Brandon Rembert isn’t sure when it will all sink in.
Sure, the Pittsburgh Pirates area supervisor was in the room when the team drafted his younger brother, Chris, with the 51st overall pick in July 11 and was one of the first to call and congratulate him.
But sometimes it just takes a little longer for reality to hit. For the first time in both brother’s lives, they’ll be part of the same team after Chris Rembert officially signed with the Pirates on July 22.
“I think once I see him actually playing out there in the Pirates gear and training in the minor leagues, that’s when it will hit me,” Brandon Rembert said. “It just doesn’t seem real right now, it’s kind of a crazy story.”
Both brothers have dedicated most of their lives to the sport, but never played on the same team because Brandon is six years older.
Brandon Rembert graduated from Booker T. Washington in 2016 and played for the Faulkner JV team in 2017, Coastal Alabama Community College: Brewton in 2018 and at Alcorn State from 2019-21.
He joined the Pirates organization in 2022 as a Minor League Baseball Operations Assistant, then moved to role as a development scout in 2023 and then a supervisor in 2024. He currently evaluates high school and college players in north Texas, Oklahoma and north Louisiana.
Chris Rembert graduated from Pensacola Catholic in 2024, setting multiple program records. He was a two-time All-SEC infielder at Auburn before being drafted by the Pirates.
However, Brandon Rembert knew he was special long before that. While the younger brother never tagged along to the older brother’s games, they started working out together when Brandon came home from college.
As someone who’s been around the game his whole life, he knew his younger brother had potential. Not just because he could always hit and had elite bat speed. He also had the work ethic to match.
“You blend those three things together that’s a recipe for success most times,” Brandon Rembert said. “I knew from a young age that he really loved the game of baseball. He loved the work, he loved everything about it. Guys like that typically see success at the next level.”
Brandon had the chance to scout Chris a couple times in the past year, first at a Team USA event last summer and then again when Auburn played at Texas A&M May 2-3. Though he called it a “really cool” moment, he’s worked to separate the job from his personal feelings.
As Brandon Rembert sees it, Chris Rembert had plenty of people at Auburn giving him tips on how to improve. He doesn’t need to be another voice in his ear. When they see each other, it’s more about catching up with him and seeing how he’s feeling rather than what just happened on the field.
Still, the older brother couldn’t help but admire how his younger brother handled this spring. Chris Rembert was named All-SEC second team as a freshman, the first Auburn freshman to do so since 2008.
A draft eligible sophomore, he had plenty of eyes on him heading into this season. But he missed six games early in the season due to an ankle injury. His batting average remained the same, as he hit .344 has a freshman compared to .343 as a sophomore. But his OPS dropped from 1.022 to .858 as he had little ramp up to the season.
“You need those at-bats earlier in the year to get your timing, see pitches, he kind of lost that,” Brandon Rembert said. “For him to still be first team all-conference and bat over. 340 in the SEC, that’s really, really good. I feel like I know he probably wanted to have a more productive year from a power standpoint, but I feel like he had a really good year despite the situation he had early in the season with his ankle injury and missing a few weeks. That’s really hard to recover from and still have the year that he had.”
Now that Chris is a part of the Pirates organization, Brandon said they’re looking for him to keep hitting the ball well but try to harness more of his power like he did as a college freshman.
But Brandon will let the coaches do most of the work. Sure, the door is open is Chris wants to ask for anything. However, that doesn’t get in the way of who they were before starting the journey that led both to professional baseball.
“He’s my brother,” Brandon Rembert said. “He’s always going to be my brother first and that’s going to come before anything. Obviously I do have a job to do but that’s my family.”
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Chris Rembert joins older brother in Pittsburgh Pirates organization
Reporting by Justin Fitzgerald, Pensacola News Journal / Pensacola News Journal
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Justin Fitzgerald, Pensacola News Journal | USA TODAY Network
