Nathaniel Lowe Revels In Teammates Exploits, Fan-Made Videos, But Skips Past His At-Bats
ARLINGTON — Nathaniel Lowe enjoys reliving the Texas Rangers' postseason run toward their first World Series championship by watching replays and fan highlight compilations.
Just don't show him his at-bats.
The Rangers Gold Glove first baseman wasn't happy with his postseason plate performance — he batted .212 with six RBI and 10 runs. He had hits in 13 of the 17 playoff games but, still, Lowe would prefer to skip past his ABs if he's watching a replay.
"It all kind of just caught up [with me] and [my bat] got lost in a hurry. And the team was playing so well that they made up for my mistakes," Lowe said."I felt like I was kind of the rally killer there for a while. My standards for myself are really high, so like everybody else on this team, everybody wants to perform the best so when I put together a month like that, it's a bigger learning experience and if I don't continue to improve and treat the problem, then I didn't get better. So I needed to do that."
Lowe earned his first Gold Glove after an improved season at first base, which included a trip to New York City for an awards dinner and a stay at the Plaza Hotel.
"It was amazing. To get that kind of recognition for that improvement was so cool," he said. "Defensive awards, I feel, are definitely more team-oriented than player-oriented. So it's easier to play better defense when the balls in motion more. So our pitchers did a great job of getting the ball in play, giving us a chance to make outs and then obviously, we put the work in on our side. So it's really cool to get some hardware for that."
As for how he finished the season at the plate, that just increases Lowe's desire to get back at it. Position players report to spring training in Surprise, Ariz., on Feb. 19.
"It's cool to watch Marcus [Semien] get on, Corey [Seager] hit another homer, Evan [Carter] have a great at bat, and Adolis [Garcia] drive everybody in," Lowe said. "And when it when it creeps down to my spot in the order, I usually fast forward."
"I felt like I really kind of ended the season on a sour note, personally. So I had to get better," he said. "And ideally, we'd like to put the rubber to the road here in a couple of weeks."
Lowe was partially joking, though. In fact, he needed to watch some of those at-bats, he said.
"There were definitely moments where I got beat and those are moments that I need to learn from, so it's been a cool experience," he said. "I watched a lot of YouTube, a lot of fans have put together some pretty cool highlight videos and it's cool to relive those moments. Because sometimes in the moment, you really, truly just black out from adrenaline and excitement. So watching it from a fan's perspective has been really cool."
Nathaniel Lowe Named Among Best
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