A tour of a lifetime: Vladimir Guerrero visits The Hall

Vladimir Guerrero’s first baseball memories start at age five.

“We played in the backyard. My mom’s. My uncle’s. My grandfather’s,” he said.

When it came to equipment, they sometimes had to improvise, including using lemons for balls.

“We also took the insides of old baseballs and wrapped them up with socks,” he said.

Vladi was in a mood to reminisce during a private tour through the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, N.Y., getting a firsthand look at the history of the game while accompanied by his girlfriend Roxannie Rodríguez, his assistant Virgilio Rojo and younger brother Julio Guerrero.

A morning among the legends is a courtesy the Hall of Fame extends to every elected player, a time that connects the past with the present, telling each new member that his lifelong journey in the game has reached its final destination.

As Vladi stood in front of the exhibit containing 19th-century artifacts from the Baraboo (Wis.) Base Ball Club, including the oldest jersey and cap in the Hall’s collection, he immediately connected it to his childhood in his hometown of Don Gregorio, Dominican Republic.

“Es un palo de guayaba,” he chortled, pointing to a long, skinny bat. “That’s a guava tree stick.”

“My grandfather would wake me up at six in the morning to milk the cows,” he said.

Vladi is reticent by nature. Many don’t realize he dropped out of school after sixth grade to help support his family by working in the fields. But as Erik Strohl, the Hall’s Vice President for Exhibitions and Collections, guided him from display to display, Vladi clearly was taking a trip down memory lane. He gazed intently at the artifacts with his brown eyes, warming up with each stop in the tour.

What struck Vladi early on was the nature of the equipment in the early days. Gloves back then were basically fat mitts with short, stubby fingers and minimal webbing.

“I used a 12-inch glove,” said Vladi, a nine-time All-Star right fielder.

Vladi peeked into Babe Ruth’s locker from the original Yankee Stadium, marveled at Cy Young’s 511-316 career mark and sized up a three-foot trophy that Ty Cobb earned for one of his 12 batting titles.

“I won a batting title in the minor leagues. I got a trophy this big,” Vladi said, moving his hands about nine inches apart.

In the Hall’s ¡Viva Baseball! exhibit that celebrates the game in Latin America, Vladi listened attentively when I translated Clemente’s scouting report for him.

He nodded appreciatively at Nicaraguan Dennis Martínez’s Montreal Expos jersey, donated in honor of his perfect game in 1991, the first by a Latino pitcher.

“My first team,” said Vladi, who debuted with the Expos on Sept. 19, 1996.

Right across from the Martinez exhibit was a plaque dedicated to the Los Angeles Dodgers’ super scout from the Cuba, Ralph Ávila, the man credited with opening up the Dominican Republic to Major League Baseball. And with getting a pudgy teenage Vladi into shape during the 10 months he spent at the Dodgers’ baseball academy.

“Do I know Ralph? He made me run. And run. And run,” Vladi said.

The Dodgers never signed Vladi, opting instead for his older brother Wilton. But that’s a story for another day.

Behind the Ávila plaque is a Dominican corner featuring Pedro Martínez, David Ortiz, Sammy Sosa and the only two artifacts the Hall currently has from Vladi—an Expos jersey and a bat he used during his 31-game hitting streak in 1999.

The bat is still stained with pine tar. Vladi was notorious for never using batting gloves, a habit he learned by imitating one of the first players he admired — Moisés Alou.

“I didn’t like how gloves felt on my hands. The bat kept sliding down. I couldn’t grip it well,” Vladi said.

The irony is that Vladi often swung off balance. He was a bad-ball hitter extraordinaire. At the Ted Williams “Strike Zone,” an exhibit in which the Splendid Splinter divided the strike zone into quadrants and projected his batting averaging at each location, Vladi simply laughed when asked to do the same.

“Just give me fastballs. High and away,” he said.

In the Hall’s vault, where most of the museum’s 40,000 artifacts are stored, Vladi got to pose with bats belonging to Ruth, Williams, Willie Mays and Mike Schmidt. He ventured his estimate on length and weight of each, sometimes using his right arm to measure. Legends don’t need a scale. Throughout his 16-year career, Vladi hit with the same bat.

“Thirty-four inches, 32-ounces,” he said of the instrument he used to hit .318 with 449 home runs and 1,496 RBI over his career. Suffice it to say that Vladi’s bat will enter the Hall with the highest batting average among the more than 700 Dominicans to play in the major leagues.

The last stop was the Hall of Fame Plaque Gallery, where every one of the Hall’s 323 members are enshrined in bronze. Vladi stopped at the plaques for Clemente, Marichal and Martínez, touching them while posing proudly.

“Growing up, all I wanted to do was sign a professional baseball contract,” Vladi said.
“Thanks to God, over 16 years I did enough to make it here. I never thought that I would be in the Hall of Fame, but now that I’m here I’m so glad it has happened.”

Vladi will be the 14th Latino inducted into the Hall. He’s now alongside the Babe, Willie, Hank and the other greats. But he summed up his day—and his journey from Don Gregorio to Cooperstown—in more personal terms.

“I’m the fifth from my town to sign a pro contract,” Vladi said. “And after my brother, the second to make it to the major leagues. And together with Marichal and Martínez, I’m the third Dominican in the Hall of Fame. The third Dominican, but the first hitter.”

That’s right, the first Dominican hitter in the Hall of Fame. That’s one memory you’ll never take away from Vladimir Guerrero.