Jose Bautista is a new college recruiter
Toronto Blue Jays right fielder Jose Bautista is currently in conversation with the NCAA and Latin American schools about a recruiting process that will allow Latin athletes a greater chance to play sports in American universities.
Bautista, who is coming off a career year belting out 54 home runs, will be starting with his home country of the Dominican Republic before moving onto the other Latin American countries.
"The general idea is going to be recruiting student athletes that are a good representation to my country," Bautista said according to mlb.com. "It's just like somebody helped me when I was trying to sign as a free agent and couldn't get a deal done. I had
somebody help me and it allowed me to go to the United States to pursue my college education and play baseball at the same time. It ended up in a lot of doors and opportunities opening for me. One of those was the chance to play professional baseball and
ultimately make it to the big leagues and have this historic season that I just got done with."
Bautista’s story starts with him practicing and working out with baseball academy during the day and going to night school back in his home country. He lived this life for two semesters with only a couple of Major League Baseball teams, notably the Arizona
Diamondbacks and New York Yankees, taking notice. Nothing seemed to be coming of it, so Bautista was going to quit baseball and concentrate on his education, but that all changed five days before the start of his third semester.
Oscar Perez, Bautista’s former little league coach, gave him a call and got the ball rolling for Bautista to make the journey from the Dominican Republic to college ball in America. Perez worked for an organization called Latin Athletes Education Fund which
works in partnership with the NCAA to help the Latin American athletes reach their educational and athletic goals.
The phone call ended up getting Bautista into Chipola Community College in Florida in 2000, also the same year he was drafted in the 20th round by the Pittsburgh Pirates.
The hopes are that many of the other Latin athletes that may get overlooked will have a better opportunity to make their dreams come true and Bautista wants to be there for them, just as Perez was for him.
"Some kids don't have enough to pay for the plane tickets," Bautista said to mlb.com, "or the meals, or the books, or whatever tuition the school might not cover, a lot of the expenses that go along with going to college. Even though those might be normal
things and normal prices for the common American, I know it's a lot of money for kids coming out of the Dominican Republic."
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