Los Angeles (United States) (AFP) – Los Angeles Dodgers shortstop Mookie Betts was named on Monday as the 2025 recipient of the Roberto Clemente Award given to a Major League Baseball player for his charitable work. The award is named after legendary former Pittsburgh Pirates star Clemente, who was killed in a plane crash while delivering relief supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua in 1972.
MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said that Betts, who was lining up later Monday for the Dodgers in game three of the World Series, was an “unbelievable ambassador for our game.” Manfred said Betts had been an “overwhelming choice for the award” before detailing charitable work the Dodgers star had been involved in together with his wife Brianna.
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“Mookie and Brianna were active in terms of supporting victims of the Los Angeles fires. They have been active in fighting hunger and homelessness here in Los Angeles,” Manfred said. Betts had also donated youth sports equipment, funded a youth baseball tournament, and sponsored youth teams in his hometown of Nashville.
Betts, 33, welcomed the award. “Life is about more than kind of what you do, I think, as far as work. It’s about how you affect people. People always remember how you make them feel. So I know we live by that,” Betts said.
© 2024 AFP
