Little scandal, big dreams

NEW YORK -- Danny Almonte is standing exactly 60 feet 6 inches away -- a span he's calibrated not with the help of a tape measure, but by his own perfect instincts. Even in the wide-open dimensions of the outfield, a true pitcher -- even a teenager -- knows how far a fastball is supposed to travel.

"You ready?" Almonte asks. We haven't begun to play catch, but his vibe is unmistakable. Long arms, long torso, cap pulled down low, Andy Pettitte-style. Almonte almost looks like he's ready for life on 161st Street in the Bronx, where baseball isn't a passion, it's a business.

But Almonte isn't there yet. He is, after all, just a sophomore at James Monroe High School in the Bronx, pitching at Shea Stadium for the New York City championship against George Washington High School.

Almonte was dominant in No. 1 Monroe's 4-0 win over No. 2 George Washington before an estimated crowd of 5,000 at Shea Friday night. He struck out 11 and allowed one hit while pitching a complete seven-inning game. Of his 89 pitches, 69 were strikes.

He says it's the greatest here-and-now moment of his abbreviated baseball life, but he's still trying to outrun the scandal of the 2001 Little League World Series.

Then, the Dominican-born Almonte pulverized 12-year-old hitters with a 78-miles-per-hour fastball, striking out 46 batters in three starts -- a stunning feat until it was discovered that Almonte was actually 14.

That's the asterisk Almonte carries today, and perhaps forever: white heat, followed by a white lie.

On this day not long ago, however, Almonte, 17, is far away from Williamsport. Instead, he's in Babylon on Long Island, paying a visit to the All-American Sports Academy, a crisply run camp for baseball-addicted preteens. Almonte has been invited to the camp by its director, Rob Drommerhauser, who was the Mets' bullpen catcher in the 1980s. Drommerhauser knows Ray Negron, who counseled Dwight Gooden after he succumbed to cocaine. And Negron knows Rolando Paulino, Almonte's Little League coach from the Bronx and current caretaker.

Sifting through four degrees of separation, Almonte finds himself in the middle of 135 upper-middle-class boys. The currency is the same for everyone here -- a love of baseball -- but that's not to say Danny has much else in common with the campers. He barely speaks, and when he does, he uses Negron to translate one- and two-word answers.

No matter. No one has to really talk to Danny to know his story. The kids recognize his face. And they surely realize the gift of his adult-like left arm.

"Fastball," Almonte says, announcing the first pitch, like the Speaker of the House bringing in the president for the State of the Union. The campers are all watching Almonte, as are the camp's staffers, including a retired Baltimore Orioles' scout whose presence lets the kids believe they're on a bullet train to The Show.

Me? I'm the one playing catch with Danny -- a former Columbia righthander who's still hanging around the sandlots of New Jersey. I'm too old, Almonte is too young. Our skills are hurtling in opposite directions, but for one brief moment we're in exactly the same place in the baseball universe.

Even as he goes into his windup, it's obvious Danny has a DNA to die for. His windup is short, his hips rotate perfectly, his front leg coils like a snake. And upon releasing the ball, his arm forms a perfect "L" -- just the way it's taught to the campers.

Only, these mechanics are a product of genetics -- inherited, not taught. As much as the All-American Baseball Academy advertises to the contrary, such physics can't be force-fed to its students. As Almonte's limbs unfold and the ball leaves his fingertips, it's obvious where he and that heater are headed.

"Danny has what I call pitchability," is how Yankees' scout Cesar Presbott put it. He's a New York-based bird-dog who, along with every other area scout, has been tracking Almonte since 2001. So far, Presbott likes what he sees.

"It's not about how hard you throw," the scout says. "I've seen plenty of guys who are at 95 (m.p.h.) and can't pitch. Danny has that something special."

Maybe it's because Almonte has already lived through the darkest days of his life. In the wake of the Williamsport fiasco, Almonte's perfect game was stricken from the record books, his Bronx-based team stripped of its third-place finish, and his coach, Paulino, banned for life from all Little League tournaments.

There were culprits everywhere in this sorry tale -- primarily Danny's father, Felipe, who was caught chiseling two years off his son's age. No one ever blamed Almonte for the scam, but even if you have a problem with him today, his impenetrable wall of serenity, sprinkled with the requisite teenage indifference, suggests it's your problem, not his.

Almonte has moved along quite nicely since 2001. He won All-City honors with a 10-2 record and 2.63 ERA last year and was even better this season, lowering his ERA by more than one run. When he wasn't pitching, Almonte was one of Monroe's best hitters, starting at first base, posting a .456 average -- which is one reason the Eagles are 41-2.

Their coach, Mike Turo, believes Almonte will continue to grow and be throwing in the low 90s by his senior year. Which is to say, he'll be riding that bullet train to The Show.

Joe DeLuca, a former Orioles' scout, would later say: "There's no doubt in my mind Danny's going to be drafted. Even with the stuff he's got right now, he could go somewhere in the lower rounds."

It's not that Almonte has major league velocity. If the meter for respectability drops at 90 m.p.h., then Danny is a work in progress, somewhere in the mid-80s. But he has several obvious factors working in his favor: he's young, he's a lefty, and because of his long arms has what one major league executive calls "a projectable body." In other words, Almonte is waiting to ripen.

One more thing: Almonte's fastball has last-second-movement. Scouts call it late life in the zone, and it's the difference between a high-round draft pick -- and a fat signing bonus -- and spending the rest of your baseball life with me in the sandlots.

Hitting a baseball is all about timing and comfort, which is why a straight fastball -- even in excess of 90 m.p.h. -- looks like a grapefruit to a major-leaguer. But nothing makes a hitter more uncomfortable than a fastball that moves late and unpredictably, which is precisely the gift that's been bestowed upon Almonte.