As for Lois Gross, she simply penned a quick, phonetic phrase on a piece of paper for the Dayton Dragons players who were huddled around her during Wednesday’s Meet The Team luncheon at Fifth Third Field:
“Aim hapi tu bi hir.”
Every year — the day before the minor-league season is to start — the Dragons gather their players for the press, have each guy stand and, with microphone in hand, tell his name, where he’s from and then give some kind of interesting or oddball fact about his life.
The American-born players went first Wednesday and then it was time for the Latin guys to introduce themselves. With five players from the Dominican Republic and four from Venezuela, the Dragons’ 25-man roster is 36-percent Hispanic. And that’s not counting the guys born in the U.S. who have some Spanish heritage.
A few of the Dominicans and Venezuelans know some English, some do not, but they all got their marching orders before they stood.
“In English,” Tony Fossas, the Dragons’ Cuban-born pitching coach called out teasingly — but pointedly — from the front of the room. “Speak in English.”
Some of the Latin players mouthed Gross’s transliterate line, but a couple — like Venezuelan Humberto Valor and Dominican Wagner Gomez — were confident enough to riff on their own.
All, though, seemed to agree with the message:
“I am happy to be here.”
And why wouldn’t they be?
They’ll be seen night after night by one of the biggest and most faithful fan bases in minor-league sports (the Dragons have sold out 913 straight games, a record for professional sports in North America) and the franchise has had 57 players put on major-league uniforms, many wearing the wishbone C of the parent Cincinnati Reds.
And, for the Latin players, there’s also the benefit of Gross and her English as a Second Language program.
Gross spent 40 years as a Spanish teacher in schools in Huber Heights, Centerville and Englewood. She also ran ESL school programs.
In 2003, Grant Griesser, then an assistant farm director with the Reds, wanted to start a language program for the growing number of Latin players coming into the organization. He reached out to Marc Katz, then the Dragons beat writer for the Dayton Daily News, and Katz suggested Gross.
Since then she has had nearly 50 Dragons students, several of whom have made it to the big leagues.
“I tell our (Latin) players, even though they might feel comfortable speaking only Spanish, they shouldn’t develop that mentality,” said new Dragons manager Jose Nieves, who was born and raised in Venezuela before playing major-league ball with the Chicago Cubs and Los Angeles Angels. “This is a different culture and they need to make the adjustment if they want to be really successful.
“I tell them to make use of the opportunity they are being provided here because it doesn’t happen every place else.”
Professional baseball has a distinct Latin flavor these days. According to the Associated Press, 24.2 percent of opening-day rosters of the 30 major-league teams this year came from Latin American countries.
The Dominican Republic, which won last month’s World Baseball Classic, had 89 players. Venezuela was second with 63. Cuba had 15 and Mexico 14.
At 36 percent, the Dragons are ahead of the curve and along with Nieves and Fossas, hitting coach Alex Pelaez has Hispanic roots. He grew up in California, but his parents are from Mexico.
Yet the Dragons brass all want their Latin players to step out of their comfort zone when it comes time to communicate.
The 55-year-old Fossas, who pitched 21 years in pro ball, 10 in the big leagues, said he conducts all his pitching meetings in English: “If I make it easy for them and just speak in Spanish, then they don’t learn.”
He knows his method works: “I was 10 when we came from Cuba and we ended up in Jamaica Plain, Mass. I was the only Latin kid in the whole elementary school. I was thrown into a classroom where the books were all in English and I had to figure out what the lady was saying and the kids were saying. The last period of the day they’d bring me to a classroom and teach me English words, but after school is when I learned the most – on the street and playing sports.”
Nieves said he learned his English when he came to the States to play minor-league ball in Williamsport, Pa., where he lived with a host family. “Our team, though, didn’t have any classes like we have here,” he said.
Gross meets with players in a conference room two or three times a week for an hour a day. She tries to get in 30 classes during a season and one former manager was so enthused, he had her meet 40 times with the players.
Almost all of her instruction is done in English and the players — just as would other students — embrace the experience differently.
“With some guys I think there’s the fear of being made fun of,” Pelaez said. “But actually the American players are usually pretty good with the Spanish players and trade words with them.”
Fossas agreed: “A lot of it has to do with self-image and confidence. The brave ones are the ones who end up rooming with an American kid, the ones you see out in center field with a bunch of American players (during batting practice).”
He could be talking about a guy like Gomez.
“I’ve tried to learn a new word every day,” the Dominican catcher said. “I want to get better every single day. Last year I did my first English interview ever … and it felt good.”
Valor has the same approach: “I didn’t speak any English when I came here three years ago, but last year I roomed with a guy from Puerto Rico and he taught me a lot. And I’m not afraid to ask, ‘How do you say that? How do you say this?’ I don’t speak perfect English, but it’s getting better.”
As he headed off to join the workouts that had begun in left field, he suddenly turned, grinned and said:
“Pleased to me you … Have a nice day.”
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