He’s an educator for the Sox

FORT MYERS, Fla. — When Duncan Webb was turned down for an internship early last year by the Red Sox, the sound he heard was not of a door closing but of another opening.

‘‘Going through the interview process made me realize this is what I wanted,’’ he said, ‘‘to be around professional sports and baseball, in particular.’’

Webb, a 24-year-old Lynn native and graduate of St. John’s Prep in Danvers — where he played on the 1999 and 2000 state championship baseball teams — stayed in touch with Sox director of player development Mike Hazen and vice president of player personnel Ben Cherington, and eventually became the organization’s Latin education coordinator.

A 2004 graduate of Amherst College, where he was a double major in Spanish and psychology and a baseball captain as a senior, Webb sold Hazen and Cherington (also an Amherst alumnus) on both his baseball skills and his fluency in Spanish.

‘‘We didn’t have much of a spot for him,’’ Hazen said. ‘‘But he spoke Spanish and he had some ability there. So what we ended up doing was putting a job together that was just for him in the Dominican. It’s not something that actually had ever been done before. So, when we proposed it to him — go down to the Dominican for the summer, live at the [Red Sox-sponsored] academy — he jumped at the opportunity, which was great, and so it ended up working out pretty nice.’’

Webb joined the staff of the organization’s baseball academy in the Dominican Republic as an intern, where he was an on-field assistant and off-field educator. He reported for duty June 1, opening day of the Dominican Summer League.

Webb acknowledged that he was nervous about the new venture, but ‘‘turned out to have an amazing summer working there, living at the academy, in this kind of dual role of working on the field and helping the coaches with whatever they need.’’

Part of the role of the academy is teaching English to the young players. Webb began to evaluate the academy’s education system and came to believe that it could serve its mission better with a more formal structure and curriculum. As he assumed the education duties, he also located a private high school in the capital of Santo Domingo that would take on the players as students.

‘‘It’s kind of a sad situation,’’ Webb said. ‘‘The system in the Dominican Republic is basically these guys see baseball as their opportunity to make it, and their best chance to become a better baseball player is to spend all their time playing and practicing, and that leaves school out.

‘‘But I think the Red Sox have done a great job of putting some time and money and effort into these guys once they become members of the Red Sox.’’ The Sox were impressed by Webb’s work. ‘‘He did a great job,’’ Hazen said. ‘‘The initiative he showed, the ownership he took in the entire program in the Dominican was great. He took on a lot of different responsibilities and really excelled at them; things that we hadn’t really even laid out when he went down there just because of things that emerged while he was there. That’s why we were so attracted to bringing him on full time when the internship was over.’’ Webb’s work earned him a full-time job with the Sox as the organization’s Latin education coordinator.

He launched his role in spring training, where his days begin early each morning, arriving at the team’s training complex at 6:30 a.m. to teach Spanish to Sox staff and coaches, and ending after 8 p.m. at the team’s hotel with English classes for the Latin players. In between, there are staff meetings, workouts, and games, during which he’s been coaching first base, preparing for the other half of his role with the Sox entry in the Gulf Coast League this summer.

Coaching won’t be entirely new. For two years, Webb was an assistant coach at Amherst.

‘‘It’s valuable to have that kind of role,’’ Hazen said.

‘‘He’s teaching English as a second language to our guys. He also works on the field as a coach. So he’s extremely versatile in his position and his abilities. For us, we feel it’s an advantage to have someone like that who can do all those things. He’s able to do a number of different things that allows us to branch out in areas that maybe we hadn’t before.

‘‘His humility, his work ethic, his ambition, those are the things that make him successful in this job. He’s so strong in this area, and his desire to build and grow what he has, for us, has been a separator.’’ While the days are long, Webb enjoys his role.

‘‘I feel incredibly challenged every day,’’ Webb said in March after one of those long spring training days. ‘‘I would say it’s hard for me to convince the players that an education and developing their minds is someday going to help them, not only in baseball but in their lives outside of baseball.

‘‘I think it is tough because most of them think, ‘If I can throw a ball, and hit a ball, and catch a ball, then I can do whatever I want and I’m going to be happy.’ But I certainly feel, and I think the Red Sox are in agreement, there’s more to it.

‘‘The most rewarding part of the job so far has been seeing players speak English to staff members and fellow players. That might not seem like very much because that’s what I’m here for, and that’s what they should be doing, but it just shows a level of maturity on their part and a level of confidence that most people actually don’t have the confidence to speak in a language that’s not their own in a country outside of their own.’’

And what’s behind that next door for Webb? ‘‘I’ll be here through the end of August with the Gulf Coast team. I hope to expand on the education and hopefully carry it over to some of the lower-level affiliates.’’