Is this based on a true story?
Just curious
shareI believe it is based on the story of Indian cricketers Dinesh Patel and Rinku Singh who were scouted in the Indian Cricket League and signed by the Pittsburgh Pirates as baseball pitchers.
shareDinesh is out of professional baseball already, but Rinku is still in the Pirates organization. Here is a link to Rinku's profile. http://players.piratesprospects.com/2011/02/rinku-singh.html
shareAs a longtime Pirates fan and Indian, I can pretty much assure you neither of these guys make it to the bigs, single A ball at best.
The Bucs are now contenders, neither of them have the stuff to make it.
His A ball numbers aren't bad. He could make it up to the Pirates in RP role.
http://thebaseballcube.com/players/profile.asp?P=rinku-singh
If he makes it to the bigs, it will still be a few more years.
The Buccos have a DEEP farm system, there are several more prospects ahead of him.
That aside, he may also get traded if he's good enough.
I'd still be surprised to see him pitch in relief in a big league game, but I'll be ecstatic as well.
Cricket is the only thing India is honestly good at, and hardly anyone in America cares about it. No one I know cared that Sachin Tendulkar retired, some of my Indian-American friends were mildly interested. On a similar tangent, whenever I visit India, the local paper doesn't report scores from American sports. Frustrated me when I was younger, back when you had to get your news from a newspaper, lol.
You are misinformed....India is doing pretty good in badminton,tennis,shooting,wrestling,hockey.
And nope we don't care about baseball....neither does rest of the world.Baseball is only popular in USA only and if that frustrates you....don't come out of USA.
You're the one misinformed. Baseball is huge in Japan, Korea, and most of Latin America. It's also big in Canada but obviously nowhere close to hockey.
derp
What are you talking about? Baseball is huge in the Dominican leagues and Japan is pretty big with baseball as well.
share[deleted]
He missed the entire 2013 season and is now getting a little old for a low level minor league prospect.
Still, best wishes to him.
It is always great to see someone beat the odds.
I was born in the house my father built
[deleted]
he link you gave is not an official baseball site. If you go to the actual Pittsburgh Pirates web site there is no mention of either of these two players. You can search current active and historical players and their names never show up.
shareNo one said they played for the Pirates. Both were signed by the Pirates for rather modest bonuses.
Patel is done with baseball and Singh is recovering from Tommy John surgery.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=patel-001di n
http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=singh-001rin
As someone who follows professional baseball at all levels, I can appreciate how hard it is to make it to the a Major Leagues. Only one out of ten players who sign a professional contract make it to the Major Leagues. This includes guys who are September call ups who only have a few plate appearances. Singh and Patel are guys who never played organized baseball until they signed professional contracts.
There are three number 1 draft picks who never made it to the Majors.
Thats partially untrue. They weren't Indian cricketers. They were javelin throwers. They were the winners of a baseball pitching contest.
shareIf these Indian Cricket players were signed by the Pittsburgh Pirates then why do their names not show up in the list of current or historical players????
share