英语阅读新视野第14课

International Baseball 国际棒球

Before You Read 阅前思考

Answer the following questions.

1. Do you ever watch or play baseball?

2. How popular is baseball in your country?

3. Do you know of any baseball players from your country who play abroad?

Target Vocabulary 目标词汇

Match each word with the best meaning.

1. be accustomed to a. pleased or satisfied with an achievement

2. contract b. a written and signed agreement

3. count c. a teacher

4. diversity d. variety

5. instructor e. be important; matter

6. (to) pitch f. be used to something

7. proud g. meet with courage

8. recall h. interview and choose people to join group or company

9. recruit i. remember

10. (to) face j. throw a ball in baseball

Reading Passage 阅读文章

Filipe Alou has watched the faces of baseball change a lot since he first started playing in the U.S. Major League in the 1950s. At that time, he was the one of the first Major League players from a Spanish-speaking country. Now in his sixties, Alou is a Major League Manager. As the watches international players from his own country, the Dominican Republic, play on teams with players from Puerto Rico, Cuba, Venezuela, Japan, and Korea, he recalls the tough years he had in the past. And he’ll proudly tell anyone, “We were the ones who opened the doors for the rest of them.”

Searching for new young baseball players with potential, team recruiters these days are traveling all around the world. In 2003, about one in every four players on Major League teams in the United States came from a foreign country, including players from South America, Asia, Europe, Australia, Canada, and the Caribbean. And in the minor leagues, almost half of the players with professional contracts were born outside the United States.

Probably the most internationally mixed team in either the U.S. American League or National League (the two professional baseball leagues in the United States) is the Montreal Expos. Among the forty players on the team, ten different countries) is the Montreal Expos. Among the forty players on the team, ten different countries are represented. During practice one day, one of the team’s pitching instructors, Claude Raymond, recalled, “We were on the mound talking about situations pitchers could face and we had a Korean, a Japanese, a Dominican, a Mexican, a French-Canadian, a white American, and a black American all there.” This comes as no surprise to fans of the team. They say their city has always welcomed diversity.

Although diversity is important, what really counts is performance, and international players of the past have just gone to show that great baseball players don’t have to be American. From Puerto