Nicaragua has a strong baseball tradition, but it has only sent eight men to the major leagues. This righty pitcher is #7. Born in 1977, as a youth Vicente Padilla idolized national hero Dennis Martínez, who fronted the Expos rotation at the time. He also avidly watched the Braves on TBS. Padilla began playing in the local amateur league in 1996; because this is not a professional circuit, it is hard for pinoleros to attract scouts. But when he starred for the national team in world competition in Italy and Venezuela in 1998, the Diamondbacks signed him.
Vicente started in Class A ball the next year and rose with uncommon speed, making his big-league debut that June. In July 2000, he was sent to Philadelphia along with Omar Daal, Travis Lee, and Nelson Figueroa in the Curt Schilling deal. Obviously this helped Arizona become World Series champs, but the Phillies were right to insist upon receiving a live young arm. The early thinking was that Padilla would be the closer of the future, but he became a starter at Triple-A in the second half of 2001. The following spring, he was the club's best pitcher. With the help of Martínez, Padilla now has off-speed offerings to complement his power pitching. He may well become one of the NL's aces.
Also by Rory Costello
» A.J. Burnett
» Dave Magadan
» Calvin Pickering
» Midre Cummings
» Turk Wendell
» Alfonso Gerard
» More submissions
Posted June 5, 2002.
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