There are many targets around the bullpen area of Ray Fisher Stadium. A wooden strike zone, pieces of netting and a nine-pocket netted square. Still though, there isn’t anything quite like the human element of playing catch. The unseen labor of a bullpen catcher unveils its role as senior student manager Geno Cousino makes fastballs pop in his glove, blocks breaking pitches in the dirt and offers words of encouragement after good and bad pitches alike.
Beyond the world of a Division I pitcher, where bylines critique performances and numbers complicate an already difficult process, pitchers find Cousino. With a love for baseball that started with the Detroit Tigers and pushed him to learn the hardest position, Cousino’s enthusiasm for the game emanates from every word he says.
A few things usually come to mind when picturing the many moving parts of a well-rounded pitching staff: a pitching coach, training facilities, drills and, of course, the pitchers themselves. But the bullpen catcher is as essential as any other cog in the machine.
While Cousino doesn’t show up on the stat sheet, the work of a bullpen catcher is arduous, yet crucial. Acting as a warm-up partner, practice player and teammate, Cousino is more than just a set of gear and a glove behind the dish.
“My job doesn’t change whether it’s raining, snowing or 30 degrees,” Cousino told The Michigan Daily. “If I’m an issue or I’m complaining then that detracts from what I’m able to offer someone. Regardless of if it’s a freshman or a senior, guys deserve to have someone back there who works hard for them and makes them look good so they can have confidence in themselves.”
And while the concept of strapping on gear only to be pelted with fastballs and beleaguered with pitchers claiming to need “just one more good one” may seem tenuous, Cousino approaches it with a selfless enthusiasm every day.
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Cousino’s love for baseball started at a young age and grew from there.
“Every time we’d go on vacation and I couldn’t watch a game I’d ask my mom ‘Hey can I borrow your phone? I have to watch MLB Fast Cast,” Cousino said. “The heyday of the Tigers is really what ignited the love of baseball for me.”
But instead of modeling his game after Tigers catchers Alex Avila or Pudge Rodriguez, Cousino played in the field. Having pitched and played infield in his whole life, Cousino competed for various teams around Michigan before attending Father Gabriel Richard High School in Ann Arbor. There, he was a four-year varsity player for the Irish and earned a starting role following his freshman year.
“50% of my life growing up was baseball,” Cousino said. “Every summer on the weekends I was playing, and even when I wasn’t playing I was watching.”
Cousino’s hard work paid off as he received an offer to play college baseball at an NAIA school in Florida. Still, he stayed true to his roots and enrolled at the University of Michigan. Ultimately choosing to stay in Ann Arbor for academics, Cousino later found out that attending the school that fit him best and continuing his baseball career weren’t mutually exclusive.
The summer before his freshman year, Cousino reached out to the Wolverines’ director of baseball operations, David Stolper. Cousino, not looking for any role in particular, simply introduced himself and asked if there was anything he could do to help out the team. He just wanted a chance to still be around the game. Stolper, a former bullpen catcher himself, replied asking if Cousino could catch. Despite all the time Cousino had spent around the game, countless weekends at tournaments and hours at practice, he had never caught an inning behind the plate.
But that didn’t stop him.
So, as a wide-eyed freshman, Cousino stepped into the indoor practice facility and caught the first bullpen of his entire life. Often dubbed the hardest position on the field, catching has an intense learning curve. While many catchers work their entire youth baseball career at the receiving end of the battery before framing pitches for elite pitching talent, Cousino was thrown into the deep end immediately. And in his first practice with a pitcher hurling upward of 95 MPH and intense RPM, Cousino dropped the first five pitches.
“I just thought ‘I’m going to sit back here and catch the ball,’” Cousino said. “And I remember the guy I was catching was throwing pretty hard. It looked like 100 even though it was probably only 85-90. And I dropped the first four or five pitches and thought to myself ‘maybe I’m not cut out for this.’”
So before he could engage with the finer points of catching — framing, blocking or sequencing — Cousino had to first learn how to simply put the ball in the pocket of his mitt.
Early adversity aside, Cousino settled in. After a nearby coach told him to take a deep breath and relax, he centered himself and finished out the rest of the session. Soaking up advice from coaches, getting extra reps in off a pitching machine and even going to social media to develop his skills, he eventually worked behind the backstop comfortably.
From there, Cousino’s abilities have blossomed from the infancy of dropped balls to the maturity of someone who deeply understands a staff and can provide meaningful insight to the pitchers that he works alongside.
“Geno’s been a great help,” junior right-hander Brandon Mann told The Daily. “Just giving us feedback every day when we’re throwing our bullpens, making time for us when we need a little extra time on the weekends or even when guys are here over the summer, he’s always willing to come in and spend time with us so we’re better prepared for the season.”
Cousino’s work behind the curtain shines through with the players that he does extra work with. While Mann made the unconventional switch from a football tight end to a relief pitcher over the years, Cousino was the one helping Mann get extra practice in to anchor his mechanics and become comfortable on the mound. And this Friday against Indiana, when Mann pitched three innings of scoreless ball, Mann’s perseverance coupled with Cousino’s impact were on full display.
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In practices, Cousino settles in for sessions full of different pitchers, all with varying arm slots, pitch arsenals and focuses. Still, he deftly works on providing feedback and support for his teammates.
“When I catch, I can tell a pitcher that the velocity ticked up or that it rode really well,” Cousino said. “The first couple of years I found myself guessing. But as I caught more guys, I could look at their data and tailor feedback to what they needed.”
Beyond the bullpens, Cousino gives the team reps during practice, where he calls pitches and catches during live situations. While the team practices situational hitting, Cousino calls pitches, fields bunts and backpicks runners — all signs of a good catcher. Cousino’s selflessness as a teammate stems from a passion for the game that he adopted at a young age. And despite not being a catcher by trade, Cousino carved a new path so that he could stay around the sport he feels so passionate about, even if he’s not the one on center stage.
