⚾️ ‘New Pope, New Me’: Devout Catholic Baseball Star Finds His Hitting Groove 🔌
Weekend Plug-in 🔌
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ARLINGTON, Texas — After a slow start to his first season with the Texas Rangers, Jake Burger is crushing the ball again.
The secret to the 29-year-old slugger’s renewed success?
The devout Catholic ballplayer gives credit to a fellow Midwesterner: Pope Leo XIV.
READ: A Pitch To Follow Jesus: Baseball Fans Embrace Players’ Faith Testimonials
Burger said he likes to think that Leo — formerly known as Cardinal Robert Prevost — saw him play during the corner infielder’s time with the Chicago White Sox from 2021 to 2023.
The future pope was shown on video attending the 2005 World Series, when the White Sox won their first championship in 88 years.
“It seems like he’s a baseball fan, and it’s just really cool to finally get an American in there,” Burger said of the Chicago-born clergyman’s May 8 election to lead the world’s estimated 1.4 billion Catholics. “Hopefully, he does some great things.”
Texas Rangers first baseman Jake Burger is hitting better since the election of Pope Leo XIV. (Photo by Bailey Orr, courtesy of the Texas Rangers)
In a dugout interview with Religion Unplugged, Burger said he’s always worn a rosary bead necklace — a symbol of prayer, faith and devotion in Catholicism — under his uniform.
But just since Leo’s election, Texas’ regular first baseman has started celebrating big hits in a new way: with the sign of the cross.
“I try to honor him in any way I can,” Burger said this week during a series against the Toronto Blue Jays. “For me, it was finding some really lighthearted stuff with faith involved — and try to bring that energy every single day from a strong faith background.”
Like Leo, Bishop Michael Olson — whose Fort Worth diocese includes Arlington, where the Rangers play — is a White Sox fan.
Olson, who grew up in the Chicago area, said he applauds Burger’s effort to honor the first American pope.
“I think it’s a great thing,” Olson told Religion Unplugged. “I think it points to the kind of universal appeal of Pope Leo and of the pride that we have as Catholics, but also as Americans, in his election.”
• • •
FAITH IS DEEPLY INGRAINED in Burger and his extended family.
Burger played prep baseball at an all-boys Catholic school in the St. Louis area and enjoyed summers at a family farm in southern Indiana.
“All of our family is Catholic,” Burger said. “My grandma goes to Mass every single day. For us, I think that faith is the most important thing that we have. And I try to remember that.
“Whether we’re out here playing baseball or on the farm … we try to give all the glory to God,” he added. “It’s very rooted in our family.”
On a recent broadcast, Laura Stickells, the Rangers Sports Network’s primary field reporter, noted that Burger came up with a new phrase after Leo’s election: “New pope, new me.”
READ: Jesus At The Ballpark: Why MLB Teams Host Faith Nights
“I’d like to think that he didn’t like the trade, so he put in a little blessing for me,” Stickells quoted Burger as saying.
Burger starred collegiately at Missouri State before the White Sox made him the 11th overall pick in the 2017 MLB draft.
He debuted with the White Sox in 2021 before Chicago dealt him to the Miami Marlins at the 2023 trade deadline. He hit a combined 34 home runs for those teams in 2023 and then belted 29 home runs for the Marlins in 2024.
Texas Rangers slugger Jake Burger runs the bases. (Photo by Gunnar Word, courtesy of the Texas Rangers)
This past winter, Burger was traded again — this time to the Rangers, who looked to boost an offense that underperformed last season after propelling the team to its first World Series title the previous year.
But the new Ranger struggled in his first 30 games: He batted just .190 with three home runs and a .558 OPS, prompting the team to option him to Triple-A Round Rock on May 2.
During his 10-day minor league stint, he focused on improving his hitting mindset while poring over Scriptures such as Romans 12:12, which declares, “Rejoice in your hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.”
“When adversity hits, I try to get in the Scriptures even more than I already am,” said Burger, who returned to the Rangers on May 12 and is batting .242 with four home runs and a .766 OPS in 17 games this month. “I try to find some comfort with the Word and with God.
“For me,” he added, “it’s just, ‘Hey, the Lord has a plan, and he’s with you every step of the way, and it doesn’t matter what you’re going through.’”
• • •
AS A WHITE SOX PROSPECT, Burger endured Achilles injuries and wondered at times if he’d ever play baseball again.
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, he opened up about battling depression and anxiety related to those injuries.
“I kind of look back at that whole situation, right? And there’s no way that I could have ever dreamt to be in the position I am,” Burger said. “And I give that all to God and all to his glory. He’s working in ways that we can’t fully understand, and that’s just one example of all the amazing things he’s done in my life.”
Burger sees God at work, too, in the Oct. 25, 2024, birth of his daughter, Penelope, who was diagnosed with Down syndrome.
