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Fans follow the action between Estrella and Licey in a Dominican Winter League game Saturday in San Pedro de Marcoris.
Homemade nets give some Dominicans an advantage over fellow bleacher spectators to snag a batting-practice fly ball.
An Estrella batter takes a few practice cuts Saturday prior to his at-bat at Estadio Tetelo Vargas, a Dominican baseball stadium in San Pedro de Marcoris.
Dancers regularly catch the fancy of spectators--and the wandering eye of a dugout batboy--in performances between innings in the Dominican Winter League.
ABOVE: Santos Alcala Jr. leads the bleachers in cheers for the home team during the Estrella-Licey contest. |
SAN PEDRO DE MACORIS, Dominican Republic--It's the fourth inning of a game that will eventually turn into a blowout when budding Yankees star Robinson Cano turns on a pitch and blasts it over the right field fence at Estadio Tetelo Vargas.
The second baseman struts a bit more than he would in Yankee Stadium as he begins his trot to first base, and in the stands, thousands of Estrellas Orientales fans leap to their feet.
They wave green flags, blow into shrill noisemakers, bang inflatable Thunderstix and dance in the aisles.
This is professional baseball Dominican-style: part game, part disco and part fiesta.
"I don't think anything compares," said Cesar Geronimo, a hitting coach for the Tigres del Licey, the opponent for Estrellas Orientales on a balmy December night last weekend. "The fans are unbelievable here. They are a member of the team. It's something they carry in their blood."
Much different than the Dominican Summer League, in which minor leaguers work to earn trips to the states at big league academies, the six-team Dominican Winter League is the main artery of this island's pulsing love for baseball.
Big league stars like Vladimir Guerrero and Miguel Tejada return to their homeland to play for the teams they grew up rooting for (at least for the playoffs), and they're joined by a host of other big leaguers.
Some are budding stars like Cano, who grew up in San Pedro de Macoris and has been returning to play for Estrellas for several years.
A few Americans are sprinkled in, players like Dodgers outfielder Matt Kemp, who is looking for a few extra weeks of seasoning before the start of spring training, and winter league veteran Chad Moeller, who is back for his third campaign in the Dominican.
For two months in the winter, there is nothing like it.
'A show'
Several thousand fans showed up for Estrellas' game Saturday against Licey, a game the visitors won 11-5, and before the game, a bottle of vodka is passed down a row as a group of spirited fans freshen their drinks with some hard liquor.
On top of Estrellas' dugout, a quintet of scantily clad dancers shake and shimmy suggestively, whipping the crowd into a frenzy between innings.
At every hint of action, the fans are on their feet and making noise.
This is almost calm compared to the most fierce rivalry on the island.
To the east of San Pedro de Macoris, when Licey meets Aguilas Cibaeñas, the games are known as "El Guerra "--the war.
And according to fans and players alike, they are every bit as heated as Yankees versus Red Sox, Ohio State versus Michigan and Duke versus North Carolina.
All eight regular-season games between the teams--both in Licey's home stadium in Santo Domingo and Aguilas' home in Santiago--have been sold out since November.
"It has become a show," said Jose Rijo, a special assistant to Nationals general manager Jim Bowden and a former star pitcher for Licey. "You'll see scalpers outside asking for money for the tickets."
Last year, Licey beat Aguilas in the Dominican World Series, and the two-hour ride from Santiago to Santo Domingo took nearly five hours.
The team's bus stopped at every small town along the way, with fans pawing at the bus.
"The people just go crazy," said Licey manager Rafael Landestoy. "We arrived at 3 or 4 o'clock in the morning to Santo Domingo and in front of the ballpark was packed. The bus couldn't get in to our clubhouse. There was a lot of security to take us out of the bus. That was a good feeling."
Landestoy, an infielder who played part of eight seasons in the big leagues with the Dodgers, Astros and Reds, said nothing compares to the atmosphere.
"The emotion is different than the big leagues," Landestoy said. "Here the people are more involved and the people, they know about the game. They want to be like managing the game and they don't like to see players make an error or make a mistake. They are like soccer fans. They do not want a loss."
