Major League Baseball today announced that Carlos Carrasco was named the Cleveland Indians 2017 nominee for the prestigious Roberto Clemente Award, the most prominent individual player award bestowed by MLB.
Carrasco is one of the 30 Club nominees for the annual award. Carrasco has created two foundations, the Carlos Carrasco Foundation in the U.S. and the Fundacion Carlos Carrasco in Venezuela, each of which is focused on impacting the lives of at-risk children.
He and his wife, Karry, have spent hundreds of hours in Cleveland, Tampa (their city of residence) and Venezuela visiting with kids, along with making in-kind donations.
Those efforts include:
"I am honored to be nominated for this prestigious award," Carrasco said. "My wife and I are committed to making a difference in Cleveland, Tampa and in my native Venezuela, to provide kids with better opportunities at success."
The Roberto Clemente Award is the annual recognition of a player from each MLB Club 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 16th 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.
The Roberto Clemente Award winner will be selected among the group of nominees via a blue ribbon panel that includes individuals connected to the game, including Baseball Commissioner Robert D. Manfred, Jr., representatives from MLB-affiliated networks (MLB Network, FOX Sports, ESPN and TBS) and MLB Advanced Media, as well as Vera Clemente, the late Roberto's wife. Beginning the day after the Regular Season ends, 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 easily vote by clicking on the respective nominee's name. The winner of the fan voting, which will run from Monday, October 2nd through Friday, October 6th, will count as one vote among those cast by the blue ribbon panel. Additional information about fan voting will be shared via MLB.com and MLB social media channels.
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. Major League Baseball has commemorated Roberto Clemente Day each September since 2002.
The distinguished list of past Roberto Clemente Award winners includes 16 members of the National Baseball Hall of Fame:
1971 Willie Mays+
1972 Brooks Robinson+
1973 Al Kaline+
1974 Willie Stargell+
1975 Lou Brock+
1976 Pete Rose
1977 Rod Carew+
1978 Greg Luzinski
1979 Andre Thornton
1980 Phil Niekro+
1981 Steve Garvey
1982 Ken Singleton
1983 Cecil Cooper
1984 Ron Guidry
1985 Don Baylor
1986 Garry Maddox
1987 Rick Sutcliffe
1988 Dale Murphy
1989 Gary Carter+
1990 Dave Stewart
1991 Harold Reynolds
1992 Cal Ripken, Jr.+
1993 Barry Larkin+
1994 Dave Winfield+
1995 Ozzie Smith+
1996 Kirby Puckett+
1997 Eric Davis
1998 Sammy Sosa
1999 Tony Gwynn+
2000 Al Leiter
2001 Curt Schilling
2002 Jim Thome
2003 Jamie Moyer
2004 Edgar Martinez
2005 John Smoltz+
2006 Carlos Delgado
2007 Craig Biggio+
2008 Albert Pujols
2009 Derek Jeter
2010 Tim Wakefield
2011 David Ortiz
2012 Clayton Kershaw
2013 Carlos Beltran
2014 Paul Konerko *
2014 Jimmy Rollins
2015 Andrew McCutchen
2016 Curtis Granderson
+ Member of The National Baseball Hall of Fame
Co-winner
** Originally known as the Commissioner's Award (prior to 1973)