Words are unnecessary

Por DAN BASTARD, ESPN The Magazine (In Angel Rodríguez).
Published in the edition of 8 July 2002 en ESPN The Magazine.

More anonymous super star in the sport drank from puddles when he was a child because it had no water or electricity. Then he worsened the situation. A hurricane knocked the roof of the family home leaving intact only a quarter.

That's where the seven family members gathered, sharing two beds and milk and sugar that were distributing rescue services. Vladimir Guerrero does not forget that smell and all those flies. Two decades later, still it has the taste in the mouth of those puddles and bring that flavor to the batter's box when he is already tired of training.

More anonymous super star in the sport had to work as a child in the Dominican countryside planting tomatoes, melons and onions and used the minutes off to do a breakfast with bread they gave him and what he could out of the land.

Now he laughs about it, now surrounded with all the luxuries of a Major League Baseball player. He laughs Donkey bit his leg or when he was dragged across the field as he tried to milk a cow. Vladmir family needed to work and missed a lot of school, definitively leaving after the fifth year. His mother says now, “I felt very bad about it, but we had to eat. The storm did not kill anyone in our village, but the lack of food after Hurricane killed many”. It not helped the cause that the village school had to be used as a shelter for those left homeless for three years and that the family bike had to be used to find food and not to find another school.

More anonymous super star in the sport may be the most trusted man in the world when he enters the batter's box, which he is so sure of his talent that does not waste time studying videos or reports pitchers. Nevertheless, Guerrero does not have the same confidence when you exit the diamond. That's why he does not like giving interviews. It is also the reason why it has been nicknamed “The mute” from childhood. It is so painful, even with children, many think is arrogant and aloof.

“If there were a major leaguer, I do not know where I'd be right now”, Guerrero says. “I do not know how to do anything else”.

Guerrero also feel insecure because they never learned to speak English. But it is now too comfortable to change that, despite requests from managers Expos, because he likes his simple life – quiet to use his own words. Speaking Spanish in a city where French and English dominate Guerrero allow you to hide how painful it is, creating a barrier between him and excessive attention.

Fame? “I'm not interested”, Guerrero states with a smile. “Brings many problems.” Guerrero likes being anonymous super star.

Wait a second. You can not choose whether they're famous or not, like you're asking for something from a menu in a restaurant, and especially in this culture when you have athletic talent without limits. No, Fame comes to you whether you like it or not, sometimes even by force. Guerrero, from 26 years, He has played professional baseball for ten years, so, How is it that the details of his life have escaped the publicity machine of Major League Baseball?. Y, especially, today when we know all the lives of athletes. But all you know Guerrero is limited to what happens within the diamond.

HAPPY IN MONTREAL

Vladimir Guerrero is quiet in Montreal.

Guerrero had three consecutive seasons over 30 home runs, 100 RBI and averaging over .300 before turning 25 years. Ken Griffey Jr. He never managed that feat. Nor-Rod, ni Joe DiMaggio, or Ted Williams, ni Jimmie Fox. You can argue that Guerrero is the most electrifying player in Major League Baseball and is the most complete player in the majors, without having to ask discuplas Ichiro or A-Rod.

Then in the era of MTV, How is it possible that the past and present of this superstar have been omitted?.

All aspects of the history of Guerrero – education only reached the fifth year, the fact still living with his mother, talent that puts it in a class quite apart – the most interesting is that so few people know these details.

You can not blame this because Guerrero is playing in Montreal. They have been in big stars Expos, Rusty Staub from Gary Carter and Andre Dawson to, Tim Raines y Larry Walker, but there is only one difference between them and Guerrero. He has more talent than all these players, and much. And of course he speaks English much less than historical Expos.

Guerrero's achievements within the diamond leave all surprised. “I do not know how he does some of the things that makes. I want to know how he does it”, He said his compatriot Sammy Sosa. There are brokers who takes on the bases with a shot from the warning area in the gardens. It is the combination of power and speed makes grounders between shortstop and second baseman in triples. And are the big swings that connects to the pitches that are biting the plate.

“He is one of the wonders of this world”, said receiver Expos, Michael Barret. “It leaves us fascinated with what you can do. Sometimes contacts pitches that other players can not even touch”. Hearing this, first baseman Lee Stevens added, “You must be talking about Guerrero, ¿no? He has hit bad balls harder than I can make contact with strike”.

Guerrero never wear batting gloves and extremely aggressive at the plate, throwing all kinds of release without striking out. Guerrero explains how you can do this in the same way that explains all the rest of his life – simple form. Guerrero child playing a game where you had to make a swing at everything that came to the plate. “You do not see…It is easy”, tells me.

Yes, Vladimir course, but as a child you were not trying to make contact with a slider 84 mph drawn by Robb Nenn. It is impossible to explain how the genius of Guerrero has gone out of his childhood, it is better to simply observe it in action.

