s evident immediately.”

If not sooner when it comes to the pitching staff.

Reflecting Sweeney’s considerable energy, within days after he was hired by the Royals in December, he had dinner with Scott Barlow and Josh Staumont in Kansas City … Kris Bubic in California … Amir Garrett in Las Vegas … Daniel Lynch in Nashville … and Brad Keller, Jackson Kowar and Brady Singer in Florida.

“It’s really important to earn the right to speak into people’s lives. I want to get to know the person before I get to know the player,” he said. “I wanted to just sit with them and just talk about whatever came up.”

After all, he understood one fundamental point:

“Why should they trust me at this point in time?”

Safe to say his approach has resonated with a group that certainly wasn’t collectively in sync with former pitching coach Cal Eldred — who was fired along with manager Mike Matheny after last season — and seemed to be yearning for something different.

Without pointing to the past, appreciation of the contrast was apparent in conversations with several pitchers here and interviews at the Royals Rally last month in Kansas City.

At his locker, Bubic, the promising left-hander who has grappled to find his groove, spoke of the “relaxed vibe” and “really good communication” and “positive feedback” that he feels is allowing pitchers to be themselves.

When I suggested it sounded liberating, he said, “I think you could say it’s liberating” and was optimistic that this method “could be a huge unlock for me and a lot of guys on the staff.”

Lynch, Barlow and Staumont all spoke last month of their gratitude to Sweeney for making that effort to come see them. And Barlow reiterated that on Thursday as he spoke of their dinner at Buck Tui BBQ in Overland Park.

Sweeney being “pretty much all ears” and seeing “value in the way I throw already” has both reinforced his confidence and been a fine first step toward trust with the pitching staff — which also features assistant pitching coach Zach Bove and bullpen coach Mitch Stetter.

For his part, Keller used terms such as “refreshing” and “mind-clearing” to describe the new regime and was enjoying the tutelage in new methods.

“I haven’t thought this way before in the past, and it’s really cool to see this kind of view,” he said last month in Kansas City. “I really like the change of scenery.”

Much of that sensation is driven by the man who’s here only after a fascinating career built on changes of scenery — a nomadic existence that he joked last fall stemmed from “insanity maybe.”

But no doubt part of his relatability is his perseverance and vast adventures in the game that included playing in Japan, Venezuela and pitching for Italy in the 2013 World Baseball Classic.

It was only after 18 professional seasons that included 73 big-league games that the Mercy College product knew it was time to move as he sat on his front porch in the Summer of 2014 and pondered what was next.

Downshifting with a last stint in the amateur Albany Twilight League, it came to him after the coach asked if he wanted to play outfield.

“I fell in love with the game all over again,” he said. “I was sliding and diving … and getting (angry) when we got rained out. I’m like, ‘This is where I want to be.’ …

“It made me realize I needed to have my feet on the ground in the dirt.”

In some ways, he’d already been laying the groundwork by coaching kids in the offseasons for years at the nearby All Stars Academy.

“Not at the same level, right? But just getting my vocabulary together, understanding my own philosophies,” he said. “So that was the start of it.”

This track began in earnest when he got a job with the Phillies coaching rookie ball at extended spring training. “Managing personalities from all over the world,” he said, was part of what he considered “the best thing that ever happened” to him to engage this career arc.

As he was gradually moving up the ranks with the Phillies, he also found himself gravitating to something else summoning him in the offseason.

Seeking to do something meaningful in his community, the answer came as he drove his daughter to school one day past the West Crescent FD.

Next thing you know, he’s literally knocking on the door and asking, “How can I help?”

One of the proudest moments of his life was his graduation from the training program and having his father, a 36-year veteran, attend in full dress uniform and hand him his certificate.

(Sweeney’s mother, Phyllis, died in 2000. But in some ways she remains as present in his life as his 86-year-old father. Ever since her death, Sweeney has had conversations with her in his head during each pregame national anthem, including that she yells, “Where you been?” at him, he said, laughing, when he returns to games at spring training after the offseason.)

The firefighting then became such a substantial part of Sweeney’s life that he faced a dilemma as he was about to do a video interview with the Guardians front office in 2018.

Moments before the call, his pager went off. He was being called to a structure fire. With other volunteers always at the ready, he had the choice of whether to respond or not.

“But I couldn’t sit idly by and not respond in that moment,” he said. “It didn’t feel right. So I went.”

Fortunately, the fire was “nothing crazy.” He was back in about 45 minutes, and the Cleveland interviewers “completely understood.”

Being hired by the Guardians, for whom he became bullpen coach in 2019, made for “the total opposite end of the spectrum” from his Phillies experience.

Between learning how to create relationships and communicate with the Phillies and exposure to innovation, data and how to “build a culture and a clubhouse” under highly successful manager Terry Francona and pitching coach Carl Willis in Cleveland, Sweeney blossomed into the right candidate at the right time for the Royals.

The 48-year-old emerged out of a field of five candidates who were interviewed, Royals vice-president and general manager J.J. Picollo said, upon his hiring.

Befitting his well-traveled life, Sweeney was driving in Italy with his wife, Connie, when the call came from Picollo.

When the good news came over the speaker in the car, Connie choked up and jumped up in her seat and hit him in the arm.

He was thrilled to share in the moment that way after “all the work that we as a family (including daughters Ava and Mia) have put into getting to this point.”

Another example of the “we not me” way he thinks … a trait that could be a fundamental part of how he can both infuse his staff with new tools and inspire meaningful change.

Sweeney gets that this is more about the long haul than first impressions. How trust and communication work during the grind of the season will be more telling than it is now.

But it has to start somewhere, and here’s what he’s hoping sets the tone.

“I want these guys to have a place where they love to come to work, where they want to get out on the field and learn,” he said. “Where they have the freedom to be themselves so they can be the best version of themselves. I want to communicate by gaining trust, and I want it to work both ways. …

“Let’s put that together,” he added, “and make the best version of us.”

Something that one way or another he’s been working toward all his life.