PITTSBURGH – The Cincinnati Reds held a team meeting before their rain-delayed game in Pittsburgh on Saturday to discuss what kind of help they might be able to offer for the thousands of victims of Venezuela’s deadly twin earthquakes.
“None of us are experts in that area, so we’re trying to listen and do the right thing,” Reds manager Terry Francona said. “We’re trying to figure out how we can help the best and quickest.”
Earthquakes of 7.2 and 7.5 magnitude struck the northern region of the country within less than a minute of each other late Wednesday. The known death toll had reached more than 1,400 by early Saturday, according to reports.
Eugenio Suárez, the Reds’ star slugger, and two members of the team’s traveling staff are among the hundreds of MLB personnel across the game who are from Venezuela.
Suárez told the Enquirer before the series opener in Pittsburgh that his loved ones in the country are safe but that he didn’t want to talk in detail about the tragedy because, “It breaks my heart, and I don’t want to cry.”
After Noelvi Marte won Friday’s game with an eighth-inning home run, he took time before answering media questions about the game to talk about what’s going on in Venezuela.
“Everybody in this locker room, everybody, played for them,” said Marte, who’s from the Dominican Republic. “Even myself, I wore a yellow (sleeve) on my left arm because I was honoring my Venezuelan friends.
“I know the hard situation they’re going through right now,” he added. “And I want to make sure that they know that we’re praying for them and we hope for the best outcome from this.”
Reds trainer Tomas Vera, a Venezuela native who served as the athletic trainer for Team Venezuela during its World Baseball Classic championship run in March, said players and staff associated with that team have come together on a WhatsApp chain to coordinate relief efforts, with Team Venezuela bench coach Robinson Chirinos leading the effort through his Venezuelan-based charitable foundation.
The Reds, on behalf of Suárez, Vera and Venezuelan bullpen catcher Jose Duarte, are committing resources from the Reds Community Fund toward the relief effort, Vera said. That’s expected to be through helping Doctors Without Borders deploy more medical staff to the impacted areas.
Until recent years, Venezuela was a regular winter-league stop for many MLB players and prospects, including Francona, who spent four winters playing in Maracaibo, about 440 miles west of the area of most quake damage in La Guaira, a coastal region just north of the capital, Caracas.
This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: What Cincinnati Reds are doing for Venezuelan earthquake victims
Reporting by Gordon Wittenmyer, Cincinnati Enquirer / Cincinnati Enquirer
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Gordon Wittenmyer, Cincinnati Enquirer | USA TODAY Network
