“He’s a legend,” Abreu said Sunday. “It’s an experience that I’m going to have for the rest of my life.”
Abreu has met Cabrera briefly before, when he competed in (and won) a home run derby in Venezuela last offseason. They talked at the time about the WBC, which made Abreu — who was 4 when a 20-year-old Cabrera homered off Roger Clemens in the 2003 World Series — all the more excited. He acknowledged being a tad starstruck.
“He’s the best player that Venezuela has ever had,” Abreu said. “I never thought that I would be around him. So this is a special moment for me, for my life, to be there with him . . . I know I can learn a lot from him. I know he’s going to give me some good tips that I can use for the rest of my career. So I’m going to try to learn as much as I can from him.”
Venezuela’s first game is Friday against Ceddanne Rafaela and the Netherlands in Miami. Team USA also will open Friday playing Brazil in Houston.
So Sox manager Alex Cora offered a challenge, according to Suárez: If he could completed the third in 11 or fewer pitches, Cora would buy him dinner.
Suárez needed exactly 11 pitches to get the next three outs, then pointed and laughed at the dugout on his way back from the mound.
He is looking forward to his meal.
“An expensive one, so he can pay for it,” Suárez said through an interpreter.
Cora rebutted: “No, no, it was 10 [pitches] or less. He forgot his Spanish.”
Sunday yielded complicated feelings for reliever Tayron Guerrero, who had been scheduled to leave Sox camp to join Colombia ahead of the WBC. In recent days, however, the righthander opted out of the tournament.
He said he felt compelled to focus on the Red Sox in his quest to return to the majors for the first time since 2019.
“It’s a really hard day. Not a hard day, but an emotional day. I had to make that decision,” said Guerrero, who is in camp on a minor league contract. “But I’m going to make this decision really [worthwhile] by the way that I’m going to do my things here, just to be able to have the opportunity to go back to the big leagues. So that’s a dream that I have.”
Guerrero, 35, played in 113 major league games with the Padres and Marlins from 2016-19. In recent years, he has pitched in Mexico, Japan, and the Dominican Republic. His fastball still is touching 100 miles per hour in exhibition outings with the Sox, and on Sunday he tossed two scoreless innings.
“[The Red Sox] haven’t told me anything about [his chances of making the team], but I will show that I’m ready to be part of this organization in the big leagues,” he said. “[Colombia] obviously wants me to be there, and I want to be there, too. But I have an opportunity that I want to take advantage of.”
Cora said Franklin Arias, the Red Sox’ top position player prospect, will start at shortstop Monday for a game against the Blue Jays in Dunedin, Fla. He’ll be called up from minor league camp.
“We’ll probably see a lot of him this week,” said Cora, whose club is playing three road games that require multi-hour drives and thus are wildly unattractive to established big leaguers. “It’ll be good for me to see him play, and for him to be around big leaguers and playing against big leaguer.”
