The remarkable journey of Rutgers baseball's Big Ten Player of the Year

Nick Zucchero knew a thing or two about college baseball, having played on championship teams at Division 3 powerhouse Kean University. As the head coach at Franklin High School, he didn’t get many D-1 prospects.

Then Josh Kuroda-Grauer came along.

“Kid was fast, had a strong arm, his swing was a little unorthodox, but he never struck out,” Zucchero said. “How he carried himself is something you never see – maturity off the chain.”

Surely, this young man was going places if someone gave him an opportunity. For a while, it looked like nobody would.

“I reached out to numerous schools,” Zucchero said, “but I guess nobody believed me.”

One program saw it. Rutgers’ coaches happened to catch Kuroda-Grauer knocking the cover off the ball with Bridgewater-based Full Count Academy in the summer and took a chance on a kid with no other offers.

“You’ve some something special here,” Zucchero told the two moms who raised Josh – Sumi Kuroda and Edie Grauer – and attended every game. “I’m excited to see what happens.”

What happened was a stellar three-year run with the Scarlet Knights that culminated in Kuroda-Grauer earning Big Ten Player of the Year as a junior after he led the nation in hits (95) and ranked third in batting average (.428) while stealing 24 bases and committing just seven errors at shortstop. He’s projected to be chosen in the first five rounds of July’s Major League Baseball Draft.

“I’d be lying if I said I knew I’d be the Big Ten Player of the Year when I was in high school,” he said. “It’s not cliché to say anything is possible if you put the work in.”

It’s an amazing story, on and off the diamond.

Two moms, one telling gesture

Kuroda-Grauer recalls first having a bat in his hands at age 4. His biological mother, Sumi Kuroda, introduced him to the sport early. Sumi and Edie cheered him on from the bleachers all the way up the ranks.

“They’re my rock,” Josh said. “They’ve sacrificed so much so I could just go to school and play baseball and not have to worry about anything else. I love them to death and they’re a big part of who I am as a person.”

The baseball community, he said, always embraced this family of two moms, a son and a daughter.

“Luckily for me I’ve been around great people,” Josh said. “Having two mothers, I think it was the best thing that’s ever happened to me. They put a lot of perspective in my life and gave me a lot of acceptance, with the way I treat other people.”

Rutgers coach Steve Owens witnessed the fruits of that during a 2022 trip to Hawaii. One morning Owens walked out of the hotel and saw Kuroda-Grauer handing breakfast to a homeless woman who was camped out on a bench across the street.

“If I wasn’t there nobody would have seen that, and he would still have done it if nobody was looking,” Owens told the Big Ten Network last month.

Josh spent his breakfast voucher on pancakes, eggs and coffee for the woman. He didn’t just hand it to her and walk away. He introduced himself, told her he was visiting Hawaii for the first time and engaged her in conversation, “just trying to make a person-to-person connection,” he said. “Me being in the position I was, with all the resources I had, it’s kind of a no-brainer to give back to people.”

The way Josh sees it, that empathy flows from having two loving moms.

“I’ve told his parents,” Zucchero said, “they’ve raised a wonderful human being.”

'Doing it for Jersey'

Kuroda-Grauer played well his first two seasons at Rutgers, hitting .299 and .298, but this year marked a quantum leap. It started on a rough note – a broken thumb from being hit by a pitch in the Cape Cod summer league. That cost him a spot in the training camp for the collegiate national team.

Come fall, Rutgers hitting coach Mike Garza assuaged any doubt.

“He said, ‘Go out and hit .400 and be Big Ten Player of the Year,’” Kuroda-Grauer said. “Obviously you say, ‘Alright Coach,’ but that was such a high feat, even I didn’t think I would accomplish it.”

He did, becoming the program’s fifth Player of the Year honoree and first since Patrick Kivlehan in 2012 in the Big East. (Doug Alongi in 1993, Darren Fenster in 2000 and Todd Frazier in 2007 were the others).

“The belief my coaches showed in me, the motivation they gave me, I give all the credit to them,” Kuroda-Grauer said.

He plans to turn pro this summer if drafted as expected, but pledges to finish his degree in sports management at some point. Based on his frequent returns to Franklin’s practices over the past couple of years, you know he won’t forget his roots.

“The thing I’m happiest about in winning this award is I’m a Jersey kid and I’m always going to be proud of where I come from,” he said. “Jersey has some of the best athletes in the world, and being able to stay home at Rutgers coming from Franklin, that’s what I’m most proud of – doing it for Jersey.”

Jerry Carino has covered the New Jersey sports scene since 1996 and the college basketball beat since 2003. He is an Associated Press Top 25 voter. Contact him at jcarino@gannettnj.com.

This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Josh Kuroda-Grauer of Rutgers' journey to baseball Big Ten Player of Year