Background and career
Roberto Enrique Clemente Walker (Spanish pronunciation: [roˈβeɾto enˈrike kleˈmente (ɣ)walˈkeɾ]; August 18, 1934 – December 31, 1972) was a Puerto Rican professional baseball player who played 18 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Pittsburgh Pirates, primarily as a right fielder. On December 31, 1972, Clemente was killed when his Douglas DC-7 airplane, which he had chartered for a flight to deliver emergency relief goods for the survivors of a massive earthquake in Nicaragua, crashed and plunged into the water off the coast of Isla Verde, Puerto Rico. He was 38 years old. After his death, the National Baseball Hall of Fame changed its rules so that a player who had been dead for at least six months would be eligible for entry. In 1973, Clemente was posthumously inducted, becoming the first Latino and Caribbean player and second of Hispanic descent (after Lefty Gomez in 1972) to be honored in the Hall of Fame. He is widely referred to as "the Great One." Born in Carolina, Puerto Rico, Clemente was a track and field star and an Olympic hopeful in his youth before deciding to turn his full attention to baseball. His professional career began at the age of eighteen, with the Cangrejeros de Santurce of the Puerto Rican Professional Baseball League. He quickly attracted the attention of the Brooklyn Dodgers who signed him to a bonus of $10,000 ($120,491.45 in 2025). However, due to the bonus rule under which Clemente had signed and the Dodgers' decision to send him to the minor leagues, they lost Clemente to the Pittsburgh Pirates who drafted him after the 1954 season. Clemente was an All-Star for 13 seasons, selected to 15 All-Star Games. He was the National League (NL) Most Valuable Player (MVP) in 1966, the NL batting leader in 1961, 1964, 1965, and 1967, and a Gold Glove Award winner for 12 consecutive seasons from 1961 through 1972. His batting average was over .300 for 13 seasons and he had 3,000 hits during his major league career. He also was a two-time World Series champion. Clemente was the first player from the Caribbean and Latin America to win a World Series as a starting position player (1960), to receive an NL MVP Award (1966), and to receive a World Series MVP Award (1971). During the offseason, in addition to playing winter ball in Puerto Rico, Clemente was involved in charity work in Latin American and Caribbean countries. In 1972, he died in a plane crash at the age of 38 while en route to deliver aid to victims of the Nicaragua earthquake. The following season, the Pittsburgh Pirates retired his uniform number 21. In his honor, MLB renamed the Commissioner's Award, given to the player who "best exemplifies the game of baseball, sportsmanship, community involvement and the individual's contribution to his team", to the Roberto Clemente Award.
Clemente was born on August 18, 1934, in Barrio San Antón in Carolina, Puerto Rico, to Luisa Walker and Melchor Clemente. He was the youngest of six siblings (three were from his mother's previous marriage). During Clemente's childhood, his father worked as a foreman for sugar cane crops located in the municipality in the northeastern part of the island. Because the family's resources were limited, Clemente and his brothers worked alongside his father in the fields, loading and unloading trucks. Clemente had first shown interest in baseball early in life and often played against neighboring barrios. When he was fourteen, he was recruited by Roberto Marín to play softball with the Sello Rojo team after he was seen playing baseball in barrio San Antón. He was with the team two years as a shortstop. Clemente's interest in baseball grew as he would watch games in Puerto Rico's winter baseball league as a kid. San Juan was a popular destination for barnstorming teams and players who wanted to continue playing in the winter months. Watching the games, Clemente was inspired by Monte Irvin, a right fielder for the Negro leagues' Newark Eagles. He attended Julio Vizcarrondo High School in Carolina where he was a track and field star, participating in the high jump and javelin throw. Clemente was considered good enough to represent Puerto Rico at the Olympics. He later stated that throwing the javelin helped in strengthening his arm and with his footwork and release. Despite his all-around athletic skill, however, Clemente decided to focus on baseball and went on to join Puerto Rico's amateur league, playing for the Ferdinand Juncos team, which represented the municipality of Juncos.
