Baseball feature

Here's a feature I wrote up a few months ago. Any critique would be nice

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Santo Hernandez peers from the locker room, glancing out towards a baseball field that has been slaughtered by the prior night’s thunderstorm.

He stands and watches, desolated by his muddy office, yet calmed by the inviting blue skies that lay above.

The parallelism of this particular sight to his journeyman baseball career – which has traveled the likes of the Dominican to Illinois to California to Mexico and, now, to Laredo – is alarming.

At only 23, Hernandez has seen the best and worst of what professional sports can offer.

And along the way he has discovered one absolute truth.

“Life’s about adjustments,” he said as light sprinkles began to tarnish his green baseball cap. “To be successful, most of the time you just can’t stay in one place. You’ve got to move about, discover the world. It tests your character.” Circumstances aside, the numbers are – like Hernandez’s stuff – electric.

The 6-1, 160-pound Laredo Broncos righthander boasts a 6-1 record, posting a 2.70 ERA courtesy of 59 strikeouts, and just 54 hits surrendered, in 63 innings pitched.

He’s been a solid influence on an otherwise shaky Laredo staff, and in an era that embraces the radar gun, he’s proved to be a dazzling commodity.

“Santo is one of those guys who has a lot of talent,” Broncos general manager Jose Melendez said. “He throws 92, 93 miles per hour consistently. He really shouldn’t be here, he should be playing at a higher league.

“But he’s here for a reason.”

Above and beyond
The tale of Santo Hernandez begins in the Dominican Republic, which has always been renowned as a baseball hotbed.

Since the age of 14, Hernandez has been a staple of Dominican baseball diamonds, playing four years before being signed and brought to camp by the Colorado Rockies as an undrafted free agent.

For three years, Hernandez hung with some of the game’s best at the Rockies’ low-A levels.

But he never quite found his niche, and was released in June 2003.

“It was a good experience,” he said. “Because of the talent level there, it’s a big change. But I had a fun team. I got to go where I had always dreamed of. I got to see what it’s like. I’ve had some success here in the independent leagues, but everyone’s dream is to get to that major league level.” Hernandez, however, refused to let rejection deter him.

After taking a year off from baseball, he pitched in Pensacola in 2005 before finding himself with the United League’s Alexandria Aces in 2006.

One trade later brought him to Laredo, yet another new surrounding but no different of a person.

“I’m the same guy as I was six, seven years ago,” Hernandez said. “I’ve just been working harder. I’m just looking for one more opportunity, one more chance. I want to show the world who I am and what I’m capable of.” Many have been awed by Hernandez’s array of skills and talent. Some come strictly to watch him pitch, anxious at the thought that they might see something they’ve never seen before, and might never see again.

But Hernandez has not grown comfortable with the role of unofficial team spokesman, like infielder Edwin Maldonado, and endeared himself to the public.

The reason is simply because Hernandez has bigger sights in view. And among those are getting right back to where he once was.

“I try to do my work and that’s it,” he said. “It’s (Dominican Republic) so much different from here. Over there at home, we have everything we want. It’s perfect. The only thing we don’t have is money. That’s why we come here. We come to make the money, and then go back to the place where we had everything we wanted.”

Close enough
“Our main goal is for him to improve here,” Melendez said. “He’s made a lot of strides since last season. I told him that he just needs to pitch well and we’ll get him to where he needs to be.” Earlier this season, Hernandez was named to his fifth All-Star team. Still, it’s not quite enough.

He sees the likes of Boston Red Sox Dominican slugger Manny Ramirez and Venezuelan Chicago Cubs pitcher Carlos Zambrano and realizes it can be done.

Success can be had, no matter what the background.

“I’ve worked very had to get this far, and this year I’ve worked my hardest,” Hernandez said with his eyes directed towards the heavens. “I have a long way to to go but I want to be the best I can possibly be.” For someone so young, Hernandez has a good grasp on priorities. He looks at the game a lot differently than many his age, and that comes from his vast experience in the netherlands of the game.

“Baseball is not a hard game,” he said. “Be aggressive. That’s my mindset. Give the opponent my all. Baseball is a game, and while I take losing personally, whoever plays this game is not a loser. Everybody’s a winner. All losing means is you have to work harder and do whatever’s necessary to avoid it.

“Those guys in this clubhouse are not losers.” Hernandez twists his cap and looks out towards the field, the mud and water that once sabotaged it now nothing more than a vacant memory.

“I’m very happy,” he said with a gentle nod and smile. “I love the people I play with, and I know I’ll make it.

“Everything’s going to work out when it’s all said and done.” 7/1/2007

 

TX -

Welcome to the Workshop. Thanks for posting with us.

A few thoughts, for what they're worth.

- The top suffers a little from overwriting. "Peers," "glancing" (two very different things), "slaughtered," "desolated," "parallelism," "sprinkles," "tarnish" are all words that work too hard but convey too little. Same at the bottom with

Hernandez twists his cap and looks out towards the field, the mud and water that once sabotaged it now nothing more than a vacant memory.

- The trouble, then, with the lede is that you're jacking up the writerly language to oversell the reader on the scene. Better to keep it simple and let the reader really see it. "One fast-moving thunderstorm and the field was ruined. Mud everywhere and the tarps blown into the stands, two lightstands down and a creek running through center field. Santo Hernandez has seen worse." Or something. Simple. Declarative. Don't try to beat the parallel into the reader's head. Let the reader make the connection.

- Right now it feels like you've got too many quotes, and that they're doing too little. It's almost as if your prose is in there only to separate the quotes. Try to reverse that ratio.

- I'm not sure what you mean when you write:

But Hernandez has not grown comfortable with the role of unofficial team spokesman, like infielder Edwin Maldonado, and endeared himself to the public.

The reason is simply because Hernandez has bigger sights in view. And among those are getting right back to where he once was.

- Ask yourself if you knew exactly what this piece was going to be about when you sat down to write it. It feels - to me at least, and always feel free to disagree with me - sort of unfocused. Is it about a comeback? Is it about one man's triumph over adversity? Is it about boundless hope? Unfounded optimism?

Again, thanks for posting with us. Hope this helps.