Yet another Xavier grad playing pro baseball

This is a story about a professional baseball player who graduated from Cedar Rapids Xavier High School.

No, it's not Oakland Athletics outfielder Ryan Sweeney. It's not Zach Schreiber, Travis Sweet or Ryan Arp - all former Saints who have pro experience.

This is about Michael Harrington, the "unknown" former Xavier guy. The 23-year-old outfielder is playing for the Beloit Snappers in the Class A Midwest League, who just finished a series against the Cedar Rapids Kernels.

"It's the first time I'd been back since either my freshman or sophomore year in college," Harrington said. "It's been awhile."

Originally from Marengo, Harrington played four years of college baseball at College of Charleston in South Carolina. Well, he didn't really "play" four years.

He barely saw the field as a freshman and sophomore, getting in about 20 and 50 at-bats, respectively, he figured. He finally got a chance to play as a junior, and exploded, hitting 13 home runs and being named first-team all-Southern Conference. His senior season went much the same way.

"(Sitting on the bench) really kind of gave me a chance to work on my skills," Harrington said. "I tried to look at it more like a positive than a negative. We had really good hitting coaches there, and they kind of helped me reach my potential. I just worked my butt off, finally got an opportunity my junior year to get into the lineup. I just stayed there."

Harrington was drafted after his junior year by the Baltimore Orioles, but chose not to sign. The Minnesota Twins drafted him in the 13th round last year.

"Pro ball has been good," said Harrington, who hit .266 with nine homers in 63 games last summer for Rookie-level Elizabethton, helping the E-Twins win the Appalachian League championship. "Toward the end of last season, my numbers kind of went (down) a little bit. But it's been fun. It's a good group of guys, and it's great to be with the Twins. My dad would always follow them when I was growing up, so it's kind of a good fit (that way). I like the style of play: blue collar, lots of hard work. So it's good."

The 6-foot, 195-pounder left-handed hitter is off to a slow start with Beloit, going 3-for-19 in his first five games. But, as he said, it's a long season.

"One of the things with the Twins is they're real focused on winning," Harrington said. "The main thing is to try and win games. Individually, it's such a long season, I just want to put out a consistent performance every night. I think that's what separates a lot of players from each other. One-hundred-and-forty games, it's a lot different than playing maybe 60 games in college and 70 last year in Rookie ball."

"He's a pretty aggressive player," said Beloit Manager Nelson Prada. "He's got good instincts. He has the ability, at least for a guy at this level, to recognize pitches very well. So I think he's got a chance to be a pretty good hitter."