Quote:
Originally Posted by SPORTSMEM817
An image that was on google for a while ithink it stil has several variations floating around
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Well, now I feel like I have to post
my colorized Fidel. I hope everybody knows that all that stuff about him being a "prospect" is bunk. A lot of it was made up in
this country--not even Fidel trying to build a legend. Don Hoak played a big part in the whole thing. He and a sportswriter "conspired" to tell a tall tale in print (Hoak's career was over and I'm guessing he needed the money. I'm not sure what the sportswriter's motivation was). They borrowed some details of things that actually happened in Cuba, but neither Hoak nor Fidel were present for any of it. The year in question, Hoak didn't do winter ball and Fidel was in jail (and not even in Havana).
Fidel did throw hard, by all accounts, but was wild. He was never a prospect, no one scouted him, tales of bonus money offered are ridiculous since the organization allegedly making the offer (the Senators) were cheap as hell. And Fidel never wanted a baseball career anyway. He was a spoiled rich kid who was going to become a lawyer and make money. Baseball didn't pay the kind of salary to compete with that.
Anyway, the B&W for this image was on something called "scoopfest", which is sort of like Pinterest. I obliterated the other people in the shot on purpose (they served no function). This is from the 1959 exhibition where Fidel's team was Los Barbudos, which means "The Bearded Ones".