Guerrero has the most complete collection of talent we've seen since dropping the plane where he was Roberto Clemente. Good, perhaps we have not seen because only 53 Expos games were broadcast last year in Montreal. At 2000, when Guerrero recorded numbers .345 with 44 runs and 123 driven, the only way to listen to the Expos games in English was using the internet.

“I was playing in another market they'd be talking about him as a future Hall of Famer and comparing it with the best of all time”, says the pilot Expos, Frank Robinson, one of the legends of Major League Baseball. “Every day I'm more amazed at what you can do. No pitcher can feel comfortable when facing Vladimir. It is one of the best players I've seen him play in my life”.

Robinson remembers having spoken to Guerrero a total of six times this season and always using a translator. That is the amount of exchanges between the pilot and the Expos player. For comparison, Robinson says there are times you can talk to a player six times when taking batting practice. Robinson believes that some things can be lost in translation and therefore prefer to let many things. For example, Guerrero recently made an error in the outfield and Robinson wanted to know what he was thinking when he made the move, but Robinson believed that Guerrero would think that he was punished and preferred to avoid such a situation.

“What I can hurt, prefieron then let many things”, Robinson explains. “I can not teach anything like this. I can not help with the psychological aspects of baseball. It's frustrating. The feel better and I sentería better if I could communicate better with him, but I can not. He is alone”.

Do you know anything about his personal life, Frank?

“No”, Robinson responds.

Have you read or seen something on television that can help you communicate with Vlad?

“No”, Robinson says.

Robinson spends every day with Guerrero and do not know. So how can we know something about him?.

The closer the Philadelphia Phillies, José Mesa is screaming. Mesa is a tall man and he is shouting reporters surrounding it in a combination of English and Spanish. He's telling reporters he will not talk, that will only come when something bad has happened.

Perhaps this would not be the best time to introduce yourself to Mesa as a journalist. But you speak your language. That may change everything for a Latin player. You do not have to flirt with the translated issues and you can enter their world in their own words.

Then you approach Mesa seconds after having cried half the world. And you know what happens? His reaction changes completely when he hears some words in Spanish. Little confidence he has had with the press for years dissolve in seconds. This has happened with other players who have the reputation of being difficult, players like Juan González, Pudge Rodríguez, Manny Ramírez, Benito Santiago and Orlando Hernández. Their language is like a song you already know the letters and can build a bridge across the distrust with the press.

Mesha not just grins and gives you a few minutes. It is for, you hold out your hand and take you to your wardrobe where you take a chair so that you feel.

“Are you going to write something about Guerrero not?” tells me. “It's about time someone wrote it. Oye, Joseph.”

Mesa is doing signs reliever Jose Santiago to join the conversation. “How you would throw him to Vladimir tonight”, asks Mesa.

The question makes these two pitchers laugh out loud.

“Do you launch and then begin to pray”, I finally says Mesa. “Tell him you gonna release and pull your knees on the mound to start praying. Because you can make a pitch itchy before reaching the plate and he still will make good contact. All hitters have deficiencies, but Guerrero not think it has deficiencies”.

Santiago says, “You know what we do when we talk about how to face hitters Expos? Come one by one up to Vladimir and all say 'dale base, if you let '. There is no way throw. It has not been invented a pitch that can be removed”.

TO PRAY

According to José Mesa, pitchers will throw Guerrero and pray

Rarely you are going to hear professionals in the sports world talking about a colleague in this way. The rules in the locker room is that you respect your opponent, but do not respect them too.

Many times, Latin player feels uncomfortable with his mastery of language or journalist and only gives a prefabricated told reporters. Occasionally you have someone like Sosa gives you a smile, but at the end of the day you get only a skeleton of their personalities.

You can believe in 18 years carrying the ESPN talk show, Up Close, He has never done an interview with a Latin player in Spanish. We always expect a Latin player try to speak English. What happens then is that stories like the one I just observed between Mesa and Santiago never come to public light. There will always be relegated to the corner of the locker room.

“Forget about Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa and all home runs”, He tells Mesa to Santiago. “Vladimir and A-Rod are the two most complete players in Major League Baseball. You have to put Vladimir the top. But A-Rod at least have some help. Vladimir is just. If you put the Yankees Vladimir, he will stick 50 O 60 home runs and drive 200 careers.

Santiago says: “That guy's not from this planet. It is an alien”.

Mesa laughs.

“I say to you”, Mesa says. “The devil himself would be afraid to pitch to Guerrero”.

Most Expos are sitting watching TV in the locker room. All are laughing – whites, negros, Hispanics, Australian and Japanese. But Guerrero is sitting in the cave, two hours before the game while watching the Phillies taking batting practice. You can not understand why all his companions are wasting their time watching television. And so he stays out.

