Thu, Apr 04, 2019 page16

• MLB makes pitch for first Chinese star

  • AFP, NANJING, China
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  A coach’s voice in an unmistakably US accent rings out across a baseball field: “Attaboy, good job Wayne, nice throw.”

  It could easily be California or Florida, but this was a world away in Nanjing, and the MLB is hunting for its first star from China.

  If — or more likely when — that happens, he would probably come from here.

  

  A student rounds first base during training at an MLB Development Center in Nanjing, China, on March 21.

  Photo: AFP

  The MLB has three development centers in China and in February, three youngsters from the Nanjing site were signed to the Milwaukee Brewers.

  They are to start in the minor leagues, but hope to reach the big leagues eventually.

  Missouri-born Ray Chang, who had stints at the San Diego Padres and Minnesota Twins as a player, is the coach playing a significant part in developing baseball in China.

  There are nearly 100 budding players spread across the three development centers.

  Chang has 23 of them, aged 12 to 18, under his wing in Nanjing.

  These boys, who have taken on names such as Wayne, Sonny and Roger, have been scouted from across the nation, as far afield as Tibet.

  “We are not really looking just for baseball players, we are looking for athletes,” the 35-year-old Chang said. “Baseball at that age level [when he scouts them at 11] is still growing, so we are hoping to find better athletes where we can say: ‘Look, here’s a glove, here’s a bat, let’s go six years and see what happens.’”

  “Obviously, preferably we’d like to have baseball players playing since they were five or six, but the reality is that’s just not the case here in China,” he added.

  Training is intensive with four or five hours a day from Wednesday to Friday, and then matches on Saturday and Sunday mornings, followed by more practice.

  Games are against local universities or teams, but they sometimes travel to Taiwan, Japan, Australia or the US.

  Most of the communication is in English and with all expenses paid by MLB, it represents “an amazing, amazing opportunity,” Chang said.

  “Our main goal is to get these guys opportunities in the US and obviously the top goal is to get them signed by pro teams,” Chang said.

  Huadan Cairang sees his family once a year. The 17-year-old hails from Tibet, where access by foreigners is tightly controlled by the authorities.

  Cairang — who uses the name “Roger” — initially played soccer and was a goalkeeper, but found his strapping frame better suited to baseball.

  Now mainly a pitcher, he has been playing for nine years, but admits that prior to that “I did not know what baseball was at all.”

  It was a South Korean coach who spotted his potential.

  “He went to Tibet to travel and saw Tibetans have great strength and thought we could try to play baseball,” Cairang said.

  He and others at the Nanjing base know that making a career in the MLB is a stiff task. Some will end up with Chinese teams instead.

  However, he has other goals.

  “Many Tibetans don’t know what baseball is. I want to get more Tibetans to like baseball,” Cairang said.

  MLB director of baseball development in Asia Rick Dell said that the overarching ambition is to grow the game in China.

  The three centers are a key plank and their main purpose is to get teenagers into universities in the US, China or elsewhere and “develop young men.”

  However, finding a breakthrough Chinese star — baseball’s Yao Ming moment — is “just a matter of time,” Chang said.
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