“The Hit Man from Washington”

Abstract

During Manny Ramírez’s second major league game on September 3, 1993, in Yankee Stadium, residents of Ramírez’s Washington Heights neighborhood came to cheer on their own, waving a banner that read “The Hit Man from Washington” during all of his plate appearances. The Dominican-born left fielder had already made a significant journey during adolescence from Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, to New York City before making the journey through the Cleveland Indian’s minor league system. For Ramírez, his second major league appearance signified a landmark in both his professional and his cultural journeys as he would set foot on a major league ballpark in his second home city, cheered on by other Dominicans. As his career has progressed in accordance with patterns of Dominican (im)migration and place making, Ramírez has become one of the most prolific Dominican players in the game today and has inspired Dominicans in the United States as well as on the island to claim him as an object of ethnic pride. Just as Ramírez and players like him help Dominicans to forge a place in the United States via their fame and mainstream acceptance, they serve as success stories in the face of racism and US imperialism in both the United States and the Dominican Republic. Such players also exemplify the continued transnational movement of Dominicans as an economic fact of life that in no way diminishes their identification as Dominicans wherever they may reside.