“Not a very social type”, says Lee Stevens. “We all really like, but not social. The language problem makes it very difficult. When I played in Japan I was lost and only. And I had two translators were always conmingo. When I returned from Japan I realized that Latinos so players had to cross. I had no idea how hard it was for them”.

One of the reasons why it has not been told the story of Guerrero is because there is nobody who can do. Expos, who they have nine players on their roster born in Latin American countries, They do not have a Spanish speaking journalist covering the team. And most major league teams do not have a Hispanic journalist following the team – rare as more than 25 percent of the players in the majors are Hispanic.

Even something as simple as fame seems to be lost in translation. Hispanic talent is lost players because a lot of players can not express themselves as necessary to promote publicity machine.

Did you know that Miguel Tejada, in his third season in the majors, It has better numbers in home runs and RBIs Derek Jeter? Or that the Puerto Rican Juan González has more MVP awards Ken Griffey Jr? Or that Orlando Hernandez has been more successful in the postseason Randy Johnson, Greg Maddux or Roger Clemens? Or that Manny Ramirez has achieved better statistics over the past four years Jason Giambi?

Many may say that if a Hispanic player wants to excel in this country, then you must learn the language. But that's not as easy as many believe. as Guerrero, many Hispanic players come to this country to 16 years without a basic education. It is not easy to adapt to this culture to 16 years. Ask Marlins Luis Castillo who activated the fire alarm at a hotel when he played in the minor leagues because he thought it was the machine where the shampoo out.

Then the priority for Hispanic players is to feel comfortable with their surroundings and try to focus on reaching the majors. Get to the big leagues, and not English, It will help you feed your family in your country. Hispanic players in the minor leagues are more comfortable with peers who are in the same situation as them. And if you spend all your time with other people who speak your language, you will not learn English. Until now, He is recalling that only felt when he came to this country, Guerrero invites Latinos from other teams to his apartment in Montreal, where his mother would cook a rice dish with beans. And those who are embarrassed to accept the invitation, Guerrero prepares a plate and leads the field.

“When I arrived in Albany in my first year, I spent the whole time crying”, Guerrero said. “But when it comes to the majors and was afraid. There were many Latinos. There were four Puerto Ricans, four Dominican, Colombian. He did not need to learn English. Sometimes I think I should learn”.

If he had played in New York (and who knows, If the Expos are eliminated, Guerrero could end up in the Bronx), or if expressed as A-Rod, Would Guerrero the most famous face in Major League Baseball? It is not known. There is the problem of his personality, according Mesa “It is painful in any language”. A warrior does not like talking, and when he speaks he does not say much. Even his mother says, “it is not an open person”. 

A Guerrero is concerned that sounds silly, then so you can do things like ignoring a group of children who are waiting for him to sign a ball or bat. Nevertheless, Guerrero spends more than an hour signed balls in the locker room, where you can do just. Guerrero is not associated with any product, and does not want endorsement of any product, even though this is costing millions of dollars.

“I want to do this job well, and that all”, Guerrero says. “I just want to Health, baseball and my family and am calm. I want to stay as I am. I'm with the same people with whom I grew up – the same friends, aunts, uncles, cousins ​​and grandparents. That's all I need”.

Guerrero has a contract 28 million that expires in 2003, when you can hit the jackpot like no other player has been. Nevertheless, it remains faithful to its roots. What about the house that was demolished by Hurricane? Guerrero has renovated and has made two other floors so that her mother can live there during the months you are not with him in Montreal. She was out of the house 11 months a year since worked as a maid in Venezuela. She sent all their money to their children with their photos for their children not to forget it. Now, Guerrero likes having her around. So he built his own house next to the house of his mother. Now her mother simply shout your door to come and eat.

Guerrero remembers what it was like living in your neighborhood child. All the neighborhood kids had to share the nine gloves that left former Giants shortstop, José Uribe. “My people had many children and very few major leaguers”, Guerrero joked.

So every winter, Guerrero and his mother returned to Nizao Bani with suitcases full of clothes, bats and gloves to donate their neighbors. He was one of those kids on the street was going hamrbe. He came to a field Expos with two different shoes and came out with a contract 2,100 Dollars. Guerrero is building a stadium for the children in your neighborhood, where he trains for the campaign, Guerrero also does other work when in Nizao Bani.

“When I get home I sow onions, to remember how it felt”, Guerrero says. “Can you believe the donkey that he bit me is still alive? I still do many of the things he did as a child. But, at least not I have to drink from puddles”.

More anonymous super star in the sport can walk down any street in America and nobody recognizes.

And what was it that said Santiago, Guerrero was an alien?

You know, Santiago maybe you're right.