Mark Ruiz would sometimes put his baseball uniform on three hours before the game. That?s how much he loves this sport.
Before he was old enough to play, his parents would take him to watch Little League games, where they would have to hold him back when he tried to run the bases during a game.
Coloring book pages got torn up into bases, his mother said, and crayons were his bat.
But Ruiz, now 17, never really felt the thrill of the game until the first time he hit the ball out of the park.
?It never hit me until the first time I hit a home run,? he said, eyes shining. ?I just remember rounding second base, pointing to my dad.?
The Framingham teenager has deep family roots and lofty dreams. He has watched Red Sox pitcher Clay Buchholz pitch a no-hitter at Fenway Park and won his own back-to-back World Series titles in the Framingham Babe Ruth League.
Now, baseball is about to take him on yet another adventure.
Toting a bag packed with his cleats, two bats, a glove and a shiny new passport, Ruiz will be at Logan Airport at 4 a.m. Wednesday to depart for the Dominican Republic, where he will play in the Red Sox Dominican Baseball Academy in Santo Domingo.
As part of the Red Sox program Lindos Suenos, which means ?beautiful dreams,? Ruiz will join nine other American and 10 Dominican teenage players for an all-expenses paid, two-week trip of community service and baseball.
Ruiz smiled yesterday when describing his upcoming trip, but he was modest.
?He?s beside himself,? said his mother, Sylvia.
The program unites Dominican and American youth and bridges cultural and linguistic barriers with baseball. They will work in a nearby village in the morning and spend the afternoon on the diamond.
Scoring a spot on this trip wasn?t easy, but his years of hard work paid off.
Ruiz, a rising high school senior and youngest of five, started swinging a bat when he was 4.
?Since he started walking, I?ve lived in the baseball field,? his mother said.
Although the family couldn?t afford the pricey New England Amateur Athletic Union, where many of his friends play, she has driven him back and forth across the state and rearranged her work schedule to make sure Mark made it to games and practices.
His father, Hector, who plays softball on a league in Framingham, is another big reason why Ruiz plays ball, but the two are at odds since Hector cheers for the Yankees.
In between five or six practices a week, Ruiz squeezes in homework and a part-time job at Market Basket.
He is a Christian and said his faith helps him feel confident as he plays. Next year, he will mentor freshmen at Framingham High School.
?Mark was a leader from day one,? said Jason Smith, who coached Ruiz for three years in the town league, including the years when they won back-to-back Babe Ruth League World Series titles.
?Every year he just got better and better and better,? Smith said.
Ruiz said he learned a lot from the coaching style of Smith and Howard Chorney, who would gather players in a huddle on the field and debrief.
?They tell you what you did right and how to improve,? Ruiz said.
When he?s on the field, two questions always race through his mind: What am I going to do if I get this ball and how am I going to help my teammates?
?If you know how to communicate with your team you know how to communicate with anyone,? he said.
Ruiz plays shortstop and is a relief pitcher, but he said his favorite position is third base because he has to react quickly and dive for balls.
?You get dirty,? he said with a grin.
As humble as he is, Ruiz has big plans. He wants a college degree, but he also has his eyes on the pros.
But that?s a few years off. Right now, he?s packing his bag and thinking about his trip to the tropical baseball paradise.
(Laura Krantz can be reached at 508-626-4429 or lkrantz@wickedlocal.com. Follow her on Twitter @laurakrantzmwdn.)
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