From talent-rich Miami area, Alonso stands alone
Brother-in-law Machado, others from area miss out on city’s first All-Star Game
In the streets of Little Havana, living in Miami a few years later, he used to sneak into Miami Hurricanes football games at the old Orange Bowl, as getting tickets for big games was a long shot in the conditions he was living in.
Today, Alonso’s humble beginnings in everything from baseball to simply getting by in America as a Cuban immigrant will come full circle. On those same grounds where the Orange Bowl once stood, Alonso doesn’t have to sneak in. He’s invited.
The Cuban-born Oakland Athletics first baseman, who played at Coral Gables High and the University of Miami, will make his All-Star debut at Marlins Park.
“I’m going to enjoy it — not just because it’s an All-Star Game, but it’s home,” said Alonso, who will have 60 people at the midsummer classic, ready to erupt when he comes in to either pinch-hit or play first for the American League.
Among those there will be Alonso’s father, Luis, who brought Yonder to Miami from Cuba about two months before his eighth birthday. Luis Alonso would work three or even four jobs at a time to be able to afford rent in a one-room efficiency and put food on the table. When Yonder Alonso was old enough, he would start helping to clean offices and warehouses — not so Yonder could have spending money of his own, but to help the family pay rent.
Alonso is one of several talented major league players to hail from South Florida as part of this “Miami Baseball Brotherhood,” but he will be the only one playing in Miami’s first midsummer classic. Former Douglas standout and Chicago Cubs first baseman Anthony Rizzo missed an All-Star selection after making it the past three years. Eric Hosmer, out of American Heritage, did not get in after reaching his first with the Kansas City Royals last season. Washington Nationals shortstop Trea Turner, a Park Vista product, didn’t make his first All-Star appearance after finishing second in NL Rookie of the Year voting last year. Hialeah-born pitcher Gio Gonzalez made back-to-back All-Star Games in 2011 and 2012, but hasn’t been back since.
The Orioles’ Manny Machado, Alonso’s brother-in-law, has been an All-Star three of the past four seasons, but his 18 homers and 47 RBIs weren’t enough as he hit .230.
“Me and Manny are one,” Alonso said. “He’s got three under his belt, so right now we’ve all got four in this family.”
Alonso’s breakthrough first half at 30 years old, hitting .275/.372/.562 with 20 home runs and 43 RBIs to earn the All-Star selection, mirrors the hard work he picked up early from his father.
“It is a dream come true — and the game being in Miami makes it double, triple that,” Luis Alonso said. “This is the best thing that can happen to a ballplayer — this and winning a World Series.”
Said Alonso of his father: “He’s going to enjoy every minute of it.”
The potential Alonso had to reach this pinnacle in baseball was evident from his youth. Alfonso “Flaco” Otero, who currently coaches at Miami SLAM Academy and has helped Miami Hurricanes baseball coach Jim Morris with his camps for 21 years, first saw him hit at 10 years old at an academy in south Miami-Dade County called Hardball and knew he’d excel then.
When Alonso was a junior at Coral Gables High playing in the Dade vs. Broward All-Star Game at Florida International University, Otero took his expectations for him to the next level when he saw the lefty batter do something not many could do at his age.
“I remember him hitting a ball out to left-center field on a line,” said Otero, who also coached him in a national high school baseball exhibition called the Area Code Games in Long Beach, Calif., before Alonso’s junior year. “When I saw that, I said this kid’s going to be special for a long time.”
He spent three seasons with the Hurricanes from 2006 to 2008, driving in 69, 74 and then 72 runs as a junior, when he bopped 24 homers. He played in two College World Series while with the ’Canes. He still trains on campus in the offseason.
Drafted seventh overall in 2008, he debuted with the Cincinnati Reds in 2010, spent 2012-2015 with the San Diego Padres and is now in his second year with the A’s.
Through his journey, he has upgraded his bats a few times along the way, but Luis Alonso said that broomstick still makes appearances hitting whiffle balls to this day.
Today, that Cuban kid who grew up in Miami swinging the broomstick will be an All-Star in his hometown.
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