Bucs great Walker will unveil No. 1 Draft pick

PITTSBURGH -- A hometown hero and a 12-year Major Leaguer will announce the first overall selection at this year’s Draft in Denver -- and that’s not all he’ll do with the Pirates.

Neil Walker, who played seven seasons with the Bucs, told reporters on Saturday that he had accepted an offer from Pirates general manager Ben Cherington to unveil the No. 1 pick on July 11.

“I’ll make sure that I tattoo the name on my hand or something so I don't mess it up,” Walker said with a laugh.

Walker was a first-round selection by the Pirates in 2004, when the club took him at No. 11 out of Pine-Richland High School in Gibsonia, Pa., just a few miles north of downtown Pittsburgh.

But for Walker, who retired from playing in April, this is just one installment in what one can expect to be a close relationship with the Pirates going forward.

For one, AT&T SportsNet announced that Walker would join the booth as a color analyst for Pirates broadcasts later this season, with his first appearance coming on Aug. 13. He’ll also do some radio broadcasting work in future games.

This isn’t a big shock to those who know and have heard from Walker. He always gave deep insights as a player, and he said back in April that a broadcasting role would be a “natural fit.” Walker sees value in a former player who has recently played the game telling stories and breaking down baseball, pointing to Tony Romo in football as a great example.

“There's a lot of dead [air] time,” Walker said. “So I think as an ex-player, you have to have a lot of stories or inside-the-clubhouse type of experiences and things like that. That can go a long way.

“[But] one thing somebody told me is that you don't have to always use the airspace. So I'm gonna have to maybe remind myself of that as I get into broadcasting.”

But could there be more than even that on the horizon for Walker and the Pirates?

Among the laundry list of other things Walker has done with the organization is sitting in on Draft and scouting meetings, and he’s also planning to head out to some Minor League affiliates to learn the development side of the Pirates’ operations. Though Walker said he doesn’t know if scouting is for him -- he prefers building one-on-one relationships with players, staffers and everyone else -- he’s not making the final choice about his next step just yet.

All Walker knows right now is his blood runs black and yellow, and he’s going to have a hand in the Pirates in the future.

“I just want to find a way to be involved and be an asset to this organization in some capacity,” Walker said. “That is important to me. What that is, I don't know.

“I'm still too close to the fire, as far as just finishing up, and the baseball [work] schedule doesn't necessarily excite me all that much right now. But we'll get to a place where I have a clear picture of what I'm going to do within the organization.”