Can you imagine watching a prodigy in any field just coming into their own as a teen-ager? I was thinking this in my head the entire time I interviewed Mel Zitter, coach and director of the Youth Service in Brooklyn, who coached big leaguers like Shawon Dunston, Manny Ramirez and Julio Lugo when they were still up-and-coming teen-agers looking for a way out of their rough and tumble NYC neighborhoods

The program is predominantly targeted at the very large Dominican immigrant population in New York City and gives those kids an outlet to play sandlot baseball in the summer -- while also providing many of them with a way to further themselves and gain entry into college. It's a wonderful program, but you still always come back to a 16-year-old Manny Ramirez breaking down at bats and fervently working on nuances in the batting cage while playing for Zitter. I did this interview last year, but enjoyed a rare look into the mind of a Hall of Fame hitting prodigy so much that I wanted to get it up on the blog at some point.

So, here it is. A rare look at one of the people that helped Manny Ramirez harness the amazing ability to punish a baseball that's propelled him into the 500 home run club and beyond as he continues to carve out his legend in a Red Sox uniform.

 

What’s it been like to watch Manny and Julio playing together in Boston?
MZ: It’s obviously cool. We’d had it for a while when we had Manny and Shawon Dunston playing together for the Cleveland Indians, and then Julio and his brother Ruddy Lugo were playing together in Tampa Bay, but this is obviously shaking my lifelong tradition as a Yankees fan.

 I always root for my guys. It ain’t that complicated. I knew Willie Randolph in high school and I’ve known Omar Minaya since high school, so it’s not a fan thing. It’s one of those things where I really root for the people that I know.

As far as Manny and Julio go, I’m really proud of both guys. Manny was a first round pick and Julio wasn’t even drafted out of high school.
He was drafted really late when he was a freshman in college. Body-wise, I think [Lugo] is probably one of the lightest players in the Major Leagues. I think both of those guys have a real New York determination that they’re going to work and work harder than anybody else out there. I think they both have a lot to be proud of in their careers.

What is the Youth Service, and what is its purpose?
MZ: Our organization has always been about hard work and about discipline, and obviously we’re attracting a certain kind of young man in the program. They’re obviously someone with ability, but they’re also really willing to give things up and dedicate themselves.

I don’t think you’re really going to make it in any sport unless you’re willing to really dedicate yourself and cut down on the partying so you can get the proper sleep and rest. Things have changed from 20 or 30 years ago when baseball was simply a sport that you picked up in the spring, and it’s a year-round thing now for all these players.

Do you still keep in close touch with the both of them?
MZ: I haven’t heard from Manny for a while, but Julio came down for a clinic this winter with the kids and we had a great time. It becomes hard to keep in touch with guys when they have families and they move out of New York.

Both of those guys have moved to Florida. Julio was great and I think he was touched by all of the kids there. The kids that are there now in the Youth Service are the same as Manny Ramirez and Julio. They’re 10, 15 or 20 years younger than those guys, but these are the same kids with the same backgrounds and the same hopes and dreams.

These guys come down and see the kids in the program now, and Julio even said it to the kids when he was down there: ‘Where you’re sitting right is the exact same place that I was sitting when I was here…same school, same gym, same coaches, same everything.’ He knows exactly what they’re doing with the running and we’re big into running. Our program is largely Latino-based with a big Dominican immigrant population, and it’s them all over again.

So, the way I’ve heard it…Manny was actually something of a hero to Julio when he was coming up through the system. What do you remember about the two of them?
MZ: Manny signed in 1991, and Julio came into the Youth Services program in 1992. They were never there at the same time. I think if you get Manny to talk then he’ll tell you that Shawon Dunston was that same kind of inspiration to him. Shawon got drafted in ’82 and Manny Ramirez started playing for us in 1987.

That’s the generations of kids. We had five kids out of our program drafted last year, and one of them his name is a pitcher named Pedro Beato. He was a sandwich pick as the 32nd pick in the country by the Baltimore Orioles last season, and he’s a Dominican kid and he was there when Julio visited us.

