I arrived in the Dominican Republic June 12, 2017, along with 10 other students from across the U.S., to study the globalization of Major League Baseball. The experience changed me. At the time, I assumed Dominican ballplayers had a significant advantage over Americans because of the perrenial warm weather, which theoretically meant more opportunities for year-round play and training. I didn’t realize so many Dominicans lived in such extreme poverty, but the shacks along the highway spoke of the economic hardships and the Little League fields shattered any remaining illusions. Trash littered the batter’s box, and bases were made of old cloth. If a ball was hit over the fence, two or three players initiated a search-and-rescue, because buying new balls is too expensive. One field we visited, La Liga Portorreales, didn’t have real dugouts; only fallen tree trunks that kids sat on as they waited for their turn at bat. Some played in game uniforms while others played in plain athletic wear, and equipment such as bats, helmets and catcher’s masks were sometimes scarce. Any potential advantages Dominicans had over Americans weren't evident in Little League. Life within the walls of MLB academies, particularly that of the Tampa Bay Rays, was much more of an escape from the reality outside their walls. Red Mediterranean-style buildings, palm trees and neatly trimmed lawns and flowers give it a real Floridian look, and the baseball fields are clean-cut masterpieces. Pictures of former and current Rays players adorn the hallways and stairways. The instructors arrive and take us to the classrooms for the day’s lesson. The players begin filing in, each of them shaking my hand and taking a good look at me, which I’ve gotten used to since it happens everywhere we go in Santo Domingo. For most of them, this is their first encounter with an American. They are split up in different classes: Beginners (or “basic”) and more advanced, but they're generally conducted in similar fashion. My first day is with the beginners, who question me in broken English: “What is your name?” “How many years you have?” (The teacher corrects them) “How old are you?” “Where in the United States are you from?” I answer them, carefully pronouncing each word: My name is Devon.” “I am 21 years old.” “I am from Maryland.” I point to Maryland on the map, then New York and Florida, because they know those states well. “So, New York is up here, and Maryland is down here under it. Florida is all the way down here; it’s close to the Dominican Republic.” This is the only educational instruction these guys have gotten the last few years. They’ve all dropped out of school at 13 to spend three years training with talent developers called buscones; Dominican players don’t get drafted, but instead signed at age 16 and spend their next few years in the academies until they’re good enough to make it to the U.S. minor league system. Because they drop out so early, the players average a seventh-grade education, and for the thousands of boys who don’t get signed by an MLB team at 16, they’re suddenly at a dead end; they can’t go back to school and face unlikely futures trying to find jobs with only a seventh-grade education. I only worked at Tampa’s academy for three weeks, but these baseball players had a profound impact on my view of baseball. They’ve had to overcome so much—a lack of education, a language barrier, abject poverty and even racism—and maintained focus on the task ahead. The life they’ve pursued comes with a high risk but low reward; less than 3 percent of baseball players make it to the major leagues, but many of these players have spent their entire adolescence around this game; Baseball is life, and they must do this for themselves and their families. As the class lets out and the players leave for the day, they each shake my hand and tell me thank you for coming. I tell them good luck. Now, whenever I go to Washington Nationals games with my grandfather, I’m always sure to point out the Dominican players.