Odubel Herrera's parents share his all-star moment

SAN DIEGO - Odubel Herrera Sr. is a farmer in Venezuela, a country so ravaged by economic crises that its residents ransack supermarkets for food and jump borders to find medicine. He grows guava and passion fruits in San Jose, a town in eastern Venezuela. He looks after some cows. And, whenever he can, he watches his 24-year-old son play baseball.

The elder Herrera once played. "I was the second baseman in a local league," he said, "and I was pretty good. I was fast." He laughed because this was a surreal moment, a 50-year-old farmer from a foreign land surrounded by the National League's best players in a hotel ballroom.

His son was among them. When the Phillies outfielder called home last week with the news, "I was so happy," Herrera Sr. said. "I was dancing. I was shouting in the house. I couldn't believe it. His second year in the big leagues. The All-Star Game. Thank God."

He stepped onto a small podium. As he proudly wore a brand-new All-Star Game hat, he put his left arm around his wife, Nerida, and his right arm around his son. The Herreras flew to California on Sunday, and they will stay with their son for the remainder of the season. It is safer here. They have realized a dream, with the help of their son.

They did not know it, but they stood in the same Hyatt ballroom where, 19 months earlier, the Phillies acquired Odubel David Herrera Jr. They picked him eighth in the Rule 5 draft, an esoteric event that rarely produces valuable major-league talent and forever changed a farmer's family.

After the Phillies crushed Colorado on Sunday to conclude a surprising first half, Herrera hopped a charter jet with Rockies stars Carlos Gonzalez and Nolan Arenado to join the rest of baseball's best. It was real.

"I thought about a lot of things while I was on the flight," Herrera said. "A lot of things were going through my head. I just thank God that I had the opportunity to get to this point and be here."

There are many inside the Phillies organization who helped make Herrera into an all-star outfielder - Jorge Velandia, Mike Ondo, Juan Samuel - but Herrera did the work. He is the one with the innate skill to put his bat on the ball.

"He's a special talent," said Detroit slugger Miguel Cabrera, a countryman.

"He doesn't swing and miss at a lot of pitches," Washington ace Max Scherzer said. "He can foul off your good pitches. He can actually get some hits on some good pitches below the zone. That's given me some absolute fits and left me saying some choice words to myself."

When his son was 12, Herrera Sr. said he knew something special would come. He was thick and well-built. "A little chubby," Herrera Sr. said. So he called him El Torito, the Little Bull.

As a child, he had one fear.

"He would run very fast away from the dogs," Herrera Sr. said. "When we sent him to go on an errand, if he saw a dog, he would drop everything and run away from the dog."

Herrera played volleyball in high school, and he loved to spike. It helped mold his athleticism, he said. He has a younger brother, Albert, who signed with the Mariners in 2012 but played in just 76 minor-league games before injuries ended his career. Even now, Herrera will not divulge the size of his own signing bonus from Texas in 2008. The Phillies, he said, were interested and attended some of Herrera's tryouts for scouts. But he chose the Rangers, who left him unprotected after the 2014 season, when Herrera captured the Texas League batting title.

It was the best thing that ever happened to him.

Un gran favor, Herrera said.

Herrera is one of seven Venezuelans to play for the Phillies this season. They have bonded over the current strife in their homeland, but Herrera often likes to do things on his own. He is young. He plays with a boundless energy. He can mature off the field, and his parents' presence could help.

It was his father who pleaded with Herrera to stop striking out so much. Herrera, in his second season, has advanced as a hitter.

"I watched him on TV," Herrera Sr. said, "and told him to shorten up his swing."

Herrera smiled. He wore his aviator sunglasses inside, with his dotted dress shirt unbuttoned enough to flash his gold chain. His English is so improved that he began to translate reporters' questions for his father. "It was accurate," a Major League Baseball interpreter said.

It means more than anything, Herrera said, that he can share this opportunity with his family. Venezuelan reporters swarmed Herrera's father, who grabbed a microphone and spoke into a camera about his son and his country.

"Things in Venezuela right now are really difficult," Herrera Sr. said. "It's tough to find food and work. Everything is difficult. I am praying to God that things get better. It hurts to see how my country is hurting. At one time, it was one of the best countries in the world and now we're falling. We're praying to God things get better. We want Venezuela to prosper."

For now, they will follow their son as he lives a beautiful dream.

mgelb@philly.com

@MattGelb