One of the kids raised their hand and asked Julio what he was going to do if Pedro got the big leagues and he had to face him. And Julio being Julio, he said ‘I’m going to hit him.’ And then Pedro goes ‘maybe I’ll stick one in your ear’ and that’s the kind of laughing and back and forth competitiveness you see in this program among these kids.

What were Manny and Julio like as teen-agers?
MZ: Manny was very quiet as a kid. One of the stories I tell about Manny is that most kids playing baseball are almost never as good as they think they are. Manny is one of those rare players who never thought he was as good as he really is. I don’t think Manny has ever looked at himself as being that good.

He’s one of those rare kids who is just a lot better than he thinks he is. And above and beyond the obvious skills, Manny was probably the most sophisticated young hitter I’d ever seen. The last two or three years he played for me he would get up at the plate and then he would come over to me and for 5-10 seconds he would tell me what he was looking for, what the pitcher did.

He could tell me that the last time I hit a fastball, I was looking for a curveball away and I swung at a fastball and popped it up. I was stupid to swing at it and got myself out. This is what I wanted to do, and this is what I did. You very rarely come into contact with teen-agers that have that kind of sophistication. You try to teach teen-agers to have a plan when they come up to the plate, but very rarely are they able to have a plan and follow through with it. Manny could do that.

I’ve always felt that Manny was a lot more intelligent than other people give him credit for. He has a focus of what he wanted to do at the plate. He loves hitting and he’s obviously always loved hitting. But he always had an understanding. You try to teach kids to go to a batting cage and work on something while you’re there; to go there for a reason. I would take Manny to the cages and he would work on one or two things until he was happy. If it took 1,000 swings to get whatever it was down, then he would take 1,000 swings and if he got it nailed down in 20 swings then he wouldn’t want to hit any more. I think that’s a supremely intelligent way of looking at it.

What about Julio?
MZ: Julio as a kid, on the other hand, was a lot more cocky than Manny as a kid. They’re just different personalities. Manny is a great guy and I don’t know anybody that’s had anything bad to say about Manny that’s gotten to know him personally. Julio was a little louder, a little more social about going around and talking to everybody when he was a kid. Manny was a lot more shy growing up.

Was Manny similar to the way he is now on the basepaths and in the field – where strange things seem to always happen to him?
MZ: Believe it or not, when Manny was a 17-year-old kid he ran 6.45 and 6.5 60-yard times. He was a tremendous centerfielder and a tremendous third baseman. Those are tremendous times and he was an excellent base stealer. He had times where he would lose focus a little bit, but it was always obvious to me from the time he was a kid that Manny loved the game of baseball.

Have you seen a lot of the Manny Being Manny stuff and what do you think of it?
MZ: He’s not a robot out there. A lot of Major Leaguers bore the hell of out of you because they look like they’re robots out there doing things. Manny plays with a lot of personality and that’s not the worst thing in the world. With everything Manny has been accused of, how many players on the Red Sox have come out and said they don’t like him. None, right?

I think the non-baseball parts of being a big leaguer ballplayer don’t really interest him; it’s baseball that interests him. I don’t think he has a mean bone in his body. How many people get paid that kind of money for something they would gladly do for nothing? People can say whatever they want about Manny, but you give him a couple of more years and he’s going to be a first ballot Hall of Famer. I think he’s been the best right-handed hitter in the game of baseball over the last 50 years.

What were you thinking when you saw Manny and Lugo win World Series rings?
MZ: I love that we have three guys in Julio Lugo, Manny and Alex Arias that have World Series rings. I’m proud of every one of them. People can think that Manny Ramirez has this great ability and this and that. But this country is filled with kids that have great ability that will never be great Major Leaguers or even Major Leaguers at all because it’s a lot more than just ability.

It’s the desire to be great and the competitive edge that goes along with it, and that’s Manny. Everything that’s been said and done, he works his ass off to succeed in the game of baseball. People see an attitude and someone that isn’t very quotable. This is somebody that loves what he’s doing and works at it. I’ve got a lot of friends in the big leagues and people would tell me the hardest thing is getting to the big leagues, but they’re wrong.

