Desmond nominated for the prestigious award for the third consecutive season
Major League Baseball today announced that Ian Desmond was named the Colorado Rockies’ 2019 nominee for the prestigious Roberto Clemente Award, the most prestigious individual award for Major League players.
The Roberto Clemente Award is the annual recognition of a Major League player who best represents the game of Baseball through extraordinary character, community involvement, philanthropy and positive contributions, both on and off the field.
Each Club nominates one current player to be considered for the Roberto Clemente Award in tribute to Clemente’s achievements and character. Wednesday, September 6th marks the sixteenth annual Roberto Clemente Day, which was established by Major League Baseball to honor Clemente’s legacy and to officially acknowledge local Club nominees of the Roberto Clemente Award. As part of the league-wide celebration, the Roberto Clemente Day logo will appear on the bases and official dugout lineup cards and a special tribute video will be played in ballparks.
Every year, each MLB Club nominates a player to be considered for the Award in tribute to Clemente’s achievements and character. Wednesday, September 18 marks the 18th annual Roberto Clemente Day, which was established by Major League Baseball to honor Clemente’s legacy and to officially acknowledge local Club nominees of the Roberto Clemente Award. As part of the league-wide celebration, the Roberto Clemente Day logo will appear on the bases and official dugout lineup cards and a special tribute video will be played in ballparks.
Desmond’s leadership, talent, character and humble manner has led him to be the Rockies’ Roberto Clemente Award nominee for three consecutive years. He has pursued philanthropic endeavors his entire Major League career and is an actively involved in nearly every Rockies community effort throughout the season.
Since 2012, Desmond has been an integral part of the End NF community, raising awareness and funds to combat neurofibromatosis, a genetic disorder that causes tumors to grow along various types of nerves, and possibly affecting the development of non-nervous tissues such as bones and skin. Ian and his family regularly provide tickets and hose NF families battling NF for Coors Field games, but this year, Ian expanded his NF outreach by taking his campaign to end neurofibromatosis to Major League ballparks across the country. With help from the Children’s Tumor Foundation, Desmond has hosted End NF “meet-up” outings at nearly every ballpark the Rockies have visited this season. So far this season, Desmond and the Children’s Tumor Foundation had met over 1,000 members of the NF community had ballparks around the country, with each of the tickets sold to those games including a donation to the Children’s Tumor Foundation.
For the third consecutive year, Desmond also pledged to donate 1,000 for every RBI and run scored during NF Awareness Month in May. Additionally, this year they matched funds donated by fans online during that time period. The Desmonds were excited to present a check for $34,600 to the Children’s Tumor Foundation via the Colorado Rockies Baseball Club Foundation.
“Ian demonstrates daily the importance of giving back to the community. He is always thinking of new and creative ways to share his life experience with others, and he is a great example to younger players in the game. I believe Mr. Clemente would be proud of the husband, father and baseball player that Ian Desmond has become in his career,” said Colorado Rockies Vice President of Community & Retail Operations Jim Kellogg.
“Being nominated for this award is a tremendous honor. Roberto Clemente continues to be an inspiration to all professional baseball players, and his legacy pushes us to be positive contributors to the communities around us and those people within them who are in need. That’s really what it’s all about,” said Desmond.
The league-wide winner of the Roberto Clemente Award will be selected via a blue ribbon panel, including Baseball Commissioner Robert D. Manfred, Jr., representatives from MLB-affiliated networks (MLB Network, FOX Sports, ESPN and TBS) and MLB.com, as well as Vera Clemente (the late Roberto’s wife & MLB Goodwill Ambassador). Beginning today, fans can vote for the overall winner of the Roberto Clemente Award via a dedicated website. The site will feature bios of each of the nominees and will allow fans to vote until the end of the season on Sunday, September 29th. The winner of the fan vote will count as one vote among those cast by the blue ribbon panel. Fans are encouraged to vote by visiting the following link: mlb.com/clemente21.
The concept of honoring Major League players for their philanthropic work was created in 1971 as the “Commissioner’s Award.” The recognition was renamed to the “Roberto Clemente Award” in 1973 in honor of the Hall of Famer and 15-time All-Star who died in a plane crash on New Year’s Eve 1972 while attempting to deliver supplies to earthquake victims in Nicaragua.
The distinguished list of past Roberto Clemente Award winners includes 18 members of the National Baseball Hall of Fame:
1971
Willie Mays+**
1981
Steve Garvey
1991
Harold Reynolds
2001
Curt Schilling
2011
David Ortiz
1972
Brooks Robinson+**
1982
Ken Singleton
1992
Cal Ripken, Jr.+
2002
Jim Thome+
2012
Clayton Kershaw
1973
Al Kaline+
1983
Cecil Cooper
1993
Barry Larkin+
2003
Jamie Moyer
2013
Carlos Beltrán
1974
Willie Stargell+
1984
Ron Guidry
1994
Dave Winfield+
2004
Edgar Martinez+
2014
Paul Konerko *
1975
Lou Brock+
1985
Don Baylor
1995
Ozzie Smith+
2005
John Smoltz+
2014
Jimmy Rollins *
1976
Pete Rose
1986
Garry Maddox
1996
Kirby Puckett+
2006
Carlos Delgado
2015
Andrew McCutchen
1977
Rod Carew+
1987
Rick Sutcliffe
1997
Eric Davis
2007
Craig Biggio+
2016
Curtis Granderson
1978
Greg Luzinski
1988
Dale Murphy
1998
Sammy Sosa
2008
Albert Pujols
2017
Anthony Rizzo
1979
Andre Thornton
1989
Gary Carter+
1999
Tony Gwynn+
2009
Derek Jeter
2018
Yadier Molina
1980
Phil Niekro+
1990
Dave Stewart
2000
Al Leiter
2010
Tim Wakefield
+ Member of The National Baseball Hall of Fame; * Co-winner; ** Originally known as the Commissioner’s Award (prior to 1973)