2001 statistics

Team HR RBI AVG.

Okla. (AAA) 23 74 .288

Texas (AL) 3 12 .258

PHOENIX

CARLOS PENA remembers waiting for the first snowflakes to fall. He was 13 and had never seen snow before. He and his younger brothers and sister wondered what it would feel like on their tongues.

"When we finally saw it we were so excited," Carlos said. "But after 15 minutes I couldn't feel my feet and I thought my nose would fall off. That was enough."

Pena sat on a stool in an unused locker room at the A's Papago Park training facility last week recounting the event that shaped his life.

The voice of Jason Giambi's heir apparent at first base was filled with emotion. His eyes filled with tears of gratification.

"It was a very brave move by my parents," Pena said. "They had to leave what they built behind and go on an adventure to a different country, a foreign country.

"It was very courageous and they did it for their kids, so we could learn the language and go to college."

Carlos, 23, is a product of that courage. It makes him proud to know he's Felipe and Juana Pena's oldest son.

In baseball they talk about intangibles -- the A's future first baseman has them all.

He's one of the game's top prospects but you won't find a trace of arrogance. He's confident and humble. He's intelligent and articulate.

Baseball has always been his dream, but he knows a major-league career can be fleeting, which is why the engineering major has maintained a 3.3 GPA at Northeastern (Mass.).

He signs every autograph, even it means spending 45 minutes walking from the field to the clubhouse. He's has yet to play a full major-league season but he is as well grounded as any veteran on the A's roster.

How this came to be is a great American success story.

Felipe and Juana Pena were successful professionals working in their native Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, in 1992. All things considered, life was good.

At 50, he was a successful engineer. At 43, she was an accountant and a teacher. They lived in a comfortable three bedroom house.

They're three boys were excelling in school and in baseball, a national passion. Maybe their daughter Femaris would be a dancer.

"It was great," Carlos said. "I wouldn't trade my childhood for anything. We were always running around and it was perfect weather for baseball. ... There were so many kids in our neighborhood. It was so fun."

But something was gnawing at Felipe. He wanted his children to learn English, the language of business and technology. He wanted them to study at colleges where text books weren't outdated.

He and Juana were content, but they wanted more for their kids.

Felipe's brother lived in Haverhill, Mass. They took what they could carry and left their comfortable lives in favor of the unknown.

"There were problems with the electronics on the plane," Juana said. "We had left for only 15 minutes and they made us come back. It was scary. My children were on that plane. It was the worst day. "

Felipe and Juana found menial jobs to pay the bills while Carlos resented that his parents were far more qualified and better educated than their supervisors.

Felipe worked for the waste water department, as a custodian and a driver. Juana got a job in a nursing home. They both attended English classes at night.

Everything about New England seemed strange and foreign to young Carlos.

"It was totally different living here," he said. "The transition was very hard. It was a different culture, a different climate, different food, different everything."

Carlos soon realized the snow would present another problem in this strange new land.

He played year-round in Santo Domingo. Here, the snow blanketed the baseball fields around his new home outside Boston, rendering them useless until spring.

It seemed like such a waste for a boy who had withdrawn into the game, into the one thing that was the same in both countries.

"We were very aware of the baseball situation in the North because of the weather," Felipe said. "But it was very hard for Carlos."

Felipe joined the local YMCA and was allowed to hang an old mattress on the wall in the basement.

There Carlos would practice throwing against the mattress. Felipe would toss balls to him and he would hit them against the mattress. He hit more balls into a net on the racquetball courts.

The daily practice sessions got him through the long, cold New England winters.

"We always found a way to practice the game, even when there was snow on the fields," Felipe said proudly.

While Felipe and Juana worked, the children studied. They learned English and began too feel more comfortable at school.

All except Carlos, who never felt as if he fit in. He didn't socialize outside of church. His life consisted of school, baseball, and family.

More than his brothers and sister, he longed for the familiarity of his former life.

There was the time he heard a song that had been popular in the Dominican Republic on the radio and soon tears of nostalgia were flooding down his cheeks. Other memories are too painful to share.

"In high school I didn't socialize as well," he said. "I didn't have that high school life. It was strange for me. By the time my brothers and sister got to high school they were comfortable. I was never comfortable."

Hitting a baseball is hitting a baseball, regardless of where you are or what language you speak. He had every tool but speed and quickly began drawing the interest of scouts.

The Texas Ranges made him the 10th overall pick in the 1998 draft. He's convinced that would not have been the case had he remained in Santo Domingo.

The move, and the hardship, made him focus on the game even more.

"I don't know if I would be where I am in baseball if it weren't for my parents and their decision." Carlos said. "I'm so appreciative."

The move has benefited the entire family. Carlos is the only one of Felipe and Juana's children who is not currently attending college, and that's only because he's trying to prove he can be the A's every-day first baseman.

Pedro, 21, is studying biochemistry at Old Dominion and expects to re-join the baseball team next year after recently undergoing hand surgery. Omar, 19, is majoring in architecture and is an infielder at Northeastern. Femaris, Omar's twin, is a communications major at Boston College.

Felipe, 60, attended classes at night and on weekends and recently earned a master's degree in business from Cambridge.

"As they went about life in the Dominican Republic they realized things were not beneficial for us there," Carlos said. "They had a decision to make. I'm so glad they did that for us. They gave us a great opportunity to realize our dreams."