The hardest thing is to stay in the big leagues once you’ve been there. How many hitters the last 20 years have been more productive than Manny? He’s got to be averaging close to an RBI a game over the course of his career. How many guys in baseball do you see that can hit .300 year-in and year-out without getting any infield hits and have the kind of power that Manny has?

[Youth Service] one of the top programs in the Northeast and it’s a program that’s similar to what it was when Manny and Julio were here. It’s largely made of minority kids who come from economically disadvantaged backgrounds and it’s for kids where baseball is a way out.

For most young men it’s not a way to get to the big leagues, but it’s a way out to get to college. One of my favorite phrases to my kids for a long time is that ‘you have to use baseball and you can’t be used by it.’ For every Manny and for every Julio, there’s a whole bunch of kids that aren’t going to be big league players.

Our job as coaches has to be more than how to turn a double play or how to hit a curveball, and it’s more about taking the discipline and the direction you get in sports to move your life forward. We have kids in college all over the country. The college that Julio went to in Oklahoma [Connors State Junior College] we have three kids there now and we send two or three kids a year there every year for the last 25 years. There are a bunch of schools like that in the country.

Were you surprised that Lugo ended up making it to the Major Leagues given the fact that he had to battle to get there?
MZ: Julio swears he’s over 170 [pounds] now and I have trouble believing it now. You’re talking about a guy that doesn’t have outstanding physical size but has made himself into a tremendous Major League ballplayer. They’ve come from different ways.

They’re both first-generation immigrants from the Dominican Republic and they’re both coming from New York, but one was a first round pick out of high school and the other had to come as a late draft pick and work his way up. I’m just proud of both of them. Julio’s brother Ruddy was a pitcher in the D-Rays organization and he had two of his cousins that have been in the program over the last 10 years.

Do kids in the program still ask you questions about guys like Manny and Lugo?
MZ: Some…some. We live in a me world, though. They want to know if they can be the next Manny. I’d never put that on a kid. I want a player to be the best him. That’s like when Manny was playing, I didn’t want him to be anybody else.

I wanted Manny to be the best Manny and Julio be the best Julio. I hate comparing kids to other people because it doesn’t do them any good. How am I going to compare a high school kid to Manny Ramirez, who is one of the best hitters in the world, or Julio Lugo, who is one of the best shortstops in the world. It’s not fair to them.

What was Manny like as a teen-ager as far as baseball went? What was it like watching him?
MZ: Manny has the best bat speed I’ve ever seen in my life. He is one of the few people in the world that could probably roll out of bed and start hitting. He’s done a lot of work to make himself better and really improve, but some of that is also God-given skill.

He’s smart enough and he’s worked hard enough to develop that skill, but some are just born to be athletes and Manny is one of those guys. Julio has really had to work to get himself up to the big league and work on himself to keep getting better and better.

I know Julio was really looking forward to becoming a Red Sox and getting into a situation where winning was the norm. The whole Yankees/Red Sox rivalry and the excitement and attention paid to that team on a nightly basis are things that Julio loves. That’s the overachiever mentality after not getting drafted out of high school. It was like Johnny Franco doing the same thing for years and years. Part of what he was going to do was to prove to you and show you [that he could play].

I hate to be corny, but it’s really about New York kids going out and playing with personality and showing you what they can do on the field with that huge love for the game. They’re not going to be those Major League robots where you can’t tell if they’re happy or unhappy. They’re going to show emotion and show their energy.

When I see Julio I think of Shawon Dunston as a younger player who would go out with that energy and would basically say [to an opponent] that you can’t beat me. One of the things that Julio told the kids was that ‘I go out there and play and I think nobody is better than me’ and I get up to the plate and I think ‘no pitcher can ever get me out’ because that’s the kind of mentality that you have to have.

I tell the kids that if you want to succeed then that’s the mentality that you have to have, and if you want a chance to enjoy success then that’s the mentality you have to have. Nobody is better than you, nobody is going to outwork you and nobody is going to beat you.