Dominican Dreams: Part 3

Trainer Astin Jacobo Jr. observing a player. (Casey Beck and Trevor Martin)

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.”

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/sports/090606/dominican-dreams-part-3