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BISBEE — At 13, Luis Pimentel fell in love with baseball at cathedrals like Fenway, Yankee and Shea.
The young Dominican was visiting extended family in New York, and after taking in the smell of freshly cut grass and the crack of major league bats, he bought a baseball bat and a pair of cleats.
“I said, ‘I want to be there,’ ” Pimentel said. “I went home and told my dad I wanted to play baseball.”
Pimentel’s father had been a ball player himself, and told his then 5-foot-4, 220-pound son that he would have to shed some pounds and become a better athlete before he could become a baseball player.
 Recent Copper Kings acquisition Luis Pimentel at Warren Ballpark Wednesday. Friday, Pimental and the Copper Kings will travel to Phoenix to take on Garden of Gears in the first round of the Pacific Southwest Baseball League Regional Qualifying Tournament. If the Kings win the tournament, they will qualify for the National Baseball Congress national tournament in Wichita, Kan. (Mark Levy•Herald/Review) |
“Dad told me that I had skills,” Pimentel said. “But if I wasn’t an athlete, I wouldn’t make it.”
A year after taking up basketball to lose the weight, Pimentel was playing baseball in a summertime league. In high school, the only league in his Dominican hometown practiced in the mornings. But Pimentel’s father wanted him to spend his days at school, not playing ball.
But he was able to play on a team in Santo Domingo, the nation’s capital, that practiced every day and played on weekends. The problem was the hour drive from home to practice and games. Pimentel could only make one practice a week, and sometimes had to ride the bus there because his parents were working.
Although his father was a big influence in his baseball career and acted as a coach, Pimentel prides himself on the fact that he never got discouraged and he worked hard on his own by getting up early in the morning to run.
He wanted to make his life all about playing baseball.
Now, Pimentel is the newest member of the Bisbee Copper Kings, and the team is hoping the power hitting Pimentel used against them when he was with Lake Havasu will help them in the Pacific Southwest League Regional Qualifier tournament this weekend. The Copper Kings begin play at 4 p.m. on Friday at the Grand Canyon University campus in Phoenix, taking on Mesa-based Garden of Gears.
Should the Copper Kings win the tournament, or if the Casa Grande Cotton Kings were to win, Bisbee would earn a berth in the National Baseball Congress National Tournament in Wichita, Kan., on Aug. 1.
Pimentel left his parents, older sister and younger brother to attend college in the U.S. and spent two seasons at a junior college in North Carolina before transferring to Union College in Kentucky where he was redshirted the first half of the season and played the last half.
While playing with the Havasu Heat this season, Pimentel played two of the four games against Bisbee on the last weekend of June and went 3-for-4 with a home run the first day and 2-for-4 with a three-run home run the next day.
The Heat begins its season with a 40-man roster, and gradually lets players go throughout the season. The day after Bisbee finished its series with the Heat, Copper Kings coach Butch Hammett received a call from the Havasu coach suggesting the Kings pick up Pimentel.
“He was one of the predominant hitters on that team,” Hammett said. “It’s an established place, and they let players know that they’ll be released at any point. It’s what keeps a continuous edge.
In Luis’ case, I can’t see it as a performance problem. Fortunately for us, they liked what they saw in us and thought Luis could help us and we could help him.”
Bisbee makes a point of loading its roster with players from southeastern Arizona, but Hammett hopes to bring in more players like Pimentel.
“To get the program to a Havasu level, I’d like to see more of a mix,” Hammett said. “To be able to compete, we need to bring in higher level ball players where their focus is the game and not just recreation.”
Hammett said Pimentel’s biggest contribution to the team in the two weeks he’s been with the team has been his drive as a ball player, which Hammett hopes has rubbed off on the rest of the players.
“His life is the game of baseball,” Hammett said. “It means much more for him, and the way he approaches it is different. It’s refreshing.”
Herald/Review sports writer Liz Manring can be reached at 515-4682 or by e-mail at liz.manring@svherald.com.
