Check Swing: C-K Manager Rondon Marches Against Time
Photo Credit Mark Malone - Chatham Daily News
As Gil Rondon strides slowly down the first-base line to the coach’s box in Brantford, the Chatham-Kent manager carries with him a lifetime of baseball memories.
There was his taste of the big leagues, where he pitched for Chicago (AL) and Houston in the late-70s, and later his time running pitching for Nicaragua and Chinese Taipei. Later still, he served on Puerto Rico’s staff at two World Baseball Classics and managed the homeless Empire State Greys — an unenviable challenge he looks back on fondly.
“When I managed in the Frontier League, I’m probably the only guy who can say I won four in a row and lost 90,” laughed Rondon, who led the travelling Greys through a grinding schedule against better-funded teams with actual home ballparks. “The biggest satisfaction was I didn’t get thrown out one time, (and) at the end of the year the Commissioner called me and said ‘I want to commend you, you were the most professional manager in the league with our umpires’.”
This year’s edition of the Barnstormers is off to a flying start, due in no small part to Rondon’s ability to teach — and renewed focus, following a promotion from the pitching coach role he held in 2024.
“I want these guys to understand (that) if I make them work on extra things, it’s because I see something there,” explained Rondon. “In baseball, there is an old saying: If I don’t come talk to you, young man, you better start packing your bags.
“But when I keep going after you, getting on you, it’s because there’s something there — I love what I do, I love teaching and seeing the reaction from these kids.”
The highlights have been plentiful, not only from imports Mitsuki Fukuda and Yuri Yokoyama but local bullpen arms such as Aden Ryan and Garret Day too. At 6-5 and on a four-game win streak, the Barnstormers are riding high — and Rondon has the opportunity to contend, as a manager, for the first time in his long baseball life.
At this stage of his career, he is purely here for the players: To teach them, see them learn and try to advance them to professional baseball. In some ways, it’s the objective that’s defined a baseball career that has spanned three continents.
“It gives me satisfaction when somebody understands the message and moves on,” reflected the Bronx, N.Y. native. “I love what I do, this is the best game. I’m 71 years old but feel like I still have something to contribute to these kids for another three, maybe four, years.”
He remembers finding Robert Suarez, today one of the top closers in baseball, at an exhibition showcase in Mexico.
“I had a conversation like that with Robert, it was a showcase and the guy running it had two guys for us to watch,” remembered Rondon. “I knew the first guy, he was a Mexican at 86, 87 with control — but when Robert got up to throw, he was 92, 94, and when he went 95 I said ‘stop, do you have anything in your body’.
“He wasn’t sure what I meant, but I was telling him that was the day his baseball career starts and that everybody now knew about him.”
Several years later, Suarez currently leads the majors in saves.
Rondon reconnected with him and a few other familiar faces — San Diego pitching coach Ruben Niebla, for example, played for him in 1995 — at a Padres-Tigers game in Detroit earlier this year.
“I talk to Robert every once in a while, and he’s done well for himself. He took the money he’s got, built an academy in Saltillo, and he’s there every day in the winter,” smiled Rondon. “That’s what gives guys like me satisfaction, I don’t want nothin’ from them, but when I go to the ballpark and see them they drop everything...reflecting on the outcome you’ve had on somebody’s life, when you do your job, that’s what it’s about.”
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In Brantford, Chatham-Kent takes a lead into the bottom of the eighth; reliever Aden Ryan works out of some trouble to throw a zero up on the board, in a game the Barnstormers will eke out, 4-3.
As Ryan jogs off, the first guy to meet him in the dugout is his 71-year-old manager with a firm handshake, clap on the shoulder, and immediate breakdown of his outing.
Gil Rondon’s been in the big leagues, coached in the World Baseball Classic and helped countless players to the major leagues; world-class players like Robert Suarez and Randy Arozarena have benefited from his guidance.
At an age where most baseball men are retired and golfing in places like Florida or Arizona, he soldiers on in modest surroundings — still in love with being at the ballpark, still passionate about turning his kids into ballplayers.
March on, Gil.