Michael Oliveto found it sort of a thrill when he began running into Logan O’Hoppe about a year ago. The blue-chip catching prospect from Hauppauge with the dream of playing Major League Baseball had started training at Belding Performance. And there working out next to him in the baseball offseason was the Los Angeles Angels catcher, another Long Islander who’d gotten to live the dream.
“He’s just the guy everyone looks up to, baseball-wise,” Oliveto told Newsday in a Zoom interview last week from the Detroit Tigers’ minor-league complex in Lakeland, Florida.
O’Hoppe, from Sayville and drafted out of St. John the Baptist, told Newsday he still likes “to keep up with the baseball scene on Long Island,” and when he got to know Oliveto, a bond started to grow.
Last month they became part of the same fraternity when Oliveto was selected in the first round of the MLB Draft by the Tigers on the day before the All-Star break. And O’Hoppe ushered him in with a text message of congratulations and an invitation to take batting practice together at Stony Brook’s Joe Nathan Field.
“I was really excited for him and I knew he’d be leaving for Lakeland soon,” O’Hoppe said. “I was home for the All-Star break and I was really excited for him. I thought it would be great if we could work out together and talk.”
“He asked me if I wanted to go hit with him . . . It was cool, a great way to be sent off before I left,” Oliveto said.
The 18-year-old is about to embark on a steep learning curve in the transition to professional baseball and spending the day with O’Hoppe — from lifting to grabbing a bagel, egg and cheese to taking batting practice — was invaluable.
“Professional baseball, especially rookie ball and the lower levels, are way different than baseball is here on Long Island in high school,” O’Hoppe said. “It was a big culture shock, so I tried to give him advice on that because he’s going to be exposed to some different things. But . . . I have no doubt that he’ll be doing great things here soon.”
There were plenty of “pointers,” as Oliveto called them. Only time will tell which of them prove the most valuable, but at this moment in time they all do. Among them: Learn some Spanish to better communicate with pitchers, develop a regular routine the works for you and don’t deviate, dress nicely and always remember that you’re a professional now.
“I don’t think I realized that it was like, all right, my job is to work out. My job is to eat food and gain some weight. My job is to be a better player, be a better teammate,” Oliveto said. “All this stuff . . . it didn’t sink in until I got here, but him explaining that it is a profession? I think it made it a quicker transition for me.”
“We talked about a lot of things that are going to happen for him, but the biggest thing is to keep an open mind and understand that this is your career now,” O’Hoppe said. “I’ve been impressed with how mature Michael is for his age and how he goes about his work quietly and does things the right way.”
Oliveto first encountered O’Hoppe at a travel team workout about six years ago. O’Hoppe had been drafted, was the hot name in Long Island high school baseball and an inspiration to young players even then.
“I’m sure he has no memory” of that meeting, Oliveto said. But as he developed his game, it always stayed in the back of his mind as something to shoot for.
Now he’s on O’Hoppe’s mind.
“He’s going to be someone to watch,” he said. “I keep tabs on people from Long Island, and I may be a little biased — being a high school catcher from Long Island, too — but I’m really rooting for Michael . . . and I’m here to help him with whatever he needs.”
“It was really cool to be able to grow a relationship there and have a connection that is so similar – Long Island catcher drafted out of high school,” Oliveto said. “So that’s the goal: to get to where he is now. Hopefully, we’ll be playing against each other in a couple years.”
Newsday’s Carissa Kellman contributed to this story.
Roger Rubin returned to Newsday in 2018 to write about high schools, colleges and baseball following 20 years at the Daily News. A Baseball Hall of Fame voter since 2011, he has covered 13 MLB postseasons and 14 NCAA Final Fours.