Belen, Columbus alumni look to send baseball equipment to Cuban youth

Posted on Thursday, 09.01.11
Miami-Dade

Belen, Columbus alumni look to send baseball equipment to Cuban youth

A pair of University of Pennsylvania students from Miami-Dade are collecting baseball equipment to send to Cuba.
By Julio Menache
jmenache@miamiherald.com

After attending a screening of the documentary The Tenth Inning at the University of Pennsylvania last October, Adrian Lorenzo, then an outfielder for the university's baseball team, was taken aback by scenes of poor Dominican children playing baseball with old, worn-out equipment.

Lorenzo, a graduate of Belen Jesuit Preparatory School in West Miami-Dade, knew that the Dominican Republic received numerous donations of baseball equipment from around the world, but wondered why something similar hadn't been done for another island nation that takes great pride in the sport.

"You never hear of massive sending of baseball supplies to Cuba," said Lorenzo, who is of Cuban descent.

The next day, Lorenzo spoke to teammate Derek Vigoa, who was also Cuban-American and graduated from Christopher Columbus High School, about the lack of awareness brought to the plight of young Cuban baseball players.

After a few days of brainstorming, Lorenzo and Vigoa started Go to Bat for Cuba, an initiative that looks to collect baseball gear to send to Cuban youth on the island.

The two players soon set up a collection box in their team's locker room for baseball equipment.

They later collected more than 100 bats, as well as baseballs, gloves, uniforms and helmets.

After seeing the success of the initiative in the University of Pennsylvania, Lorenzo the two players wanted to see if they could expand the project nationally.

"Once we started at UPenn we wanted to see if there was any room to grow," said Lorenzo.

New bat rules

Lorenzo and Vigoa said they started the project knowing that many college baseball programs would soon have an excess of metal bats they could donate to the cause.

Last January, the NCAA adopted a new bat standard, which meant that schools across the country would have hundreds of bats lying in storage that don't meet the new regulations.

"Since there was such a surplus of bats we thought why not send them to people who need them?" said Vigoa.

Lorenzo and Vigoa later spent the fall semester contacting various coaches, players and friends from across the country asking for donations.

The response was slow at first, but then Vigoa heard back from Georgetown baseball coach Pete Wilk, who offered to donate 87 bats to the cause.

Wilk says he knew Vigoa through some of his players who played summer baseball with him. After Georgetown's equipment manager told Wilk's they needed to get rid of some bats, he contacted Vigoa and asked if he'd be interested in taking them.

"I'm aware the history of Cuban baseball. I have a layman's education about the economics of Cuba these days. I thought we could make a pretty big impact on an impoverished area," said Wilk.

After Georgetown's generous donation, Vigoa's summer league team, the Woodstock River Bandits of the Valley Baseball League, donated more than 15 dozen baseballs.

The group later launched its own Facebook page, which helped get the word out. Two weeks after its creation, the group has more than 200 followers. The group posts pictures of recent donations by teams or individuals.

Vigoa estimates that the group has collected 150 bats.

Getting to Cuba

In the beginning stages of the project, Vigoa and Lorenzo spoke to Penn alumnus Danny La Fuente, program and grants manager for The Foundation for Human Rights and the founder of UC-CANF, the university arm of the Cuban American National Foundation about sending the baseball equipment to Cuba.

La Fuente offered to help the group send the goods to Cuba.

The FHR has used a courier service to send goods to Cuba, such as cell phones, laptops, medicine and clothes, to the island legally since 1992. La Fuente says that the FHR has never had an issue with the courier they use to send goods in the 20 years they have been sending things to the island.

"This isn't something the Cuban government will stop. We knew that wouldn't be an issue," said La Fuente. "You can guarantee it's going to the right people."

Yet, with the amount of supplies the group wants to send — Vigoa says the group's goal is 1,000 bats — La Fuente estimates that it might cost between $30,000- $40,000.

"The courier service charges per pound and baseball bats are heavy. Plus, we also have 250 baseballs. It's just a significant amount of weight," said La Fuente.

Because of the costs, the group will be looking to hold fundraisers in order to look for monetary contributions. It is also looking to reach out to other groups in the Cuban exile community focused on helping the youth in Cuba, such as Raices de Esperanza. The group will raise money through FHR and UC-CANF, both of which are nonprofit organizations.

"We feel that this is something everyone can help with," said La Fuente.

The two Penn sluggers also reached out to their alma maters for guidance.

And while the two boys-only Catholic high schools are rivals — their football teams are set to play each other in much anticipated game on Sept. 9 at FIU's south campus — both schools' instill in their students a mission to help those in need.

'The only real difference," said Belen principal Father Guillermo 'Willie' Garcia-Tuñon, "is that one is run by Jesuits and another by the Marist brothers."

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/08/29/v-fullstory/2385426/belen-columbus-alumni-look-to.html