Jake Burger with his daughter, Penelope; his son, Brooks; and his wife, Ashlyn. (Photo by Bailey Orr, courtesy of the Texas Rangers)
“For us, it felt like God gifted her to us,” Burger said. “She’s a beautiful, beautiful little girl and a beautiful life.”
Inspired by Penelope, the ballplayer and his wife, Ashlyn, who also have a 2-year-old son, Brooks, have launched the Burger Family Foundation to benefit families of children with disabilities.
“It’s kind of a two-pronged approach with the foundation,” Burger said. “The first one is Pens Pearls (named after Penelope), which is basically giving directly back to families with children with Down syndrome — medical expenses, therapies, whatever it may be.
“And then from my background … I always felt so at home and at peace when I’m outdoors, especially on a farm,” he added. “So we’re going to start a ranch that basically allows any family, any adult with Down syndrome, any sort of relation to Down syndrome to come to this ranch and get the therapies they need and just be outside with nature.”
• • •
WHEN BURGER JOINED the Rangers, he asked for a new uniform number.
Here’s why: “Trisomy 21 is the clinical diagnosis of Down syndrome,” he explained. “And my wife came up with this unbelievable idea when I got traded. She’s like, ‘Hey, 21 is a really important number to us and so many people. Let’s try to get that number.”
According to the Mayo Clinic, “Down syndrome is a genetic condition caused when an unusual cell division results in an extra full or partial copy of chromosome 21. This extra genetic material causes the developmental changes and physical features of Down syndrome.”
READ: Reporting On Baseball And Faith
Now, Burger proudly wears the number “21” on his back.
“For me, it feels like it’s not my number,” he said. “It’s for the families and all those people with Down syndrome that don’t necessarily have a voice. And I feel like I’m honoring them every single night I put this uniform on.”
With Penelope’s arrival, the couple could see God “leading us in our purpose and our higher calling, so we knew that we had a unique position and ability to be able to reach a lot of families and bring a lot of learning to them,” Ashlyn Burger said in a promotional video.
While Jake Burger is the only active MLB player with a child with Down syndrome, his cause has gained the support of teammates and even opponents.
When the Rangers played in San Francisco, a Giants employees group dedicated to families with special needs presented Burger with the “Giants Heart of the Game Award.”
While in Cincinnati, Rangers teammate Corey Seager and Reds players Graham Ashcraft and Nick Lodolo joined Burger in visiting Gigi’s Playhouse, part of a national network of Down syndrome achievement centers. Burger and Ashcraft work out together in the offseason.
“My wife and I feel like we’re standing on the shoulders of giants with all the organizations that do so much great work in this community,” Burger said. “We’re honored to be a part of it.”
• • •
IN A GAME earlier this season, a 95.9 mph sinker by Los Angeles Angels pitcher Jack Kochanowicz struck Burger.
“The ball ricocheted off his wrist and he squatted down in pain,” MLB.com reported.
But Burger escaped uninjured.
Instead, the ball hit a bracelet that a girl named Lily, who has Down syndrome, had given him in Chicago.
Jake Burger poses for a photo during an interview with Religion Unplugged in the home dugout at Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas. (Photo by Bobby Ross Jr.)
“It actually, like, exploded,” Burger said of the bracelet. “But I feel like it kind of saved my bone from breaking.”
Might God have had something to do with that?
“Yeah,” the slugger told Religion Unplugged. “I don’t think there’s anything in this world that God doesn’t have his hand in. He’s changing people’s lives every single day.”
Inside The Godbeat
Tim Dalrymple, Christianity Today’s president and CEO, will leave the magazine to take over leadership of the John Templeton Foundation.
The foundation is, as Religion News Service’s Bob Smietana notes, “one of the nation’s largest funders of research into spirituality and meaning making.”
Kate Shellnutt, CT’s editorial director of news, voiced gratitude for Dalrymple’s tenure “and how he's stewarded our magazine and supported the work of the news team over the past six years.”
The Final Plug
At the height of popularity for “Duck Dynasty,” I traveled to Louisiana in 2014 to delve into the Robertson family’s home congregation — a church where I enjoyed a personal connection as a child.
News of Duck Commander Phil Robertson’s death Sunday at age 79 saddened me. His family had revealed last year that he faced early-stage Alzheimer’s and other health problems.
In 2014, Phil Robertson prays at the end of a Sunday school class that he taught at his home congregation in West Monroe, Louisiana. (Photo by Bobby Ross Jr.)
“We are celebrating his victory and giving God the glory for how he has been used in the kingdom,” Mike Kellett, Robertson’s minister and fellow church elder, told me in a text message.
Happy Friday, everyone! Enjoy the weekend.
Bobby Ross Jr. writes the Weekend Plug-in column for Religion Unplugged and serves as editor-in-chief of The Christian Chronicle. A former religion writer for The Associated Press and The Oklahoman, Ross has reported from all 50 states and 18 nations. He has covered religion since 1999.