Disco Turkeys catcher isn't the only Newman at Truist Stadium

By Greg Sullivan

It makes a lot more sense why a talented catcher from Utah Valley University wound up playing with the Carolina Disco Turkeys once the subject of family comes up.

Trey Newman, who joined the Disco Turkeys earlier this month, got a call from his uncle about the possibility of playing summer ball in Winston-Salem. His uncle is Ryan Newman, manager of the Winston-Salem Dash.

“I was looking for a summer ball team last-minute after my other one in Canada got cancelled (because of Covid-19 border restrictions),” Trey Newman said. “My uncle was like, ‘You’ve got a really good opportunity to come play and we get to be in the same stadium.’ Growing up and spending time during the summers in the clubhouses where he’s managed, it’s really cool to play on the same field now.”

The Disco Turkeys and Dash had joked on social media during the preseason about the two clubs being summer roommates, but the Disco Turkeys’ catcher and the Dash’s manager are actual roommates.

“We’re staying in an apartment. We’ve spent a lot of time in summers before living together and have kind of gotten accustomed to the whole roommate thing. He makes it really fun,” Trey Newman said. “We’re always talking about baseball, stuff that happened in his game, my game. It’s cool.”

The Newmans are a baseball family, after all. Trey’s father played. And his grandfather, Jeff Newman was a MLB catcher for both the Oakland Athletics and the Boston Red Sox. Jeff Newman was an interim manager for the A’s and as a convert to Judaism became one of the first handful of Jewish managers in MLB history. Trey remembers spending time in the Seattle Mariners clubhouse as a kid when his grandfather was the third base coach there.

“I wouldn’t say there was a lot of pressure on me being in a baseball family,” Newman said. “My uncle has been in the game since the time I came around and kind of watching what he’s done and what my grandpa has done and my dad with his baseball background, I could do what I wanted to try to do, which happened to be baseball, and have some great people in my corner.”

Newman said he’s feeling good about the work he’s doing with the Disco Turkeys now and is enjoying his time in the Southeast. He said he thinks he’s improving and fine-tuning his skills. He wants to win while he’s here and, hopefully, help Utah Valley win the Division 1 Western Athletic Conference (WAC) next year.

“We’re having fun out here. Disco Turkeys is a funny name, but everybody on our team embraces it. We have a great group of guys and then when the game starts we can flip the switch and try to win,” Newman said. “Coach (Kirk) Cabana lets us have fun and makes sure guys can get their work in. You look around and some other summer ball teams are playing at high school stadiums, but we’re playing at the Dash’s stadium. The stadium even has a lot more going for it than other High-A stadiums. It’s probably a top 10 minor league stadium anywhere in the country. To play here is unreal. The playing surface, the stadium, the video board…it’s crazy."

The Disco Turkeys return to Truist Stadium for a five-game home stand on Wednesday, June 23, with a 5:35 p.m. game against the High Point-Thomasville Locos. Tickets at the gate are $8 and are half-price for healthcare workers with an employee ID badge.