Pressure-packed homecomingPlaying in front of a home crowd can be both a blessing and a curse for players like D'Angelo Jimenez, a journeyman infielder born in Santo Domingo.
He's played for seven different major league teams, but his family rarely gets to make trips to the United States to see him play.
"It's exciting to have your family see you playing here every day," said Jimenez, who recently signed a minor league contract with the Washington Nationals. "When you are in the states, games are not always on TV and they don't get a chance to see you."
But playing in Santo Domingo, his family can attend every game--enjoying his home runs and diving catches while scrutinizing his every strikeout, muffed groundball or base-running blunder.
Is it more pressure? Absolutely, Jimenez said.
"The game here is kind of more intimate and you want to do good for your fans," Jimenez said. "This is your home and this is your country and they are coming to see you."
That's why major league stars like Guerrero, Tejada--and maybe even Alfonso Soriano, if his new employer, the Chicago Cubs, allows him--to return to the Dominican Republic to play. It's certainly not for the money.
They make millions in the major leagues.
"It's for pride," said Landestoy, whose roster Saturday included Angels prospect Erick Aybar, Indians second baseman Rafael Belliard, Pirates outfielder Jose Bautista and Cubs right-hander Carlos Marmol.
The big stars usually arrive later, for the four-team round robin playoffs and championship series.
"When I was playing I felt more pressure here than in the big leagues," Landestoy said. "There is no question about it. For me the big leagues was like a piece of cake compared to here. We play for our people and our friends and our neighbors.
"When you make a mistake, you go back home, and the next day they are all over you. It's not like in the states. The people there take it a little bit lighter than down here. It's part of the culture here."
An American in the D.R.The competitiveness is what brings American players down to the Dominican.
Kemp batted .253 in 52 games for the Los Angeles Dodgers last season, bouncing between Double-A Jacksonville and Triple-A Las Vegas. He wants to make the Dodgers' roster out of spring training this season, so he decided a Caribbean vacation was in order.
The 22-year-old outfielder from Oklahoma City had no idea what he was getting into when he agreed to play for Estrellas.
"I didn't know what to think," Kemp said. "I was ready to already go home when I got here. It's just different. There are no rules. You ain't got to abide by anything. You just play baseball.
"You see a lot of guns here, a lot of guns," Kemp added. "People walking around on the street with big shot guns. That's about the craziest thing."
That's not the only thing.
Kemp and teammate Chad Moeller, an Arizona-born catcher with the Cincinnati Reds, stay a dozen miles from Estrellas' stadium in the town of Juan Dolio at an Embassy Suites.
They don't drive, because the roads are too crazy--a team official picks them up every day.
They watch what they eat and are careful not to drink the water.
Crime is a problem. Moeller was shocked to learn that most of his teammates carried guns when he arrived for his first winter ball season in 2001 with Licey. Recently, Moeller had a laptop computer stolen from his hotel room.
In Estrellas' cramped clubhouse--the size of most minor league clubhouses--there is rarely hot water.
And the fans can be harsh.
"You've got to make an impression really quick here," Kemp said. "If you don't, they are going to tell you to go back to the United States."
But it's worth it, Kemp and Moeller said, not just for the experience, but for the perspective.
When Moeller played winter ball for the first time in 2001, he said he got a new appreciation for how his international teammates adapted every day.
"You are going to see something every day that shocks you, but it's tremendous perspective," Moeller said. "I think every American should play winter ball simply for perspective of how nice we have it, and what it's like to play in another country, what your teammates go through."
To reach TODD JACOBSON:
Email: tjacobson@freelancestar.com
Nationals’ beat reporter Todd Jacobson and photographer Mike Morones are in the Dominican Republic this week, examining baseball in the Latin American nation.
Today: Summer game in winter
Americans’ sports fixation turns to football when cold weather sets in, but in the Dominican Republic, the baseball winter leagues are all the rage.
Tomorrow: A hometown hero
In the tiny town of Consuelo, new Nationals manager Manny Acta is a treated as a celebrity by the town’s residents. But he wants to put his fame and fortune to good use.
