Every time Isiah Kiner-Falefa visited PNC Park, he would make a point to look up at Ralph Kiner’s retired No. 4 or visit the bronze bust of his hands holding a Louisville Slugger bat.

They share more than a surname. Kiner-Falefa’s maternal grandfather is Ralph’s cousin who attended the University of Hawaii and never left the Aloha state. Raised in Honolulu, Isiah never met the late Hall of Fame slugger, a second cousin twice removed — who died in 2014, a year after Isiah was drafted in the fourth round by the Texas Rangers — but always believed his success in the sport could be hereditary.

“Growing up, my grandpa would say, ‘It’s in our blood.’ He instilled that in me. It’s like, we’re special, baseball is in our blood,” Kiner-Falefa, who also counts Hawaiian, Japanese and Samoan in his heritage, told TribLive. “And I’m from Hawaii, so sometimes it’s hard to dream. I don’t look at the world the same way as people who grew up in the (mainland) States do, so seeing that I have someone of that caliber in the Hall of Fame gave me the (belief) that I want to be a big leaguer at a young age. It was like, ‘I can do it.’ Understanding we’ve got the same last name means a lot to me. It’s like baseball’s in my blood.”

After being acquired from the Toronto Blue Jays at the July 30 trade deadline, Kiner-Falefa is thrilled to be wearing the same uniform as the six-time All-Star who hit 301 of his 369 career home runs for the Pirates, leading the majors in homers six times from 1947-52, before being traded to the Chicago Cubs in June 1953.

Kiner-Falefa is interested in digging more into Ralph Kiner’s life and career — beyond his days of dating Marilyn Monroe or as a New York Mets broadcaster and host of the Kiner’s Korner postgame show — and maybe eventually meeting some of his distant relatives.

“It’s pretty cool. It’s a full-circle moment,” Kiner-Falefa said. “Talked to my grandpa a little bit, and he’s ecstatic. He’s really happy that I’m able to be here and represent that part of my family. Hopefully, I can meet more of the family because I wasn’t able to meet (Ralph) or that side, so it would be cool if they could come down or we could figure something out.”

Until then, Kiner-Falefa is trying to make a name for himself with the Pirates. The 29-year-old infielder never thought of himself as a hitter — “I was just trying to steal bases and get on base, do the little things” — until he made “a small change in approach” this season.

A self-described “flare guy” who found hits through the four-hole, Kiner-Falefa took on a different mentality this season and produced a career-best .292/.338/.420 slash line with the Blue Jays before spraining his left knee in early July. Since being traded for Double-A outfielder Charles McAdoo, Kiner-Falefa was 7 for 27 (.259) with two doubles, two triples and two RBIs in his first six games with the Pirates.

Pirates manager Derek Shelton called Kiner-Falefa “a really good acquisition for us,” given his defensive versatility and leadership ability. Kiner-Falefa won an AL Gold Glove at third base with the Texas Rangers in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, but he has started four games at second base and two at shortstop for the Pirates.

“If you talk to anybody about him, they’re going to tell you he’s one of the best teammates they’ve ever been a part of,” Shelton said on the SportsNet Pittsburgh pregame show after the trade. “This guy’s played all over the field. He started his career as a catcher, has won a Gold Glove, has played third, has played second, has played the outfield. I think you guys know how much I love versatility within a player, then he’s having a really good offensive year on top of it, which is something that was really important to us.”

Kiner-Falefa immediately embraced how the Pirates’ “grinders” mentality is reflective of Pittsburgh’s blue-collar reputation, even as they have lost six of seven since he joined the team. Five of those losses have come by one run, including three comebacks that fell short.

“I haven’t been here that long, so I don’t know what happened previously, but from what I’ve seen, it’s a never-quit attitude,” Kiner-Falefa said. “That’s the one thing: I walked in here and was like, ‘These guys work. They come to work every day.’ When you come to work every day, whatever happens on the field happens on the field. But everybody is prepared. They’re ready to play. That’s all you can ask for.

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“We’re never out of a game. It just takes one ball to fall our way, and we’ll break things open. We’ve got to keep grinding.”

Kiner-Falefa knows the difference. The Texas Rangers finished in last place in the AL West three times, including a 102-loss season in 2021.

“We’re way ahead of where they were,” said Kiner-Falefa, who was traded before last season, when the Rangers won the World Series.

He spent last season with a New York Yankees team that finished 82-80 — three games ahead of the Pirates’ pace — but failed to live up to lofty expectations with a lineup that featured Aaron Judge and Gerrit Cole.

“It’s a different expectation, a different payroll, different players. With the players that those guys have, if you don’t win it, it’s a big problem,” Kiner-Falefa said. “Here, it’s like our players are going to be turning into big stars. We’re building, and it’s nice to see how these guys want to win. They want to learn.

“I think that never-quit mentality is something other teams don’t have. I think that’s special. If we can really dig into that, dive into that, then I think that’s where we have a slight edge because of the way our clubhouse is and the way our organization is run. This is a gritty, blue-collar city, so this is all you can ask for: a bunch of ballplayers who want to shock the world.”

Kevin Gorman is a TribLive reporter covering the Pirates. A Baldwin native and Penn State graduate, he joined the Trib in 1999 and has covered high school sports, Pitt football and basketball and was a sports columnist for 10 years. He can be reached at kgorman@triblive.com.