A member of the first San Jose Giants team in 1988, first baseman Rich Aldrete had a .320 average over a seven-year minor league career. Those are darn good numbers. So why did Aldrete never play in the majors?He thinks it had something to do with his older brother Mike, who was battling to keep his job as a backup first baseman with the San Francisco Giants.
“It was one of those things where if I had played in another organization I think I would’ve gotten a little more love, as far as the bloodline,” says Rich. “Mike was struggling with the Giants, and you don’t need two 25th men. We were kind of the same player, hit for high batting average, with average power, five-ten, five-eleven inches tall.” The fact that Will Clark was the starting first baseman for San Francisco didn’t help either.
Aldrete played five years in the Giants chain, then in the Saint Louis and Milwaukee organizations. He played as high as Triple-A, and won a Double-A championship with the Giants’ old Texas League affiliate, the Shreveport Captains. Several times a minor league all-star, he’s on the San Jose Giants 20th Anniversary and All-Decade teams.
Off-seasons in his pro career, he ran the non-profit Aldrete Baseball Academy in his hometown of Monterey, Calif., and by his numbers sent more than 100 players on to play college baseball. He continues the Otter Baseball Academy for boys and girls at California State University-Monterey Bay, where he was hired as the first head baseball coach in 2005. The university, which was built on the old Fort Ord military base in nearby Seaside, had no field, no tradition and little money for scholarships.
His baseball academy spent $250,000 on materials and labor and turned an old football field into a baseball diamond. But the work isn’t finished. Aldrete hopes to get donor support to build an indoor training facility, outdoor lights, locker rooms and weight rooms.
Aldrete says you need “quality kids” to build a winning program, and is proud that the grade point average of this year’s team, which plays in the Division II California Collegiate Athletic Association, is just shy of 3.0.
He says playing before friends and family in San Jose was “one of the best experiences of my life.” Aldrete has turned down various professional coaching and scouting jobs, and although he says he could’ve played a couple more years, he has no regrets.
“I really like the fact I’m one of the few coaches who’s okay with his playing career that I didn’t play in the big leagues.”
His goal is to leave a legacy at CSUMB of graduating student-athletes, build a winning tradition, and mentor some productive young adults.
Originally Published at: http://www.examiner.com/x-4505-San-Jose-Giants-Examiner~y2009m3d13-Whatever-happened-toRich-Aldrete
0 comments:
Post a Comment