Dominican Dreams: Part 3

SAN PEDRO DE MACORIS, Dominican Republic — Astin Jacobo Jr. smiles broadly as a lanky 13-year-old trots towards him from across center field. Behind him, a group of teenage baseball players in faded black uniforms — kids in Jacobo Jr.’s training program — are playing a practice game. With his eyes fixed solely on the giant lumbering towards him, Jacobo Jr. is looking past the prospect’s disproportionately long limbs and untrained gait to a 6-foot-3-inch recruit with a future in baseball.

“I’m happy today,” he gushes. “You don’t find kids like that every day, and I know I can develop him.”

After a two-minute tryout and a brief talk with the boy’s mother, Jacobo Jr. invites the teenager to sit in the dugout and welcomes him to the family — some 40 players and coaches that make up his program.

The new recruit is a lucky one. By signing on with his new coach, he’s entered the fast track of Dominican baseball.

The story of Astin and his players is the third installment in a special report for GlobalPost of video portraits and written reports titled “Dominican dreams: El barrio to the big leagues." (Read the first part, "The Dominican Republic’s baseball magic," here; and the second part, "The next sure thing," here.)

The son of one of the Dominican Republic’s first MLB scouts, Jacobo Jr. is a new type of entrenador, or trainer — one that emerged to confront the sensationalized archetype of Dominican trainers as disingenuous cheats. Undeniably, those trainers still exist; Jacobo Jr., however, is proud to have an open door policy: “I’ve got an open place, where [you] can come and see … If [you] really want to know about a player, this is the place.”

His training program is legal, healthy, game based, and produces well-rounded athletes. Jacobo Jr. runs a two-a-day system, with practice and drills in the morning and games in the afternoon. He scoffs at the notion that Dominican baseball training is a repetition-based system. Jacobo Jr. plays more than 300 games a year: “I play more games than anybody. Even the Major Leagues!”

The crowd of recruits at Jacobo Jr.’s field is what he fondly refers to as a “melting pot.” He recognizes that in order for his younger players to develop, he needs an amplified level of play. To this end, all types of players are present at his field: former minor leaguers trying to make a comeback, a few Americans lured by the mystique of Dominican training, and even the odd major leaguer in the off-season.

His major focus, however, is on the younger players. Each year on July 2, Major League Baseball’s international signing day, dozens of eligible 16-year-olds sign six- or seven-figure professional contracts. These professionals then spend anywhere from a few months to a few years lodged in multimillion-dollar MLB “academies,” where the island’s top talent is fine-tuned for export to the U.S.

Jacobo Jr. says he needs between two and two-and-a-half years to ready a player for an academy.

That time has almost come for his number one July 2 prospect, a 6-foot-1-inch 16-year-old shortstop named Jean Carlos Batista, whom Jacobo Jr. hopes to be one of the top players signed this year. Born into a devastatingly poor family, Batista has immense talent and focus, making him the poster child for what Astin Jacobo Jr. can accomplish with his program.

Batista lives in Jacobo’s pension, or dormitory, along with 12 other players. The pension is home to some of the more impoverished players, those with family problems, or who don’t live in San Pedro. In many cases, Jacobo Jr. becomes a surrogate father to his players, providing  everything from Tylenol to life advice. He gives them a safe place to live, healthy food to eat, access to a gym, all while shuttling them to and from practice and tryouts and helping out with their families.

“Where’s he gonna get the money to pay $200 for a baseball glove? If he gets sick, how’s he gonna go to the doctor? I mean if he needs anything, where’s he gonna get it from? He’s gonna get it from me,” Jacobo Jr. explains.

Agents in the U.S. regularly charge a 5 percent fee on contracts they negotiate. However, in the Dominican Republic, independent entrenadores assume multiple roles as agent, trainer and coach, and they incur the associated expenses. Their programs are a substitute for the widespread high school and college baseball programs in the U.S. — albeit usually without educational requirements.

In this way, Jacobo Jr. and other Dominican trainers justify their 25 percent to 35 percent cut of their players’ signing bonuses. “I make my money … after I sign the guys. They can spend five years here, and if they don’t make it, they don’t make it," Jacobo Jr. says. "Everything that has to be taken care of — medical bills, equipment, gears … food, and transportation — I have to pay for that. So we charge them a different price than they do in the States.”

For Jacobo Jr., though, the payoff doesn’t come in the paycheck, but in the hope of having a player make it to the big leagues. “My goal is to from time to time go to a Major League ballpark and see some of my kids playing … That’s what’s going to make me think that I made it into this game.”

This article is the third part of GlobalPost’s continuing series, “Dominican dreams: El barrio to the big leagues," about baseball in the Dominican Republic and the lead-up to July 2, International Signing Day.

Read more in part 4 about Junior Rosario, a 17-year-old long shot prospect, for a look at the hard truths of Dominican baseball. You can also learn more at the authors’ website.