Clemente's professional career began at age 18 when he accepted a contract from Pedrín Zorrilla with Cangrejeros de Santurce ("Crabbers"), a winter league team and franchise of the Puerto Rican Professional Baseball League (LBPPR). Clemente signed with the team on October 9, 1952. He was a bench player during his first season but was promoted to the Cangrejeros' starting lineup the following season. During this season he hit .288 as the team's leadoff hitter. While Clemente was playing in the Puerto Rican League, the Brooklyn Dodgers offered him a contract of $15,000 — $10,000 bonus and $5,000 league minimum salary. Clemente signed with them on February 19, 1954.
At the time of Clemente's signing, the bonus rule implemented by MLB was still in effect. The rule stipulated that when a major league team signed a player to a contract with a signing bonus in excess of $4,000 ($58,000 today), the team was required to keep that player on their 25-man active roster for two full seasons and failure to comply with the rule would result in the team losing the rights to that player's contract, and the player would then be exposed to the waiver wire. As Clemente's bonus was larger than $4,000, he was considered a bonus baby. However, the Dodgers decided against benching him for two years in the majors and decided to place him with the Montreal Royals, their International League Triple-A affiliate. While it is often believed that the Dodgers instructed manager Max Macon to use Clemente sparingly to prevent him from being drafted under the Rule 5 Draft, Macon himself denied it. Box scores also suggest that Macon platooned Clemente the same as he did with other outfielders. Affected early on by both climate and language differences, Clemente received assistance from bilingual teammates such as infielder Chico Fernandez and pitchers Tommy Lasorda and Joe Black. Black was the original target of the Pittsburgh Pirates' scouting trip to Richmond on June 1, 1954. Noticing Clemente in batting practice, Pirates scout Clyde Sukeforth made inquiries and soon learned about Clemente's status as an unprotected bonus baby. Twelve years later, manager Macon acknowledged that "we tried to sneak him through the draft, but it didn't work" but denied being instructed to not play Clemente, stating that the player needed time to develop and was struggling against Triple-A pitching. However, Pittsburgh noticed his raw talents; as Sukeforth recalled years later, "I knew then he'd be our first draft choice. I told Montreal manager Max Macon to take good care of 'our boy' and see that he didn't get hurt." In 87 games with the Royals, Clemente hit .257 with two home runs. The first home run of his North American baseball career came on July 25, 1954; Clemente's extra inning, walk-off home run was hit in his first at-bat after entering the game as a defensive replacement. His only other minor league home run came on September 5. On his 20th birthday, August 18, he made a notable game-ending outfield assist, cutting down the potential tying run at the plate. At the end of the season, Clemente returned to play for Santurce where one of his teammates was Willie Mays. While with the team, the Pirates made Clemente the first selection of the Rule 5 draft that took place on November 22, 1954.
For all but the first seven weeks of his major league career, Clemente wore number 21, so chosen because his full name of Roberto Clemente Walker had that many letters. For his first few weeks, Clemente wore the number 13, as his teammate Earl Smith was wearing number 21. It was later reassigned to Clemente. During the off-seasons (except the 1958–59, 1962–63, 1965–66, 1968–69, 1971–72, and 1972–73 seasons), Clemente played professionally for the Cangrejeros de Santurce, Criollos de Caguas, and Senadores de San Juan in the Liga de Béisbol Profesional de Puerto Rico, where he was considered a star. He sometimes managed the San Juan team.
In September 1958, Clemente joined the United States Marine Corps Reserve. He served his six-month active duty commitment at Parris Island, South Carolina, Camp LeJeune in North Carolina, and Washington, D.C. At Parris Island, Clemente received recruit training with Platoon 346 of the 3rd Recruit Battalion. The rigorous Marine Corps training programs helped Clemente physically; he added strength by gaining ten pounds and said his back troubles, caused by being in a 1954 auto accident, disappeared as a result of the training. He was a private first class in the Marine Corps Reserve until September 1964. Clemente would face racism throughout his major league career, particularly from journalists. Former Pirates teammate Bill Mazeroski wrote that some sports writers, "tried to make him look like an ass by getting him to say controversial things and then they wrote how the Puerto Rican hot dog was popping off again." The language barrier between Clemente and the American journalists created a divide which led Clemente to be distrustful of the media. Mazeroski wrote that, "writers who couldn't speak three words of Spanish tried to make him look silly, but he's an intelligent man who knows people and knows the game." Clemente's disagreements with the media were worsened by his open expression of anger at the continued discrimination in baseball. His outspoken nature earned him a reputation for being hot-tempered that followed him through his career.
